Spiritualism - Eternal Voice

captained India against Australia, England, New Zealand,Pakistan and the West Indies in 22 tests.Bishan Singh Bedi is unquestionably the greatest left arm spinbowler that India has produced. With his smooth and shortrun up; easy flowing action, the subtle variations of pace andflight and a deceptive loop, Bedi raised spin bowling tosublime heights and mesmerized the best of batsmen. Hisaction was so relaxed and co-ordinated that he was able tobowl all day with rhythm and control - a great asset to anycaptain. His 266 wickets in 67 Tests and 1560 victims in firstclass cricket - more than any other Indian's - are ampletestimony to his remarkable bowling achievements. Hisfigures of 12-8-6-1 in the first world cup in 1975 is the mosteconomical bowling feat, which will be hard to surpass.Playing for Delhi against J&K, Bedi took 7 wickets for 5 runsin a Ranji Trophy match.Cold statistics impressive as these are, do not however give acomplete picture of Bishan Singh Bedi's greatness. It was he,who brought about a paradigm change in the nature ofIndia's Test team. First he instilled self-belief in the team.That is why India could successfully chase a mammoth 400plus score in the second innings in a Test match to record ahistoric victory against the West Indies in 1976. Bedi's wasthe second test team to perform this remarkable feat afterDon Bradman's 'Invincible Australians'. Secondly, manytalented cricketers from North Zone like Mohinder Amarnath,who had been consistently ignored by the powers that be,began to find a place in the Test teams.Bishan Singh Bedi brought about a similar change in themindset of Delhi cricketers. The result was that Delhi wonthe Ranji Trophy for the first time under his captaincy. Lateron, as a coach and manager of Punjab Ranji Trophy team, hetransformed the ordinary Punjab team into a fighting unit.Punjab, too, won the Ranji Trophy championship. Bedi coulddo it all because he was essentially a players' man and couldeven risk his own cricketing career for their sake, as he didwhen he took on the authorities, who had reduced DDCA totheir personal fiefdom.Bishan Singh Bedi was undoubtedly an impacting cricketer.His very presence at the top must have surely enthused andinspired many young Sikh sports persons to play cricket forthere were around his time so many Sikh cricketers playing inRanji tournament such as Balwant Singh and Inderjit Singh(Delhi), Sarabjit Singh (Haryana), Harbhajan Singh Anand,Jasbir Singh and Jaswinder Singh (Railways) and Col A.S.Mann (Services). Rajinder Singh Hans of Delhi was yetanother left arm spinner, who could on his day run throughany team. Ram Singh, a Sikh settled in far flung Bikaner, alsoplayed a few matches for Rajasthan. Gurcharan Singh, who isnow an eminent coach, turned up for Railways in mid-sixties.Jasbir Singh of Punjab and Jodh Singh from Biharrepresented India at junior level.The Sikh cricketers continued to make important contributioneven after Bishan's retirement in 1979. Yograj Singh played aTest and six one-day internationals in 1981. Balwinder SinghSandhu, who played for Bombay and the West Zone, was amember of 'Kapil's Devils', who won the Prudential WorldCup in 1983. Sandhu played a pivotal role as a medium pacerin the final. The Indian junior team that toured the WestIndies in 1981-82, had as many as four Sikh cricketers namelyGursharan Singh, ManinderSingh, Navjot Singh Sidhu andRaju Sethi. Gursharan Singhlater played a test matchagainst the mighty WestIndians. Maninder Singh, a leftarm spinner cast in the Bedimould played as many as 35Tests and 59 one-dayers in theeighties and nineties. ManinderSingh is one of the bestexponents of spin bowling everproduced by India. The ball heclean bowled Javed Miandadis still considered one ofthe greatest balls bowled ininternational cricket. He hadm a n y o u t s t a n d i n gperformances against England,Pakistan and Sri Lanka.Maninder Singh now acts as aexpert commentator for someT.V. channels.Both Gursharan Singh andManinder Singh were coachedby Gurcharan Singh.Navjot Singh Sidhu, a mercurial batsman from Patiala, had avolatile career as a cricketer from 1983 to 1999. He playedmany swash-buckling innings for India in his Test careerspread over 16 years. 'Sixer Sidhu' represented India in morethan fifty Tests. Some other Sikh cricketers like ReetinderSingh, Bhupinder Singh Sr., Rajinder Singh Ghai andHarvinder Singh played one-day internationals.There were quite a few more Sikhs, who distinguishedthemselves in domestic cricket. Kanwaljeet Singh, an offspinnerfrom Hyderabad played in more than fifty RanjiTrophy matches and Sukhvinder Singh, a left-arm spinner.In the first decade of the 21st century, many Sikh cricketershave represented India in international tournaments.Sarandeep Singh, Reetinder Singh Sodhi and Manpreet SinghGony have all played in one day internationals. Yuvraj Singh,son of a Punjab actor and test cricketer Yograj Singh, is anoutstanding cricketer, who has played a stellar role in manyof India's victories in Twenty-20 and one day internationals.He has already scored more than 7000 runs in one-dayers.He is a flamboyant batsman, a brilliant fielder and more thana useful left-arm spinner. His six sixes in an over against ChrisBroad of England is a record for Twenty-20 World Cup.Although he has done reasonably well in Test matches also,Yuvraj Singh, however, is yet to blossom to his full potentialas a Test batsman.Bhajji – the TurbanatorHarbhajan Singh, the Turbanator, is one Sikh cricketer, whodeserves a special mention. Born in a lower middle class family,Bhajji, as Harbhajan is fondly called, is the finest off-spinner inthe world today. He has been anintegral part of India's Test,One-day International andTwenty-20 for well over adecade. Harbhajan Singh hasalready 393 Test wickets and246 victims in One-dayInternationals against his name.Great as Bhajji's achievementsas a bowler are, his theatricalbatting is also a delight towatch. Harbhajan was trainedas a batsman by his first coachand he shows that he canswing the bat around onoccasions. In a recentlyconcluded Test series againstNew Zealand, Bhajji scoredtwo centuries in successiveTests and was the top scorer ofIndia in that series.Eternal Voice Nov, 2010 - Jan, 201156 57