Cricket: India's need for fast bowlers

No bowling attack in recent memory has dominated the Indian batting line-up as comprehensively as the current England brigade. Their pace attack, bristling with matchless aggression in their own backyard, has been simply awesome.

Led by the hugely experienced James Anderson, the pace attack of Chris Tremlett, Tim Bresnan, Stuart Broad, not to forget young Jade Dernbach, has looked a class apart and is, probably, the finest pack this generation of Indian batsmen has encountered.

The England fast bowlers’ dominance has been so total that in comparison their opponents’ bowlers have simply paled into insignificance. No wonder Indian team manager Shivlal Yadav, former India off spinner, has publicly lamented the lack of fast bowlers in his side.

This telling criticism of his bowlers in the middle of the tour is inexcusable. To extend his logic, just imagine the damage it would have done to the team’s self esteem and confidence if he had said that we could do with a good captain or we don’t have good batsmen!

The indiscretions of manager Yadav aside, it must be straight away pointed out that Indian cricket has never had a fast bowler. Barring Mohammed Nissar, who played with great success for undivided India in the 1930s and whom the legendary CK Nayudu claimed was quicker than Don Bradman’s nemesis Harold Larwood, we’ve never had a fast bowler of express pace.

No, not even Kapil Dev or Javagal Srinath, who were otherwise two of the fastest bowlers to don India colours could be termed genuinely quick bowlers. Kapil Dev, at the start of his career and Srinath, during a memorable tour of South Africa, kindled hopes among Indian cricket fans.  But all too soon they sacrificed pace for cricketing longevity and proved that they could be just as successful.

But this had its consequence as it robbed an entire generation of youngsters a role model of a tearaway fast bowler. A succession of bowlers concentrated on seam and swing rather than pace bowling. While these worked when conditions were ideal, they looked pedestrian at other times. In the process, Indian fast bowling hardly tested opponents with searing pace.

In contrast, neighbouring Pakistan which is undoubtedly the nursery of fast bowling for the past two decades at least, have much to thank that charismatic leader Imran Khan. Till he came on the scene with his brand of raw pace and dipping in-swingers, it was the fast medium pace of Sarfaraz Nawaz and Asif Masood, to mention just two, which held sway. But Imran changed all that.

To start with, he was a wild fast bowler given to express pace but with little control. But once he sorted that out, he made for magnificent viewing. His racing approach to the bowling crease, that impressive leap at the delivery stride, long hair bouncing and adding to the persona and that final explosive effort caught the imagination of Pakistan’s youngsters like nothing else. For good measure, he intimidated batsmen with his pace and bounce and these further excited his legion of young followers.

Additionally, once Imran took over as captain, he identified and promoted other bowlers on raw pace and potential like Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis, Aquib Javed, et al. And each, in his own right, inspired others.

Here, it must be pointed out that Pakistani pitches are as flat and insipid as the Indian ones. If anything, they encouraged run feasts. But the advent of tape ball cricket which coincided with Imran’s exploits on the international arena gave Pakistan’s fast bowling future a great leg up.

Tape-ball cricket was actually a Pakistani innovation perfected by its expatriate workers in the Middle East. They coiled tape tightly around a tennis ball to simulate a hard cricket ball (they could not afford all the paraphernalia that goes with playing with a hard cricket ball nor could they afford to get injured and miss earning their bread and butter in the gulf). This adaption was quickly introduced back home in Pakistan and spread to the various towns and cities. Tape-ball cricket was exciting as it encouraged pinch-hitting. Teams routinely scored 300 runs in 30 overs.

Bowlers therefore had to improvise by bowling as fast as possible and by sending down innumerable yorkers. And they did.
Many bowlers like Shoaib Akhtar, Umar Gul, Mohammed Asif, Mohammed Amir, et al have come through this route and have gone on to exhibit their skills on the international scene. Today, Pakistan has the finest assembly of young fast bowlers which is the envy of every cricket-playing nation.

So why can’t India produce similar fast bowlers?

Role model is the key issue. (Everyone wants to be Sachin Tendulkar or Virender Sehwag). But another equally telling point is the lack of athleticism in our cricketers. Kapil Dev was a magnificent athlete no doubt. But the same cannot be said of, say, Anil Kumble or VVS Laxman, Ashish Nehra, Munaf Patel or even Rahul Dravid.

A fast bowler has to necessarily be loose-limbed or have a quick arm action. Akram and Malcolm Marshall, for instance, had quick arm action while Brett Lee, Alan Donald and Michael Holding were supremely athletic and this contributed to their devastating pace.

In this context it is worth recalling the words of Mahesh Bhupathi’s father Krishna, the foremost tennis coach in the country. He once told me: “If I get one single fine athlete in a group of 200 youngsters, I would be excited at his talent and concentrate really hard on honing his tennis skills. Elsewhere, in America, for instance, you’d get 50 such athletes in a group of 200, each pushing the other for top spot. And that’s the difference.”

That splendidly sums up our challenge to even identify and develop tennis players or fast bowlers.

Venkatesh Prasad, former India player and coach, once lamented the inability of the Indian fast bowlers to maintain a good work ethic. Barring one or two exceptions, he claimed, most would not even put in the desired effort in the nets and this exposed them in the longer duration matches (as different from T20 cricket).

But rather than the established players, it is the younger emerging talent and hopefuls that bear watching.  Unless they believe that they have a future in express fast bowling, they would simply not put in that effort. And unless we have hundreds of young hopefuls, all wanting to bowl as fast as possible, we’d always struggle to find fast bowlers.