Bare-headed wonders

Garry Sobers: there was nothing this man couldn't do © Getty Images Enlarge

So seductive is the aroma of the past that it can easily obscure perspective. Watching footage of old cricket matches invariably brings a terrible longing for the good old days. I stole a copy of Richie Benaud's Greatest XI DVD from a friend last night and have already watched it three times, rewinding, forwarding, playing portions in slow motion, zooming in, freezing frames, peering, enquiring, confirming. It wasn't all cricket, though; there was a lot of talking in it, from Mark Nicholas and Benaud, but there were enough glimpses there to give you a glorious sense of well-being.

There's something magical about black and white. Just as it is impossible to visualise Casablanca in colour - Ingrid Bergman was never the same to me the moment she stepped out of black and white - it is hard to imagine Jack Hobbs and Don Bradman in colour. Visually, Bradman was never the most compelling of players, but there are a few shots of him in the DVD, rocking back to pull balls just short of a length, and they tell you instantly why he remains the greatest. Then there's Keith Miller, lighting up the frame by his mere presence. He bowled any way he fancied - a slower ball off 15 paces, a sharp bouncer off four. But he looked like a cricketer even when he walked. He also looked like a movie star.

Garry Sobers straddled colour and black and white. Quite simply, he could do everything. The DVD has his six sixes against Malcolm Nash. They were hit both off the front foot and back foot. The back-foot ones are spectacular. Nash bowled rather slowly that day, so Sobers had to generate all the power on his own, swivelling and swinging his bat in a violent arc. That he could bowl everything, we all know, but seeing it is something else: he induces an edge from an outswinger; traps a batsman lbw with a full inswinger; and then goes round the wicket to float a chinaman that rips in from two feet outside off to hit middle. The batsman walks off in a daze, muttering to himself, perhaps saying how life isn't fair.

Sobers isn't finished, of course. He goes to field at leg slip. He is standing almost at the edge of the crease, the closest you'd ever see anyone field in that position. He plucks two catches from Lance Gibbs's bowing, and the second one is a stunner. The batsman turns the ball off his hips, low to Sobers's right, his wrong side. Sobers's right hand extends, as if programmed, and he comes up with the ball and throws it up. It's a moment of awe and wonder, a moment that tells you that this man was born to rule on the cricket field.

Sobers rarely batted with a cap, and there is a regal air to bare-headed batsmen. The helmet has become as essential as the leg-guard or the gloves these days, but it is a curse against aesthetic pleasure. The photographer Patrick Eagar once told me that the helmet has robbed the batsman of all character. He was right. It makes the batsman look encumbered, burdened and mechanical. Under it, he lives in his own world. You can't see him wince, smile, glow, look bemused or pleased. In modern cricket, a batsman reaching a landmark - a fifty, a hundred - is a moment of great revelation. The helmet comes off, and you see the batsman in full in his moment of triumph. It's his moment of communion with the spectator, it's a moment when he declares his sovereignty.

Sunil Gavaskar: played the fast bowlers superbly, and without a helmet too © Getty Images Enlarge

It was a touching thing that Michael Clarke did, discarding the helmet in favour of the Baggy Green before reaching his hundred in his debut Test at Bangalore. But there was an air of manufacture to it. Watching Gordon Greenidge hook a ball inches away from his nose for six to bring up a memorable, matchwinning double-hundred at Lord's is a thrilling sight, but it's a sight that's lost for ever. Then there's Sunil Gavaskar, curly-haired and gentle-faced, driving big fast bowlers down the ground. Gavaskar rarely allowed himself to be distracted while batting, but occasionally, he broke into a smile, and it lit up the screen. And of course, there's Ian Botham, belting the Australians, his dishevelled hair flying all over the place in direct proportion to the velocity of his strokes. It is a glorious sight.

The wicketkeepers come on a while later. There's Alan Knott, running a batsman out with a lightning backward flick, Rod Marsh and Jeff Dujon diving on both sides of the wicket, and there's Ian Healy keeping majestically to Shane Warne, anticipating the edge, rising with the ball, the hands moving into position and gathering the ball securely, without fuss. Comparisons are mostly futile, but it is impossible not to think of Parthiv Patel and feel wretched. Wicketkeepers are often the soul of the team. At the moment, Parthiv looks a boy burdened by the weight of his own failures. It's not been a question of one bad match; he has had a horrendous run for over a year. He is a boy with a big heart and with some batting talent, but he is fast becoming a liability behind the wicket.

There are a few frames of Sachin Tendulkar in the DVD. Benaud describes his hundred at Sydney in 1992 as perhaps the best he has seen in Australia. Tendulkar was 18 then, younger than Parthiv is today. But Parthiv is no prodigy. There is only so much faith you can invest in potential.

Sambit Bal is editor of Wisden Asia Cricket and Wisden Cricinfo in India. His Indian View will appear here every Thursday during the Indian season.