Happy 60th Birthday to Vishy!  I along with his fans around the world, VISH him a century and VISH him to end in the victorious side as always.

Gundappa Ranganath Viswanath, this name will bring very fond memories of one of the finest batsman India has ever produced, an arist when at the crease and a gentleman par excellent when off it.

Vishy, as he is fondly called/ known, was a batsman with special caliber.  He had that silken touch to his batting which was only seen with Mohd Azharuddin later on.  However, in terms of playing vital knocks in times of crisis he had very few equals.

At the M A Chidambaram Stadium, Chepauk, a Test match during Pongal was never complete without this artist with the willow on song.   I would be understating if I said he enhanced the taste of Pongal for the cricket fans with his strokeful innings.

With the bat, he was sort of a silent killer.  It would appear as though he was just wielding a brush and not a bat as square cuts, late cuts and leg glances flowed from his bat and you will just see him caressing the ball never hitting hit.  Before the opponent captain woke up to place a thirdman fielder at the right position Vishy would have moved to 30 or 40 with six or seven hits to the boundary in the arc from thirdman to point.

That he was a touch and grace player and was not a power player is underlined by the fact that he scored just six sixers in his entire test career spanning 91 Tests and 155 innings.

Though there was no stroke that he was not capable of playing (he used to be known as The Little Master, The Master of All Strokes etc.) it was the square cuts and late cuts that he became famous for.

There were several great innings played by him in the 91 tests he played for India.  His average at 41.93 will lie and downplay his achievements.  He was never a player going after records.  But, a captain could always count on him when it mattered.  He will come up with a brilliant knock.

He made his test debut against Australia at Kanpur and scored a duck in his debut innings.  That was in 1969.  In the second innings, he announced his arrival to big time cricket with a brilliant 137 studded with 25 fours facing an attack that included Garth McKenzie (60 tests for Australia with 246 wickets) and Ashley Mallet (38 Tests, 132 wickets).

There was no stopping after that.  If my memory serves right he held the record for maximum consecutive test appearances since debut for a long time before Rahul Dravid broke that record.  Viswanath still holds the record as the only player in cricket history to have scored a century in his debut in a first class game, official test match and unofficial test match.

He was the first Indian batsman and remained the only one to have broken the jinx haunting debut centurions of India for a very long time.  Before him, AG Kripal Singh, Lala Amarnath, Abbas Ali Baig, Hanumant Singh  had scored centuries on debut but never scored one more century afterwards.  Even after Vishy broke that jinx, Surinder Amarnath (son of Lala) made a century on debut and didn’t score a hundred again.  The jinx remained with Indian batsman until it was broken once more by Azhar who also had the same silken touch like Vishy and also a pair of King Wrists.

Vishy, in his illustrious career, made 14 Test centuries and till date is the only player in the world to hold the enviable record that his team never lost a test match when he scored a hundred.  I personally think it will ever remain his record.

During his playing days, due to his short stature he used to field 99% of the time in the first slip only.  When the opponent country played a long innings, Vishy was the guy with the longest walk in the match as he moved from first slip in one end to the first slip in the other. (Remember that even the keeper walks between the wickets but he will stand closer when the spinners bowled).

Ask anyone about the memorable knocks of  Vishy and you will sure to get the following reply:

1. 97 not out at Chepauk against Andy Roberts (ranked 38th amongst the best 100 innings all time).  Andy Roberts was at his best as a tearaway fast bowler.  This match was won by India, thanks to this great knock by Vishy.

2. Century at Port of Spain when India created the world record for chasing down 403 (highest runs scored at that time to win a test)

3. 124 against the West Indies (Sylvester Clarke, Vanborn Holder, Norbert Phillip) in mine field of a bouncing wicket and come back to score a very vital 30 odd to ensure India chased the small but difficult target of 124 (Kapil blazed in the end with a 26 with 6 fours).  I still remember his leg glance to get the three runs to reach his century.  He ran two and Syed Kirmani, the fantastic team player that he was, egged Vishy to complete the third run for that century which was the first by an Indian batsman at Chepauk in 13 years.  Sure that glance didn’t miss the photo lense of The Hindu photographer.  It found its place on the front page of next day’s The Hindu – a tall photo with caption “And thats Vishwanath’s hundred”.

4. 114 at Melbourne against an Australia.  The Austrlian attack consisted of  the wizard of swing Dennis Lillee and Len Pascoe.  It was a memorable test in which India came back from behind to set Austrlia a meagre target of 143 and dismissing them for 83 (you read it right, just 83) aided by a 5/26 from Kapil Dev who came to bowl India to victory braving a thigh injury.

The above are just four great innings that I have mentioned.  But each of his 100s and fifties were extremely valuable and he never scored runs when there was no challenge.  I will still not forget to mention one super 75 he made in the 1979 world cup match countering the pace battery of the West Indies even though that match was lost by India.

That is the greatness of Vishy.  He wasn’t bothered about the averages.  He was head and shoulders about the average and average seeking cricketers, though he was only 5 ft. 4 inches in height.

Vishy captained India only for two test matches, one of which was the famous Jubilee Test against England at the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai (then Bombay).   That match till today is remembered as the match of Ian Botham and Bob Taylor (he took 10 catches) and more importantly for the great sportsmanship displayed by Vishy.  England won that match but Vishy won all true cricket lovers’ heart (those that criticized him, in my view, were not true cricket lovers).  This is what Bob Taylor the center figure of that incident says:

“I had been given out caught behind and I went to walk, but it was Gundappa Viswanath who was the captain then, not Sunil Gavaskar, and he said to me: “Stand there Bob, I’ll talk to the umpire”. I thought I was going to get into trouble if I did, so I said: “No, I’ll go,” but he insisted. So I was in the middle of the wicket with Botham and Kapil Dev the bowler, chatting away, while Viswanath persuaded the umpire to change his mind.

I went on to get 40-odd, and Ian Botham got a hundred, and together we got ourselves into a decent position from which to win the match, so it was an extraordinary gesture.”

Sure he would have square cut a cake for his sixtieth birthday, with a knife but again with the same soundless grace.

He will remain unbeaten in our memory as the most graceful and sportive cricketer to represent India.

Also read this and this beautiful article by the current Chairman of Selectors and the exponent of unconventional batting methods Krish Srikkanth.

One more great read – A man with no enemies

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