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Goodbye, Tiny!

Ramakant Desai's untimely death this Monday came as a rude shock.

After Mohammed Nissar, Amar Singh and Dattu Phadkar, Desai was probably one Indian bowler who could be termed as 'fast'. This of course was before India produced Kapil Dev and Javagal Srinath, in the same category.

One, unfortunately, did not see him in action at the height of his glory, but one had heard of his exploits from cricket-crazy uncles, cousins and their friends.

I remember watching Desai bowl for the Mumbai team in the Ranji Trophy at the Brabourne Stadium. The footprints caused by his seemingly innocuous but perfectly angular run up, on the dew-kissed grass, lasted all day.

The Mumbai attacks of the late 50s and 60s were dominated by spin stalwarts like Bapu Nadkarni, Sharad Diwadkar, Baloo Gupte and later, Padmakar Shivalkar. Once, while in discussion, Umesh Kulkarni - the former Mumbai and India seamer - mentioned how the spinners used to monopolise the proceedings at the earliest possible opportunity. Barely ten overs would be bowled, before Bapuji and Co. came on. It was in such a scenario that Desai made his mark as a bowler of great calibre.

For a small built, wiry man, Desai generated a lot of pace. An uncle, who played club cricket alongside Desai, used to say that he had the ability of generating a lot of pace off the wicket, which a lot of his contemporaries attribute to his perfect run up. He also had a lethal 'slippery' bouncer in his repertoire which surprised most batsmen. In those days the introduction to Desai invariably began with 'he is the one who made life miserable for Hanif Mohammed.'

True. In Ramakant Desai, the all conquering Pakistani run- machine had met his match. Apart from gathering wickets in the series, Desai had scored 85 runs at a time when tailenders were considered mere rabbits with the bat.

One watched him bowl on a nasty rain-affected wicket, in a Kanga League fixture for his club Shivaji Park Gymkhana (SPG) against arch rivals Dadar Union. He was bowling to a future Mumbai and India opening pair, Sunil Gavaskar and Ramnath Parkar. On that occasion, he troubled both these young hopefuls and sent Parkar to the dressing room with a bruised head in his third over.

SPG was Desai's cricketing alma mater. For the club, he took the field along with dadas like Vijay Manjrekar, Manohar Hardikar, Madhav Apte, Baloo Gupte, and Ajit Wadekar among others.

Club cricket in Mumbai, then, thrived because all the top cricketers of the day, of Test and first class levels, gave it a lot of priority. P.J. Hindu Gymkhana had in their ranks Nadkarni, Dilip Sardesai, Budhi Kunderan, Eknath Solkar and Diwadkar while Dadar Union boasted of Vasu Paranjape, V. S. Marshal Patil, Milind Rege apart from Gavaskar and Parkar. Fixtures involving club teams used to attract thousands of spectators who used to brave the scorching heat while standing on the sun-baked parapet at Marine Drive or in any of Mumbai's shadeless maidans.

The situation, alas, has changed today. Come April, and leading cricketers are off to the United Kingdom or Kenya where most end up playing a lower standard of cricket. One can see a distinct apathy towards club cricket, which could be attributed to a lot of reasons. The lure of playing cricket in foreign lands, which also accord the cricketers a paid holiday is one, and the taxing international schedules which do not give any time for cricketers to turn out for their clubs is another.

One of the prime reasons why Mumbai kept producing great talent was the high standard of club cricket. Youngsters, then, got the opportunity to learn while playing alongside Test cricketers. By way of contrast, since his international debut in 1989, Sachin Tendulkar has probably played no more than 10 matches for his club.

Cricketers like Desai and his contemporaries served their clubs, offices and state even after they hung up their international boots. Desai, in fact, continued to bowl a mean leg-cutter for his employers until the mid-eighties. From serving the Mumbai Cricket Association as a managing committee member, Desai died in harness as its vice president. He did not have too comfortable a time as chairman of the Indian selection committee as he was a man of few words and not one who could take an aggressive stance, so necessary for a person in his position. His shy demeanor made him extremely uncomfortable while facing the media, and things became worse each time the BCCI spokesperson made comments which were contrary to those made by Desai himself.

Ramakant Desai belonged to the generation of cricketers who put honour, prestige and pride in their performance above all else. Desai and his contemporaries gave of their very best whether they were representing their club, office, state or country. Apart from his sterling performance with the ball, Ramakant Desai will always be remembered as the first Indian who shattered the myth that to be a fast bowler one had to be tall, big and burly.

Hemant Kenkre