J. Devaraj was to his team what a shepherd is to his flock. Secretary of the Mylapore Zone, he gathered his players together on match days. Rising before the sun did, he would pedal his bicycle, call on each player and make certain his team was in full attendance. Self-employed and industrious, Devaraj, however, never allowed the pressures of his modest private enterprise whittle away his commitment to the team. He helped the Zone become a super power in Buchi Babu cricket. In the late 1950s, it won the trophy for two years on the trot.
Without exception, managers of teams in local cricket sacrificed their time and resources unselfishly. Except for the satisfaction of having given their best to the team and a little recognition from their players, they received nothing in return. Those were days when publicity was scarce ? there were no blogs and television channels. Still, they served their teams cheerfully.
S. Annadurai would have spent a fortune just ?feeding' his players on match and practice days. A lawyer by profession, he ran City Central League, which had cricketers drawn from North Madras. He made a habit of taking his players to Modern Caf? and other fashionable restaurants of those days. Back then ? when money was not discussed in the same breath as cricket ? treating a team at even a small eatery was a luxury.
While on the subject of restaurants, the Dasprakash family had a huge appetite for cricket. Besides running local teams, they also stood out as good performers. Starting with Balakrishna Rao, the family produced a succession of players that were jewels in the crown of Madras cricket.
For want of sophisticated communication tools, numerous contributions in local and district cricket went unrecorded. The saddest part is this: many great players are forever lost to the generations that followed. Veerabadran, a brilliant off-spinner who played for North Zone in Buchi Babu tournaments, bowled with the guile of E.A.S. Prasanna. Just like the man in the Indian spin quartet, he would toss the ball and give it ample flight and get it to turn off the pitch at a bewildering angle. Towering at six feet and six inches, P.R. Sundaram of Mylapore Zone was a difficult customer on matting wickets. The Joel Garner of those days, this fast bowler got the ball to whiz past the batsmen's ears at an awkward pace. Leg-spinner M.K. Rajamanickam, who played for the Nungambakkam Cricket Club and later for the Corporation of Madras, was a past master at bowling the googly. His career suffered because it ran parallel to that of the incomparable V.V. Kumar.
And, I can't forget R. Prabhakar bristling with aggression in a match at the University Union Grounds. Playing for SBI, he pulverised the opposition scoring a quick-fire 184 in a 30-overs-a-side match. As this ground at Chetpet is among the biggest in Madras, this was no ordinary achievement.
Despite missing the bus to the higher levels of cricket, these players neither showed any regret, nor any bitterness. It is this that wants me to set the clock back to the days when cricket was truly a gentleman's game.
BIO M.G. BAVANARAYANAN Born in 1928, he is qualified in law and worked for the Port Trust. A medium fast bowler and middle order batsman, he played for National United Club, Mylapore Zone, SVOC and Port Trust. Unfortunately, he was part of the Madras cricket team more as a 12th man ? whose brilliant fielding skills were utilised to the maximum ? than as an active player. He has been a selector with an experience ranging from colts to Ranji cricket. From the 1970s, he has been running Friends 11 Tambaram, a team in the Kancheepuram district cricket.
I REMEMBER When the Madras team went to Indore to play Holkar in a Ranji match, S. Balakrishnan and I shared a room. To avoid giving us the heebie-jeebies, the organisers hid the fact that in the past a murder had taken place in that room, until the match was over.
