In his playing career, he was the tall, slim and elegant striker of the ball in the most orthodox of ways who went on to lead the country in 10 Tests on taking over from Kapil Dev after the 1987 World Cup
CHENNAI: An affirmation that time flies comes in Dilip Vengsarkar turning 70 on Monday (April 6). One of the finest batsmen of his generation, he went on to lend a voice of reason in selection matters while also running for decades a programme for young cricketers to train in, besides chipping in as an administrator whenever called upon to help at the MCA.
In his playing career, he was the tall, slim and elegant striker of the ball in the most orthodox of ways who went on to lead the country in 10 Tests on taking over from Kapil Dev after the 1987 World Cup. He is among the select few who played more than 100 Tests for India, scoring 6,868 runs in 116 Tests, many of them attractively and some of them in critical situations as in a Lord’s Test when he and Viswanath added 210 runs in 1979.
Having come into national prominence with a spectacular innings for Ranji champion Mumbai against the Rest of India XI that had some of the country’s famous spinners in it, he came to be known as the ‘Colonel’ to the generals of Indian cricket who were the maestros Gavaskar and Viswanath. Indeed, with his height and his bearing he may have looked handsome in a military uniform.
The title of the ‘Lord of Lord’s’ was also given to him for his three centuries at the hallowed ground in 1979 (103), 1982 (157) and 1986 (126*) but just couldn’t make it four in a row when he played there again in 1990 though he averaged over 50 on three previous tours. He had followed up his Lord’s century with 102 in Leeds in difficult batting conditions and enabled India to win the series 2—0 in 1986. He was the most dominant batsman in a team that included Gavaskar and Mohinder Amarnath.
Vengsarkar could take no part in the ’83 World Cup final as he was injured by a nasty lifting ball from Malcolm Marshall at The Oval where India met the West Indies for the second time in the league and he had to sit out the famous run to the cup with wins over Zimbabwe, Australia and England that followed.
Strike as he did the cricket ball high and handsome, Vengsarkar would be the last one to get stuck in any controversy. His idea of the limelight was to play the game well and let other matters take care of themselves. As a mentor who set up five academies in Mumbai and Pune, he has had a fair deal to do with finding the finest talent and grooming them to play for India. Among his finds are Yuvraj Singh, Ajit Agarkar, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Suryakumar Yadav and Ruturaj Gaekwad.
It must also be mentioned that he considered his judgment came good for India the best when he insisted on choosing a very young Virat Kohli over S. Badrinath in the Test team. Not to mention that he helped shape Rohit Sharma’s batting. Of course, going back some, he promoted the prodigy Sachin Tendulkar, backing him for an early debut. And not to forget the fact that he was chairman of selectors when he proposed the little-known Mahendra Singh Dhoni to be captain of the T20 World Cup team to South Africa in 2007. And the rest, as they say, is history.
Even today, Vengsarkar enjoys his role most as he helps shape the talent of young players. In fact, he was the first to be named chairman of a talent spotting panel by BCCI and he also headed the NCA, which is now an integral part of the cricket infra in the country that is producing great players and championship winning teams and squads. He was the first to speak up that selectors also be paid like players and though he didn’t enjoy the perks he has helped reward many a retired cricketer for manning the thankless job of selecting players.
