Sport

Change has hindered spinners’ growth: Raju

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WORDS OF WISDOM: Former left-arm spinner Venkatapathy Raju is candid in his views on the reasons for the decline in emergence of quality tweakers.

Rajkot: Spinners must be clever and develop the ability to trick and fool the batsman in order to achieve a high success rate, said Venkatapathy Raju, former Indian left-arm spinner and a member of the BCCI’s senior National committee.

“If a spinner has the skill to bring in variations in the air, extract turn off the pitch and guile he will be very successful.

The game of cricket has changed a lot at all levels and the proliferation of competitions from club and school level to the international level has largely hindered the development of quality spinners.

“Fortunately I bowled to senior players at nets when I was in school and benefited a lot from M.L. Jaisimha, who, without trying to change my natural action, advised and made me understand the nuances of spin bowling. Initially I was bowling right-arm off breaks, but I was always a leftie with my throws,” said Raju in an interview to The Hindu.

Excerpts:

It’s all dictated by the environment, pitch conditions and the trend in international cricket.

At present, the emphasis is on accuracy and the spinners wait for the batsmen to make mistakes.

When Anil Kumble and I came on the scene we were good line and length bowlers. We slowly learned to bring in variations according to the conditions.

One cannot afford to stagnate as a typecast bowler in international cricket. One has to improve and enhance his repertoire, become a smart spinner with the ultimate aim of fooling the batsman to get his wicket.

With Twenty20 having come in in a big way, the batsmen do not waste time defending. The spinners can go for 15 or 50 runs in four overs. Twenty20 has made the game faster and when the spinner can bowl only four overs, anything can happen.

Well, we practised a lot, bowled at a single stump for hours, to senior and best batsmen in the State and country in competitions and carefully listened to people like Jaisimha.

We also learned on our own. There were not as many matches, so there was enough time to organise yourself, work hard and improve.

Today there is no time to work hard on skills individually or with assistance from good coaches in order to sort out flaws and enhance skills.

Even the Indian batsmen do not get a chance to play enough quality spin. Someone like Michael Clarke is taking wickets against India.

Indian cricketers, from the under-15 age group to the under-22 level, are exposed to one-day cricket. They bowl flat and quick. The revolution of the ball is more important. The trajectory should facilitate spin. At the age when they are supposed to learn skills, they tend to bowl flat.

Then in the same age group, they play too many inter-school and club tournaments. There are too many coaches.

All this has, in a way, impeded the growth of the spinners and confused young bowlers who want to bowl spin.

In their eagerness to play for India under-19, India ‘A’ or even the Ranji Trophy the youngsters play more competitions without learning the skills, practising hard enough or without understanding situations in a game.

When they play the longer version at higher level they don’t get as much success.

In a 50-over match, they bowl 10 overs, but to succeed consistently in international cricket, they have to practise hard and make an individual effort to improve.

In the 1980s and 1990s when a spinner came on, there were close-in fielders to put pressure on the batsmen. Today it’s different.

The batsmen have found ways to counter. They employ the sweep, paddle shot and even reverse hit. They hit out from the word go.

In such a scenario one has to learn to bowl to a field and bring guile into play.

All this can be improved only in four-day first class matches and to become a good Test match spinner, one has to get used to bowling long spells in first class matches.

My first coach was the English teacher in school. Then, the emphasis was on flight and we had enough time to practise.

There was only one match a week. There was more interaction between the players.

Today there are too many coaches, but not specialists and this disrupts the process of learning skills.

It’s probably a cycle. We don’t have too many spinners now. But once they emerge, they have to adapt quickly and cannot take their own time. Now with T20, it’s going to be much more difficult to adapt.

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