RAHUL
DRAVID:Rahul Dravid,the most steady batsman in the present
Indian team was born in Indore on the 11th of January,1973.He made his
debut at Lord's in 1996 against England in the second test and was unlucky
not to score a century on debut.Before making his debut he was a well-known
player in the local circuit having amassed tons of runs against all oppositions.Rahul
Dravid has been one of the main pillars of the Indian batting with his
blend of technical proficiency and stylish strokes. In a side packed with
so many star batsmen, he has frequently played the sheet anchor role to
perfection.The fact that most of his centuries have been scored outside
India is a pointer to his unfaltering technique and temperament on all
types of pitches.His style of batting was once regarded as too slow for
the one day game, but through sheer practice;he has transformed himself
into an integral part of the team in the shorter version of the game also.
He was clearly the batsman of the 1999 World Cup with two hundreds and
the highest aggregate. For sheer consistency, Dravid has few equals and
has maintained a Test career average of over fifty. His temparament is
exemplary and his concentration legendary. A batsman who revels in a crisis,
Dravid, against New Zealand in January 1999, joined the ranks of Vijay
Hazare and Sunil Gavaskar as one of only three Indians to have scored
a century in each innings in a Test.He was the Wisden Cricketer of the
year for the year 2000.
ANIL
KUMBLE:The ace spinner of the
Indian team was born in Bangalore on 17th October in the year 1970.He
made his international
debut against England in Manchester on India's tour to Old Blighty in
1990 as a tall,lean,bespectacled bowler.Although Kumble is not such a
great turner of the ball as he himself admits;his line,length,unerring
accuracy and invariable bounce that he extracts from the wicket so often
gets the batsmen baffled.The best way to play him is to treat him as a
medium pacer and not a spinner is the usual advice given to many a batsmen.Whatever
may be the case,the truth is that this Bangalore lad always gets a bagful
of wickets and is the match-winning bowler for the country in both versions
of the game.He and Shane Warne were responsible of reviving the dying
art of wrist spin bowling all round the globe with their success.Apart
from his bowling Kumble is a very useful lower-order batsman and has scored
centuries in first class cricket for his state side.The bowler had a stint
with county side Northamptonshire and now Leicestershire in the English
domestic league.The principle achievement of his carrer so far has been
his match winning effort where in he took all the 10 wickets in a single
innings to equal Jim Laker's long standing record against the visiting
Pakistanis in the Delhi test match.Surely,the country needs a lot more
dedicated spinners of Kumble's class to revive the golden era of Indian
cricket where we had the famous quartet of Venkat,Bedi,Chandra and Prassana.
VENKATESH
PRASAD:This tall fast bowler
was born in Bangalore on 5th August,1969.He is a product of the MRF Pace
Foundation in Chennai,coached by the legendary Dennis Lillie of Australia.He
made his debut for the country against England in the first test at Birmingham
in 1996.They say good bowlers hunt in pairs,no wonder he and his statemate
Javagal Srinath formed a deadly pair to torment the batsmen all around
the world.Prasad being a seam bowler has been a great threat to batsmen
on the helpful pitches abroad,but he has risen to the occasion on the
slow Indian pitches and his most devastating spell came in the famous
Chennai test in 1999 against the Pakistanis where he took 6 for 33 in
an inspired spell of fast bowling.He has been a crafty one-day bowler
with his off-cutters and slower ones doing most of the damage.Although
shuttling in and out of the Indian team due to injury problems this bowler
has always bowled his heart out for the state and employee's Canara Bank
in the local tournaments.