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October 9, 1997
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Spin and other turns
V Gangadhar
It's been a while coming -- but Anil Kumble, India's ace spinner, is finally smiling again.
Following a haul of 11 wickets in the Irani Cup match, for Rest of India against Ranji Trophy champions Bombay, the long drought, the uncertainity, is over and the right hand column on the Kumble bowling card begins to inch closer to what it used to be like a little over a year ago.
It is now that Kumble has begun believing, apparently, that he is on the way to a successful comeback -- having been dropped at the end of the Sri Lankan tour.
"I was not bowling badly," explained Kumble. "But people expect too much from me. I mean, a five-wicket haul every time I bowled. Which is impossible to fulfill..."
But then, he wasn't gettting any wickets for a while, leading to much discussion about his bowling having deteriorated, for technical and other reasons. "No, I do not think my bowling arm had become lower, as mentioned by some cricket correspondents," says Kumble. "I admit I did not bowl as well as I normally do, during the last visits to England and Sri Lanka, but I was the highest wicket taker in the series against the West Indies."
Kumble seems more than reconciled to having been dropped for the Toronto and Pakistan tours. The rest from international cricket, he says, has done him good. In this period, he has met with and discussed some of the techniques of leg spin bowling from V V Kumar, the distinguished leggie from Tamil Nadu. Following Kumar's tips, Kumble said, he has been trying to bowl slower, and introduce more variety.
His especial bugbear in recent times have been left-handers -- Lara was cavalier in his treatment of him in the West Indies, Saeed Anwar mauled him in the Independence Cup, Sanath Jayasuriya added enormous insult to these injuries in Sri Lanka. To counter this, he says, he has been practising coming at them from round the wicket, hitting the rough outside their off stump.
Kumble whose 27th birthday falls on October 17, spun a cricket ball from hand to hand as he answered questions. No, he says, he was not unduly worried when he was dropped from the team -- after all, he has taken 168 wickets from 40 Tests and had an outstanding record in one-dayers too. So, he says, being dropped is not the end of the world -- rather, an opportunity to try out new techniques.
"I've been spending long hours in the nets, practising. I'm satisfied with the results. As for being dropped, things like that, you have a good series, occasionally an average series, but my overall record is good and I am satisfied."
Did the prolonged absence of his pace bowling statemate, Javagal Srinath, bother him, place an additional burden on his shoulders? "Well, the entire team missed Srinath, not just me, he is one of the best in the world today. And I think maybe Venkatesh Prasad, his strike partner, missed him more even than I did."
So who was his own favourite bowling partner, among spinners? Kumble quickly named the Hyderabad left arm spinner, Venkatapathy Raju. 'With Raju operating at the other end, I had always bowled well," he says, pointing out that Shane Warne always bowled better with off spinner Tim May supporting him from the other end. And in fact, Kumble and Raju performed well in the Irani Cup tie, particularly in the Bombay second innings.
The leggie was quick to admit that the Wankhede wicket was underprepared, and that it helped spin bowlers. And that led to Sairaj Bahutule, his counterpart from Bombay who had gone one better than Kumble with an eight wicket haul, and in fact bowled his side to a fine win. "He bowled well," said Kumble, adding, "but we had not played together as a team. Bombay had that advantage."
And where now? Kumble's answer is a smile, a gleam in the eye -- the Sri Lankans first, and later the Australians, loom on the horizon. And the leggie, as he says he is looking forward to the challenges in store, spins the ball from hand to hand, faster...
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