Indian cricket journalism rarely rises above hagiography. Rarely does one hear a new bit of information or a startling insight into the game and its practitioners. But Vedam Jaishankar had an interesting point to make while discussing the genius of Anil Kumble last night on CNN-IBN.
“The secret of Anil is his ability to reinvent himself. If someone says you did a bad show or wrote a bad article, the instinctive reaction is to run away and hide. But look at Anil. When he was a teenager, he was a medium pacer, and when somebody called him a chucker, he went and reinvented himself as a legspinner. When he was a Test match cricketer and they said he didn’t turn the ball, he developed variations like the slider. It’s this ability to constantly reinvent and reengineer himself that has enabled him to stay on top. Which is why, over a period of 17 yers, no single batsman has ever been able to overwhelm him. Yes, he has had a bad match now and then, but never once has a batsman attained completely mastery over him.”
Never once has a batsman had complete mastery over him? What about ’96 tour of England, South Africa tour same year, ’97 Sri Lanka tour, ’98 NZ tour, ’99 Australia tour, ’01 South Africa tour, list goes on. It is only in the past 2-3 years that he was somewhat successful overseas. Before that he used to be a complete dud outside of India. Forget about any single batsman, entire batting line-ups used to have complete mastery over him. Yes, it is natural to remember the good times when someone retires, but that doesn’t mean we should start spouting absolute nonsense.
I’m a very big fan of Kumble, and he’ll always remain my biggest role model. He is by far the best bowler India has ever produced, and I cant see an Indian bettering his test record in the next 15-20 years. But having said that, I agree with Mohan. VJ’s comment is very much a hagiographical account of Kumble’s career. Between 1996 and 2000 almost every tailender had mastered the art of batting against him. Think Dion Nash and Daniel Vettori. The fact that Kumble was often left out of games against Srilanka in favour of a below-par Harbhajan is testimony to the pummeling he has received from Jayasuriya & co. On the contrary I can’t think of a particular team or a top-class batsman Kumble has dominated both home and away.
I think VJ will shortly come up with a book on AK or will collaborate with AK, this is all the build up b4 that
Yes I agree with Mohan that he was not initially successful in overseas matches. But as his records speak he was successful in overseas matches after 2002. I think everybody will remember his contribution in Australian tour of 2003. This turn around once again justifies VJ observation that Kumble reinvents himself each time.
In my opinion the greatest attribute of this ‘Smiling Assasin’ was his character. He would never give up come what may and was always ready to play without any complaints. He was a true fighter with great determination and never say die spirit. His celebration on getting each wicket personified his personality and the respect he had for the opposition irrespective whether he is a great batsmen or a tailender. One incident that comes to my mind is bowling against west indies with a broken jaw and getting the wicket of Lara with a beauty. I think that this episode alone shows the fighting characters of this great human being.
He has been a typical kannadiga in being very humble, soft and non-aggresive. He has been a role model both in his personal life and as well in his professional life.
He has been humilialted by Saurav on various occasions (eg. west indies tour in 2002, world cup 2003) but has never complained and allowed his performance to talk.
And lastly who can forget his 10-wicket haul. I think this performance symbolises his greatness and will be tough to equal by other great bowlers.
We will all miss Kumble the bowler and Kumble the human
I totally agree with Raghu. But why are we talking of AK in the past tense? He hasn’t yet retired from tests.