Viswanathan Vaman Kumar vs Ravindra Jadeja: He bowled a wicked wrong 'un — or two

Everytime I read about “Sir Ravindra Jadeja” and his alleged antics, my mind harks back to a time when cricket had its share of characters like Salim Durrani, Derek Randall and Sadanand Viswanath.

My own favourite was the great wrist spinner Viswanathan Vaman Kumar, whose views on the game were so original that he would sometimes describe a leg-spinner as an off-spinner, or an opening batsman as a middle-order specialist and try to get away with it. He was even known to have dropped out of important matches on a whim the way southern flute genius TR Mahalingam missed concerts. Don’t get me wrong: VV’s eccentricity only added to his aura as one of India’s best spinners.

Long before I saw him in flesh and blood, Kumar had excited my imagination with his heroic deeds in Pakistan as a member of the Indian Starlets that toured that country circa 1960 under the captaincy of by Lala Amarnath, by then retired from Test cricket. It was a great opportunity for young Test hopefuls to impress the national selectors. On the Indian side, Kumar and fellow Madras cricketer AG Milkha Singh were the undoubted successes of the tour. At my grandfather’s Trivandrum residence, I excitedly awaited the arrival of The Hindu around 4pm everyday from Madras bearing all the cricket news of the day. VV and Milkha rarely belied my expectations that summer.

I first saw VV in action when he made his Test debut not long afterwards at Delhi’s Feroz Shah Kotla and my father, then working in the capital, took me and my brothers to the match. I was barely 14 then and my memory of the action is clouded by the passage of time, but I can never forget the thrill I experienced when VV snared his first victim — Imtiaz Ahmed, the Pakistani wicket keeper.

Kumar went on to take five in the innings and seven in all in the match.

Unfortunately, Kumar’s dreams of prolonged success as a Test bowler were crushed after his second appearance for India. By a strange coincidence, I happened to be one of the spectators at the Brabourne Stadium, Bombay, next season, as my father had by then moved there. It was a miserable match for Kumar, as he finished with none for 70 in the first innings, did not bowl in the second and did not distinguish himself in the field. He never played another Test.

Returning to Madras in 1962, I had several opportunities to watch Kumar bowl in the local league and the Sport & Pastime trophy matches and eventually play with and against him — with him in the BS Nets organised by the cricket association, and against him in league games. He was a master bowler, constantly improving, adding new weapons to his armoury while perfecting those he already possessed.

He did not believe in exaggerated flight, but tossed it up in a tantalizing arc, varied his pace, bowled two different types of googlies and an effective flipper. He was accuracy personified, as was his younger spin partner in the state team, S Venkataraghavan. Both were workhorses, wheeling away in the nets for three hours every evening. VV’s competitive streak made him a successful bowler against every top batsman. It also made him hound me, a mere tailender, for a whole season in the nets after I foolishly went after his bowling one evening.

Kumar was not above a bit of gamesmanship, which sometimes had a powerful impact on the umpire, as when he barked at a Test umpire officiating in a local match. The umpire actually fell asleep standing and woke up startled by VV’s appeal for leg before. “Told you not to stuff yourself with curdrice at lunch,” the bowler admonished. “Come on VV, mind your tongue,” the umpire retorted. A couple of balls later, VV rapped the batsman on the pads again, but though the ball was clearly missing the leg stump, he nonchalantly turned to the umpire, and said in Tamil: “How about this one, I say?” This time, up went the umpire’s finger.

No batsman in domestic cricket mastered Kumar, with the solitary exception of V Subramanyam of Karnataka, who in the course of a double century in 1967, punished his bowling severely. In the South Zone, the leading lights of Hyderabad and Karnataka, like Pataudi, Jaisimha and Vishwanath always found him a handful.

He had more than 400 Ranji Trophy wickets and 599 first class scalps in all in his long career. He took part in two hard fought Ranji Trophy finals against Bombay in 1967-68 and 1972-73, both of which Madras lost despite Kumar’s splendid bowling. Despite his consistent successes, his return to Test cricket was blocked by the emergence of the unorthodox but match-winning leg spinner BS Chandrasekhar.

On a visit to Chennai more than a decade ago to help him at the MAC Spin Academy, Sir Garfield Sobers was obviously impressed by the energy and dedication of the veteran. During an informal dinner some of us were privileged to attend at the Madras Cricket Club at the end of the camp, Sobers was therefore not very surprised when we named VV the best orthodox wrist spinner in India after Subhash Gupte in reply to his query if Subhash’s younger brother Baloo would have fitted that description.

In fact, VV’s cheeky young assistant coach S Vasudevan said, “VV is the most improved bowler in the camp,” in an obvious reference to his long spells at the nets. In his seventies now, Kumar is fitter than men half his age and still enjoys turning an arm over.

For the benefit of today’s cricket followers brought up on a Qadir-Warne-Kumble legacy, it is important to acknowledge Kumar’s greatness as one of the finest exponents of the art of leg-spin bowling in the history of the game.

The author, a prominent off-spinner in the 1970s, now writes on cricket and music besides editing Sruti, a leading monthly magazine from Chennai devoted to the performing arts.