Greatest Indian Cricketer pre - Gavaskar Era

[Cricket Bliss]

Who is the greatest Indian Cricketer till the arrival of Gavaskar ? Not including the spin quartet since I feel they haven't played much in the 60s alone to be up in the conversation.. or perhaps EAS Prasanna can have a chance

 

[capt_Luffy]

Vijay Hazare
Vijay Merchant
Vinoo Mankad
Subhash Gupte
Amar Singh & Mohammad Nissar
CK Nayudu

 

[trundler]

Hazare.

 

[Coronis]

Vijay Hazare
Vijay Merchant
Vinoo Mankad
Subhash Gupte
Amar Singh & Mohammad Nissar
CK Nayudu

I expected you to say Ranji tbh.

 

[capt_Luffy]

I expected you to say Ranji tbh.

Ranji is English as he played for England afaic

 

[Prince EWS]

I expected you to say Ranji tbh.

Johan to say Jardine?

 

[capt_Luffy]

Johan to say Jardine?

Or Cowdrey.....

 

[Thala_0710]

Hazare
Merchant
Mankad

 

[govinda indian fan]

If not for war vijay merchant and vijay hazare would have been 50+ avg batsmen

 

[Burgey]

Hazare
Merchant
Mankad

Yeah these guys were guns by all reports

 

[peterhrt]

In England Mankad enjoyed the highest reputation. Partly due to league cricket where Hazare also did well. Among batsmen Merchant ranked first after his masterly performances during the wet English summers of 1936 and 1946.

English opinion regarded Bedi more highly as a cricketer than Gavaskar until 1979.

 

[capt_Luffy]

If not for war vijay merchant and vijay hazare would have been 50+ avg batsmen

Both came pretty close to that in their short careers tbf

 

[Ali TT]

Ranji is English as he played for England afaic

I guess whether we are only counting players to have played for India or cricketers who are Indian. Ranji played for England but given he was the probably ruler of an Indian state, he was I'm sure very much Indian. So much so, one of the Indian domestic tournaments is named after him!

On a similar vein, could also add Duleepsinjhi to this list and, a bit more controversially, Abdul Kardar who was a prominent figure in Indian cricket pre-partition before becoming the father of cricket in Pakistan.

 

[capt_Luffy]

I guess whether we are only counting players to have played for India or cricketers who are Indian. Ranji played for England but given he was the probably ruler of an Indian state, he was I'm sure very much Indian. So much so, one of the Indian domestic tournaments is named after him!

On a similar vein, could also add Duleepsinjhi to this list and, a bit more controversially, Abdul Kardar who was a prominent figure in Indian cricket pre-partition before becoming the father of cricket in Pakistan.

Fair IMO. Depends on criteria. Abdul Kardar wasn't very good though; won't make top 20.

 

[sayon basak]

Vijay Hazare and Vijay Merchant should be pretty high.

 

[bagapath]

Mankad

 

[Ali TT]

Fair IMO. Depends on criteria. Abdul Kardar wasn't very good though; won't make top 20.

No probably not. His influence as captain then administrator exceeded his performance. Although his FC record was pretty fine, even if the standard was probably not that high in domestic Indian then Pakistani cricket is in that era.

Had circumstances been different, Fazal Mahmood may have toured Australia with India in 47/48.

 

[peterhrt]

I guess whether we are only counting players to have played for India or cricketers who are Indian. Ranji played for England but given he was the probably ruler of an Indian state, he was I'm sure very much Indian. So much so, one of the Indian domestic tournaments is named after him!

On a similar vein, could also add Duleepsinjhi to this list and, a bit more controversially, Abdul Kardar who was a prominent figure in Indian cricket pre-partition before becoming the father of cricket in Pakistan.

The feats of England-based royals Ranji, Duleep and Nawab of Pataudi senior inspired folk back home but they played very little cricket in India. Pataudi played six first-class games there, Duleep two and Ranji none. At the end of his career Pataudi did captain the Indian tourists to England in 1946.

There was also London-born Raman Subba Row.

All four men were Oxbridge-educated and all scored a hundred on their Ashes debut.

 

[capt_Luffy]

The feats of England-based royals Ranji, Duleep and Nawab of Pataudi senior inspired folk back home but they played very little cricket in India. Pataudi played six first-class games there, Duleep two and Ranji none. At the end of his career Pataudi did captain the Indian tourists to England in 1946.

There was also London-born Raman Subba Row.

All four men were Oxbridge-educated and all scored a hundred on their Ashes debut.

Subha Row played post independence though; don't think he is more Indian than Nasir Hussain or Ravi Bopara here.

 

[peterhrt]

Subha Row played post independence though; don't think he is more Indian than Nasir Hussain or Ravi Bopara here.

I suppose he was born pre-independence unlike the other two. Indian father and English mother like Hussain, though Hussain was born in Madras and Subba Row in London.

Subba Row described himself as Anglo-Indian and didn't really have any cricketing connections with India, apart from touring there with Commonwealth teams and playing the odd charity match.