Cricket has witnessed many spinners of class who spun their web of magic on the 22 yards. We have seen the likes of Shane Warne, Abdul Qadir, Anil Kumble and Muralitharan – all of whom who supplemented their fast bowlers.
But never in the history of cricket has a team of spinners completely shouldered the entire bowling attack for a country for such a long period of time. They are the famous Indian spin quartet of Bishen Singh Bedi, B. Chandrasekhar, E. Prasanna and Venkatraghavan.
It is worth noting that for no less than a decade, they carried the burden of Indian bowling attack, without a single quick bowler of substance to back them. An outstanding feat indeed.
Historically the only Test all these four spinners played together was in a Test match in 1967. But for more than a decade since then, all of them played for India in some combination or other.
Australia had the first taste of the famous Indian spin attack in 1969, when Ian Chappell – apparently troubled by Prasanna – suggested he was the hardest spinner he ever faced.
India tasted its first major victory abroad at The Oval, in the year 1971. India and its spinners never looked back ever since. Series of wins in different series followed, though interspersed with a few losses like the English tour of 1974, when the Indian spinners couldn’t get a good grip on the ball due to an unusually cold, wet and blustery early English summer.
In the series of 1974-75 against the West Indies India lost the series narrowly by a margin of two to three. But the spinners carved their niche, with the young master blaster Vivian Richard clearly seen out of the world against Chandra’s leggies.
Soon came the 1976-77 series down under in Australia. Bobby Simpson’s team managed to eke out a narrow win over India, in spite of some world class spin seen from the famous triumvirate of Bedi, Chandra and Prasanna.
It was around the same time that the media mogul Kerry Packer started his rebel World Series Down Under, which attracted almost all the fast bowlers from that generation. It would have been interesting to see these Indian spin troika who did so well in the official series of 1976, playing in this rebel cricket league.
It was a missed opportunity, for the presence of these spinners would have added some spice and flavour to the gang of “big boys who played at night” – a popular Packer slogan. Apart from Derek Underwood of England, no other team of that time possessed a spinner of their quality and calibre.
But the ageing Indian spin quartet were soon to be edged out after a below par performance against their arch rival Pakistan. Zaheer Abbaz, Javed Miandad and Imran Khan hit them with impunity out of the ground and out of their career. The lost series across India’s western border acted as the harbinger of the demise of India’s famous quartet.
The curtain came down on their career sooner, though later in 1979 Bedi toured England under the leadership of his other quartet mate Venkatraghavan.
This series saw the rise of Kapil Dev, dawning the beginning of yet another era in India’s bowling, as the last of the quartet, Bedi and Venky would faded away into a not so graceful exit.
Pope Paul VII
Guest
Some of my favourite battlers are the Aussie establishment during the Packer years. Alan Hurst, Rod Hogg, Higgs, Yardley, Yallop, Wood, Hughes etc
JohnB
Guest
I remember before that series someone wrote that the Australian openers would each effectively be given 20 odd runs, then it would get tough for everyone when the spinners came on. It didn't really work out that way. I didn't realise until looking it up how solid Ghavri's and Madan Lal's figures were (combined anyway), leading to the "what if" thought - why didn't they even once try playing both of them? Of course, it's never completely that simple - Venkat and Prasanna didn't take many wickets (8 in 5 tests between them) but they did bowl a lot of overs tightly. Take that out and maybe Bedi and Chandra wouldn't have been as effective. I recall thinking Ghavri looked not at all bad, although Madan Lal appeared a bit straight up and down. Probably totally inaccurate, but Ravi Rampour in more recent times reminded me of him slightly. Bedi I remembered from the Rest of the World tour in 71-2 - he was fascinating because he looked innocuous, practically strolling to the wicket and looking like he was just rolling his arm over, yet everyone had trouble with him. Chandra I'd never seen - but you could immediately see he would be a handful, bowling quickish legspin from an unusually long run and with a fast arm action.
Anindya Dutta
Roar Guru
John you are absolutely right. I don't think it's fair either to say the spinners bore the entire responsibility for bowling out the opposition. Ghavri was an effective left arm medium pacer in the mould of a Gilmour. Madan Lal was a lion hearted medium pacer who could run down and bowl (admittedly it seemed like he ran in faster than he bowled on occasions) over after over doggedly when his team needed it. And they both had decent averages. Among the spinners, Chandra was the most exciting to watch because he was the most unpredictable. Bedi was a crafty left armer and Prasanna and Venkat were very good off spinners.
JohnB
Guest
The only Indian series I saw much of in that period was the tour to Australia against Simpson's side (which was in 1977-8, not the year earlier). The Australian side was shorn of all of its Packer players, the only clear first choice selection playing being Jeff Thomson. I'd say you're half right and half wrong that the spinners completely shouldered the whole bowling attack for India, at least in that series - for each of the 5 tests, India picked one of Karsan Ghavri and Madan Lal as an opening bowler and they took a respectable 20 wickets between them, at a combined average in the low 20s, despite only bowling about 110 overs between them in the series (8 ball overs admittedly). Mohinder Amarnath generally opened at the other end (a not so flash 7 wickets at 32 for the series, and an 81 strikerate). Amarnath only bowled 14 overs per test on average - barely enough to get the shine off the ball - but didn't do any worse than the 3rd Indian spinner (Prasanna 4 tests, Venkat 1, 8 wickets between them at 50 plus). Bedi and Chandra on the other hand - 59 wickets at 24.5 between them. So perhaps not literally true that they shouldered the whole attack, but figuratively speaking a fair enough comment.. Interesting to look at those figures - Bedi and Chandra won the third test in Melbourne virtually by themselves with 18 wickets between them, but were helped by 5 wickets from Prasanna (who only took 1 in the other 3 tests he played) in the win in Sydney - would they actually have been better off picking both Ghavri and Madan Lal (assuming both were fit - I can't recall if there was ever an issue there) in place of the ineffective third spinner in the other 3 games (all lost, 2 very narrowly and 1 perhaps more narrowly than it appears)?