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INTERVIEWS |
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Indians
need two good openers and a third seamer to win tests abroad, says |
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| Interview by Chandramouli Kanavi Geoffery Boycott probably the best technically equipped opening batsman of the 60's and 70's in international cricket, ended his test career playing for England against India in 1981 after overhauling Sir Gary Sobers aggregate in test cricket. He was one of the best opening batsman England had ever produced and scored 22 centuries in his test career. A very straight forward and controversial cricketer, now is known for his excellent television analysis of the game. Here are some of the excerpts of the exclusive interview the writer had with Geoff Boycott for MS: MS: You played a test match at Bangalore during England's 1981 tour and you have also been to B'lore on media assignments. How do you find B'lore compared to other grounds? G.B.: This is my most favourite stadium. Most people like Eden Gardens as it has more capacity and it can accommodate more people. I like Bangalore stadium because the stands are open at a height, people seem to be close and they get a good bird's eye view of the game. As a player you feel as if the crowd is very close to you and intimate and it is a very good atmosphere playing amidst a close crowd. As a player I don't like the crowd to be far off like Melbourne. Melbourne is a wonderful stadium with a capacity of a hundred thousand people. If you get 60,000 there, it is half empty and the crowd far off. I like Sydney also which is very muck like Bangalore. MS : You have been following Indian Cricket team's progress closely for a few years. To become world champions, in what area we should improve the most? G.B. : You need two good opening batsman to play test matches to get your country to a good start and winning position. They should be able to play good seam bowling early on and give a solid start. Most of the time India are 20 for 2 and then the middle order batsman. Tendulkar, Ganguly and Rahul Dravid will be under pressure. In Test matches outside India you cannot win matches with spinners. It is okay in India when you play two or three spinners when the pitch is dry and it does not help the fast bowlers. But abroad, your results have been quite poor. Basically, in England you recently sent a lot of spinners and it didn't work. You have two wonderful opening bowlers in Prasad and J. Srinath. They are world class. Srinath is a class bowler and he has been there for a while. You need a third seamer. Abroad test matches are often won by good batting aided by good fast bowling by seam bowlers. It is very rare that a spinner wins a match abroad unless he is a wrist spinner like Shane Warne, Mustaq Ahmed or Anil Kumble. The finger spinners do not win matches now. So you need a seamer and two good opening batsman, to help you to wind test matches abroad. MS : Do you feel that winning matches on tailor made spinning tracks in our country is harmful to Indian cricket? G.B. : It is okay that you win matches here on spinning tracks. But it does not help you in the balance of the team when you to abroad. MS : Do you think that cricket academies are necessary to unearth good youngsters? G.B. : I don't know how far these academies help, what the youngsters need is specialised coaching. Also we need good competitive country/local cricket can groom the youngsters, not the academy. MS: Yorkshire has produced so many great cricketers like Freddie Trueman, R. Illingworth, Brian Close, Geoff Boycott. But now there is none, what is the reason? G.B. : The club cricket in Yorkshire is not as strong as it used to be. We got all our cricketers from strong and solid Brad-Ford and Yorkshire League. Unfortunately, for the last 10-12 years, club cricket has been very ordinary and is very much like country cricket. The standard has dropped. Once the standard drops, you don't have to be that good to get to the top. Then when you come to test match cricket from league and country cricket, I am afraid it is too much for them. MS : Why haven't you yet get involve English cricket like a selector or a talent scout? G.B. : I really don't know. It is upto the TCCB. Sometimes the administrators don't like people who are outspoken. I am straight forward, straight talking guy and outspoken. They don't like it.
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