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BV Swagath

Mention the name Sadagoppan Ramesh and lots of voices come out “he has no footwork!” But for me Sadagoppan Ramesh still leaves me memories of some of the most stylish flicks ever played off the fastest bowler in the world Shoaib Akthar. I thought Sadagoppan Ramesh’s flicks off the fast bowlers were an absolute delight to watch. Yes this Tamil Nadu opener did perform well whenever he was called up for National duty. Many experts had predicted that this man has no technique, no footwork for an opening batsman and would falter in the due course of time. But Ramesh proved them all wrong with his cool match temperament, which was shown in his very 1^st Test match against the likes of Wasim and Waqar.

The 29 year old left hander has over 1000 test runs to his credit with 2 centuries and 8 fifties. Ramesh last played for India in the 3^rd Test against Lanka at the Sinhalese Sports Club in 2001. Ramesh notched up 46 and 55 in that test match and never did he play a test match after that although he was in the test squad during the Down Under tour of 2003-2004. Unfortunately Ramesh did well in the tour games with an average of 50 plus, but with Sehwag doing a blistering job and Akash Chopra who just started to settle down, it wasn’t easy for Ramesh to make it at the top. Now even Akash Chopra finds his place in a quandary with Yuvraj Singh forcing his way into the test team. Coming up to Ramesh’s last test innings and he was dismissed to easily “one of the balls of the century”. It wasn’t poor batting from Ramesh that got him out, but it was a ball that turned way outside the leg stump to hit the off stump! And no guesses who the bowler was, it was one and only one Muttiah Muralitharan.

A super cool guy he is, Ramesh puts everything behind him, whether it’s a “near outside edge” or a “rank bad shot that could have got him out”; he only plays ball to ball cricket and that’s the best part of his game. Not much footwork, but hey watch out for Sadagoppan Ramesh’s timing, easily among the best! His flicks as I have already mentioned along with his cover drives are his strengths. Ramesh does like to flirt with danger; we have seen him on numerous occasions late cutting an off spinner just past the 1^st slip! But that’s the man and yeah he doesn’t play as carelessly as Virender Sehwag does. May be Ramesh should work on his footwork and his big hitting ability, just a thought anyway. Not all batsmen play the same way and that is the beauty of the game. One more good thing is that Ramesh is a “Score conscious” batsman and that’s the reason why he averages 37 plus in the 19 tests he has played which includes a highest test score of 143 against Sri Lanka. How many of us remember the sharp catch at short leg to dismiss Shane Warne, which resulted in the first ever hat trick by an Indian bowler in Test Cricket? Atleast Harbhajan Singh – the bowler would remember it lifelong. It’s indeed a pity that we don’t get to watch players like Ramesh, Sriram, Badani, Gambhir and a list of many good players in the test team. It’s only because we have one team and at a time only 14-15 players. May be it’s time to get two teams each out of countries like Australia, India rather than get the lacklustre players from Bangladesh, Zimbabwe. Just a wild imagination…

Sadagoppan Ramesh should be on duty for Tamil Nadu in the upcoming Ranji Season and he’s just 3 short of making it 100 first class matches for Tamil Nadu. Stay tuned to Cricketfundas.com to get more info on Sadagoppan Ramesh.

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