The Gentle Giant turns 50

 

Its difficult to write about a man whose gentleman in more ways than one in a sport which is increasingly becoming menacing and so un gentleman like . The hidden teeth and claws of  barbarism have captivated cricket so much that a cricketer whose not conforming to those norms do not stay in public memory . Yet given the nature of his seminal contribution to cricket , without hurling a single word makes him a giant , an absolute goliath of the game . AND HE TURNS 50.. 

History says , cricketers from south are the most erudite India has ever had .  Javagal Srinath, Venky Prasad were engineers , Dravid was becoming an MBA , Anil Kumble studied Mechanical Engineering as he played for India.  For me , growing up in the 90's, I never thought Kumble would become a colossal figure in Indian and world cricket when I first watched him. A tall leggie having the physique of a fast bowler with an unusual action and who started his career as a fast bowler , his lack of turn he made up with his unusual speed & more variety.  But the enduring picture we all have of Kumble is not his unusual bowling action or his less of turn which made him look ordinary , but his heroic bowling in the Caribbean with a broken jaw when he took the wicket of the one and only Brian Lara. Kumble has always been a go to man for all his captains and his dedication to his sport with his unusual gentleness is what has made him such a STAR.

 

What makes Anil Kumble unique ? - the images are plenty, unforgettable and unique . The set jaw , the glint of   steel in the eye, the effort in action, the ball shooting from a great height , poison tipped & diabolical. Then the vicious moment of landing on the pitch , followed by the skid , the thud into the pad , or past every line of defense into the woodwork or off a hapless edge, or suddenly the devilish bounce that undermined why the keeper behind the stumps was always intent on donning a helmet .

And then that elation - match after match won through one man's relentless endeavor.  The desire for victory visible as the flame that set those eyes ablaze. No bowler has come even close to in terms of single-handedly winning matches for . At home he sent down deliveries that went down as the biggest challenge to negotiate for batsmen around the world . And after a decade of painstaking perseverance , finally success touched him on foreign shores. Like vintage wins, he improved with time, new essence added into the mix while the fizz and sparkle remained undiminished. Even when victory did not materialize, the blaze of glory surrounded this tireless performer like a glowing halo.  It took the form of a bandage wrapping the fractured jaw as he entered the field and tried to bowl India to victory in Antigua. Gallantry was complemented by dignity , and never was this more starkly demonstrated than in the press conference after the infamous Sydney Test of 2007-08. Under the shadow of defeat, frustration from shoddy umpiring & faced with an onslaught of unethical ruthlessness under the guise of gamesmanship , Kumble , the captain of India , maintained striking calm shrouding the simmering anger within and pronounced his personal verdict in a fluent , articulate sentence that stunned the cricket world into introspection.  

A spinner with a difference

Yet, he was hardly a spinner other than in the pages that listed his profile. He seldom lured batsmen out of the safety of the crease with tantalizing flight.  Rarely were his victims stumped, or induced to loft in the air and hole out in the deep. The vagaries of the googly improved with time, some of his leg-breaks did turn. But, he preferred his own method of snaring batsmen — perfected through practice. The top-spinners and flippers, relying on the bounce and the skid, getting the batsmen leg before, bowled or caught in the close cordon. Not for him the philosophy of the millionaire leggie Arthur Mailey, who would rather be hit for four by a turning delivery than bowl a batsman with a straight one. Kumble hated to be taken for runs. 

Sessions used to go down without a boundary scored off his relentless line and length. For the batsman there was no moment to relax when Kumble was bowling a spell.Off a gangly run, the arm came over from a great height on top of his six foot two inch frame, propelled by powerful shoulders. Through the air he was always quick, often compared tongue in cheek to the medium-pacer — by onlookers, seldom by the tormented batsmen. The stumps were his target, and he could go at them forever. If the surface helped the ball skid or there was a semblance of cracks, he would become unplayable. Bounce would nourish him as well. With time the leg-spinner in him did evolve. The direct approach at pad and stumps was refined. Side spin increased, the slow leg-break and the flighted googly came to the fore. The angle of attack was varied, there were spells from round the wicket at the left handers. But, never did the most successful spinner of India resemble a conventional one. In fact the only man Kumble could be somewhat compared to was the previous Indian leg-spinning great, Bhagwat Chandrasekhar.

The early days

There are many temptations to link Kumble’s development as a bowler with Chandra’s guiding example, especially since both hailed from Bangalore. However, Kumble was too young to appreciate the methods of the freakish spinner of the 1960s and 1970s. It may perhaps be that the parameters of heat, the primordial mud underneath the matting wickets on which both bowled their way through the early stages, the uneven bounce that these surfaces offered, independently gave rise to two similar spinners destined for greatness. 

However, before graduating to these wickets for his club Young Cricketers, Kumble turned out in tennis ball matches in the streets. As is common in India these matches were organized in their own serious tournaments. Initially, as is well known, Kumble bowled medium pace. The telling transformation came about when he was 15, elder brother Dinesh persuading him to bowl leg-spin. There was no coach to show Kumble the traditional way of gripping and spinning a leg-break. In a country where coaches, qualified or otherwise, abound in every street corner, the Indian cricket followers must be eternally grateful for this stroke of heavenly luck. Kumble discovered his own method and stuck to it. The arm came through as if still plying medium pace and the ball often bounced from short of good length. There was yet another connection with Chandra. After graduating to Karnataka Schools in the Under-15 tournament, Kumble started making heads turn with his performances for Karnataka and South Zone Under-17 sides. And it was in 1989-90, during Chandra’s last year as state selector, that the young leg-spinner was drafted into the Karnataka side as a bespectacled engineering student. The next engagement that same season was for India Under-19s against the Pakistan Under-19s, and strangely, Kumble dazzled with the bat scoring 113, 76 and 41 in successive matches. 

In the initial days he was more steady than spectacular, and his ODI debut in Sharjah saw tidy spells and limited success. The Test debut followed in the summer of 1990, when he played against England in the Old Trafford Test, bagging 3 for 105 as England piled up a huge score.

The rise of the match-winner

He did not play a Test for another two years, and it was a spate of excellent bowling performances that got him back into the side — the final step taken with a spellbinding 13 for 138 in the Irani Trophy. As was to happen many a time during his fantastic career, this haul was obtained at the Kotla. It put Kumble on the plane to Zimbabwe and South Africa. At Johannesburg one realized that this odd leg-spinner who hardly turned a ball was to be more than a handful down the years. In the second innings, he pegged South Africa back with figures of 6 for 53 from 44 overs. The combination of accuracy and guile was being perfected. By the time he was back home to play Tests against England in 1992-93, he was the most potent weapon in the country. He became the lethal ingredient in Mohammed Azharuddin's persistent formula of piling up Sachin Tendulkar powered runs and then setting his spinners after the opposition batsmen on deteriorating tracks. As many as 21 wickets were claimed in the 3 Tests as India performed their first clean sweep. The flipper worked over and over again. He shared the spoils with Venkatapathy Raju and Rajesh Chauhan, but 6 for 64 in the second innings at Chennai marked him out as a special breed among the many, many spinners at home. Opponents arrived in India one after the other and Kumble kept hitting their wickets and pads, having them snapped up by the battery of close in fielders. Zimbabwe were put in their place as the minnows of the world, yet again at Kotla. West Indies were routed in the Hero Cup Final with figures of 6 for 12. At Lucknow, the hapless Sri Lankans were rolled over, with 11 for 128, his first 10-wicket haul in Tests. But, Kumble knew that he had to develop his variety and generate venom in different conditions. Hence when Curtly Ambrose became unavailable for Northamptonshire in 1995, he persuaded Azhar to telephone Allan Lamb and recommend his name for the county. The agents of the Northants contacted him at a Madras hotel. Kumble, eager to expand his horizons, accepted the contract without discussing terms. During the summer, he bowled slower through the air, tried more sideways spin and used more conventional ways of operating. He worked on his googlies, especially when bowling at left-handers. The season saw him bowl Northamptonshire to some extraordinary victories, one of them after conceding 527 in the first innings against Nottinghamshire. He ended the summer with 105 wickets, the first man to cross 100 since 1991; the first spinner since 1983; and the first leg-spinner since 1971. For this effort he was named a Wisden cricketer of 1996.

A look at the numbers

  It makes sense to look at some of the highlights of his career in detail. As mentioned earlier, no bowler has contributed more to the victorious causes of the country. Kumble has captured 288 wickets in wins at the amazing average of 18.75 and strike rate of 44.4.

	Tests	W	Ave	SR	5WIs	10WMs
Won	43	288	18.75	44.4	20	5
Lost	33	124	41.35	83.1	5	0
Drawn	56	207	37.81	85.6	10	3
Total	132	619	29.65	65.9	35	8

The home and away records of Kumble are known to be a study in contrasts. As shown below, the Tests abroad did not really fetch Kumble as much success as his phenomenal run at home.

	Tests	W	Ave	SR	5WIs	10WMs
Home	63	350	24.88	59.4	25	7
Away	69	269	35.85	74.5	10	1

However, to get a better perspective of his career, we need to look at how his numbers changed over the years. We witness an initial period with absolute supremacy on Indian wickets and a struggle in the foreign lands, a period of 5 years between 2002 and 2007 during which his potency in India perhaps reduced but his performances abroad improved immensely. It was towards the very end of his career that he experienced some rather ordinary days.

Kumble across phases

	1990 to 2001-02			Summer 2002 – Summer 2007			Summer 2007 to end of career
	Tests	W	Ave	Tests	W	Ave	Tests	W	Ave
Home	36	210	21.30	20	115	28.11	7	25	40.16
Away	34	109	40.40	25	118	31.09	10	42	37.42
Total	70	319	27.82	45	233	29.62	17	67	38.44

 

Kumble's place in World and Indian Cricket is secured for ever. He may not have turned the ball like two of his famous contemporaries - Warnie and Murali, but his role as an effective match winner and a champion bowler can never be undermined.  His 350 wickets @ 24.88 at home is one of the best home figures by any bowlers playing for such a long period .  His record will always speak for him ever . Here's wishing him a very happy 50..