Indian Cricket: Then and Now

Martin Chandler | 9:16am GMT 17 December 2023

Published: 2023
Pages: 340
Author: Sundaram, Venkat (Editor)
Publisher: Harper Collins India
Rating: 4 stars

There was a time when cricketing anthologies were commonplace, whether that be in the form of collections of the work of a single writer, of essays on a specific subject or of writings of a much more general and diverse subject matter.

And the purpose of anthologies? The answer to that one must be to sell books, so clearly that must be trickier than it once was, particularly given the wealth of material available online these days for those who like their cricket writing in small bite sized pieces.

The compiler of this one is a First Class cricketer himself, and whilst Venkat Sundaram might not be a household name he was clearly a decent player. A very short introduction at the end of the book tells his reader that he captained Delhi and North Zone. What it doesn’t tell you is that in 1977/78 he averaged a Bradmanesque, or perhaps I should say Merchantesque, 98.12.

So there is no doubt but that Sundaram knows the game inside out, and his motivation for putting this one together is in itself an interesting story; not too long ago, a great Indian opening batsman was nearing the world record for the first wicket partnership in Tests. When informed that he was within touching distance of a record held by Vinoo Mankad he asked who Mankad was.

His reaction was, very few names in Indian cricket have been bigger than Mankad, yet this incident  illustrates that even he is liable to be forgotten. We had to do something so that these names live on, and Indian Cricket: Then and Now is the result.

There are 47 contributions to the book from 40 different writers. One difference from the traditional anthology is that many of the pieces were commissioned especially for the project, so have not appeared in print previously.

In the main the individual chapters amount to pen portraits of the great and the good of the game in India. As the title of the book makes clear the entire history of Indian cricket is covered, so Palwankar Baloo and ME Pavri are mentioned as well as great players who have emerged from the country since it played its inaugural Test in England in 1932.

One of the early pieces in the book is from the pen of Vijay Merchant, and gives his an account of an episode in 1936 when, for suggesting to the Maharajkumar of Vizianagram that he should step down from the Test side he was almost send home. One small frustration is that there is no reference to where this piece first appeared, and its quality is a salutary reminder that a full biography of Merchant is certainly merited, and preferably soon, whilst some of those who had dealings with him are still with us.

Any reader who picks up Indian Cricket: Then and Now without much knowledge of a time before the IPL is going to find it an excellent introduction to the subject, but even for those of us who already know a good deal about the individuals and incidents featured there is still plenty to enjoy. Not all of those written about have been the subject of books before, and I particularly enjoyed Clayton Murzello’s essay about Karsan Ghavri, the first Indian pace bowler to get to 100 Test wickets.

At the other extreme ‘Tiger’ Pataudi and Kapil Dev are two of the most written about Indian cricketers. There are essay about both, pieces of writing that certainly add to what we know of those two great players by virtue of being written by Yajurvindra Singh, briefly a Test player himself in the late 1970s, and who draws heavily on his personal knowledge of his two friends. Yajurvindra also  contributes the longest chapter in the book, that on the historic series victory in England in 1971.

So those are a few highlights from a most enjoyable collection of cricket writing, and there is nothing in Indian Cricket: Then and Now that is not well worth its reader’s time. This one is highly recommended.