Australians are suspect against good off spin bowling: Shivlal Yadav

"Basically, if you observe right from the old days, Jim Laker's time to recently, I think Australians are a little suspect against good off spin bowling. Prasanna has done well, John Emburey has done well, Geoff Miller has done well; even I have taken more than fifty wickets (55) in 13 Test matches against the Aussies. So basically I feel they are a little suspect against good off spin bowling. Given a chance Harbhajan should make use of their weakness." These were the observations of former India off spin bowler Shivlal Yadav, who is currently the secretary of the Hyderabad Cricket Association, in a chat with CricInfo.

As a young boy, Yadav's first passion was football. As luck would have it, his school cricket team was short by a player and wanted a kid to make the head-count to eleven. So Yadav started his cricket as a runner. Quickly he found himself bowling medium pace. It was his coach, the late Eddie Aibara, who encouraged him to take off-spin as a trade. Yadav's father who was a state wrestler gave him all the support and encouragement to do well as a cricketer.

Yadav who played under ML Jaisimha in the domestic league made it to the Hyderabad Ranji Trophy team in the 1976/77 season. He did not have to wait long to make his international debut as the famous spin quartet started to make way for others. Yadav's debut Test was against the visiting Australian team led by Kim Hughes. He did well against the Packer-depleted side which lost the series 2-0, picking up 24 wickets in five Test matches.

Yadav toured Australia in 1980-81 and made a name for himself as a great team player, defying the Aussie pace attack in Adelaide with the help of Karsan Ghavri and denying the Aussies victory. India had lost the first Test match in Sydney and there was a lot of pressure going into the match.

Just before the Adelaide Test, India had lost to New South Wales in a tour game. Yadav tried to take the strike away from the last man Dilip Doshi and in the effort got out and India lost the match. A livid Sunil Gavaskar let his anger and disappointment out on Yadav, shouting at him that being a professional cricketer, he should look after himself and leave the rest to the other person to look after himself. Yadav says that taught him a lesson. "I decided I would look after myself and if the other person does the same, we can do the job. That inspired me to hang on for 15 overs, Karsan and myself defended and drew the game."

Yadav has fond memories of the great Test victory at Melbourne that followed the drawn Adelaide Test. He clearly remembers the partnership, where he helped GR Viswanath to put on 70 odd runs that set up the victory. Viswanath made one of the best Test hundreds at Melbourne, on a dicey track.

Yadav was very much a part of the tied Test in Madras in 1986. Recalling it, he says, "Actually the game started on a slow note. It was a good batting track, a good Test match wicket. For the first three days it helped the batsman and slowly the spinners got some purchase out of it. It so happened that the Australians made a challenging declaration, which prompted us to go for the runs. Had they batted on for ten minutes and then declared on the last day, I don't think we would have gone for the runs. That would have pushed us back. But the declaration had been made and the run chase started on a good note, we were making 50-60 runs and losing a wicket. So the chase was on till the last wicket. I think the biggest winner of the match was the game of cricket."

Yadav got to his hundredth Test wicket at Ahmedabad against the visiting Pakistanis, the same match that has been etched in the pages of cricket history as Sunil Gavaskar became the first batsman to get to 10,000 runs. "My 100 wickets were forgotten totally, because Sunil getting to 10,000 runs was a greater achievement which he achieved in style and it was a proud moment for me to be associated in that particular Test match. Because getting 100 wickets is not that big a milestone but being around with a man who got 10,000 runs in that particular Test match is a good memory for me. I will always remember that."

About the most difficult batsman he has bowled to, Yadav has no doubts at all. "To me straightaway it would be Viv Richards. The reason was that he never allowed the bowler to dominate, he would dominate the bowling. In one particular Test in Mumbai, I had two wickets in two balls and was on a hat-trick. He came in just before lunch and hit me for three boundaries, three balls before lunch which goes to show the confidence of the man. He could have got out playing those shots. He was a batsman of that talent. Straightaway it has to be Viv."

Yadav is disappointed about the lack of good off spinners in India. After all he is the last off spinner to have picked 100 Test wickets. He says, "Straightaway I can point out to far too many one day matches that are being played as the main reason. Even in Ranji matches the captain prefers a bowler who can keep things tight. Any moment a bowler starts experimenting he doesn't have a longer life. That could be one reason. More and more one day matches are spoiling the actual talent which would emerge. When you bowl, think a batsman out, that is when you are going experiment. You can't think a batsman out by bowling tight all the time. You have to vary your line and length, you have to vary your flight trajectory, try all those things. Maybe because of one day cricket, bowlers are trying to bowl faster through the air. So the experimentation is gone."

About his days as a administrator and being the national selector, Yadav is of the opinion that the job is a tough one but one that he enjoys a lot. About being a successful administrator, Yadav says, "It all depends on how much time you give to the game. As a cricketer you have to practice hard, 4-5 hours a day. Like that if you give more time to the game and also attend your duties and work in all sincerity, you can be good at it."

Yadav is of the view that the present system of having selectors from five zones helps the cause of Indian cricket. He believes that there should be junior selectors to help out the senior selectors to find the real talent in this big country. He says, "If this system can find players like Vijay Merchant, Vijay Hazare, Sunil Gavaskar and Sachin Tendulkar, why can't it keep delivering more?"

Yadav believes that his son (who is in the Under-19 India team) is like any other young cricketer who needs to understand that, "In cricket or that matter in any sport, things do not come in a silver spoon, you have to work hard, have to achieve it, then only you feel proud of it. Any cricketer has to achieve it himself, you can take him to the boundary line, you can't push him inside; beyond the line is his, he has to show the skills."