Cricketers today are being spoon-fed, spoilt: Bishen Singh Bedi

Former India captains Bishan Singh Bedi and Kapil Dev are a generation apart. The latter got his India cap under Bedi's captaincy in 1978. But the fondness and enormous respect the duo hold for each other was apparent on a balmy Sunday afternoon in the capital during the release of a book on the famous Indian spin quartet in which Bedi was not just the most successful but also the most outspoken. As the the left-arm spin legend walked into the function hall, Kapil Dev rose, touched his feet and was hugged tightly by his first skipper.

The occasion was the Delhi launch of the book Fortune Turners: The Quartet That Spun India To Glory—a joint effort by Aditya Bhushan, a management professional and a self-confessed cricket fan, and Sachin Bajaj of Global Cricket School. It is an ode to the famous Indian spin quartet of Bedi, Erapalli Prasanna, Bhagwat Chandrasekhar and Srinivas Venkataraghavan, who took 853 Test wickets among them. The evening also saw Bedi and Dev enthral the packed hall with anecdotes about each other.

In his inimitable style, straight from his heart, Kapil Dev, the 1983 World Cup-winning captain said: “I played with them when they were at the end of their careers. They were not great athletes but they had something which history will never see again." Never one to let anything go past him, Bedi promptly reacted to Dev's remark on athleticism while showering praise on the latter. "If we were to play today, except for perhaps Venkat, rest of us will struggle to find a place in the team in terms of athleticism. Kapil Dev is solely responsible for changing the structure of cricket in India after he led the team to the 1983 World Cup win."

Also present were former cricketers from Delhi and former hockey captain Zafar Iqbal and 1975 World Cup hero Aslam Sher Khan. In an era where greatness is easily ascribed to or the acronym GOAT freely used, the feats of the spin quartet under the leadership of Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi first and then Ajit Wadekar, not just helped India clinch those elusive wins on foreign soil but also establish a legacy that subsequent generations of spin bowlers have tried to carry forward.

The four spinners were not just different in terms of their abilities but also in nature. Talking about their combination, Bedi reminisced, "We were very proud of each other's performances. We shared a lot of cricketing thoughts. Just recently, on Teachers Day, I sent a message to Prasanna saying 'Thank you for all the learnings'. He was very touched." Bedi went on to add that he "admired Venkat's tenacity to stick with it at all times" and said that "we all would dream of playing at Lord's. Venkat is the only one to have played, captained and umpired at Lord's".

He rated Prasanna as the "best off-spinner in the world who had the confluence of both hand and mind". As for Chandrasekhar, he termed the leg-spinner as "we had God's own hand in Chandra. No roommate of Chandra has ever seen him without a shirt and would get to listen to singer Mukesh's songs endlessly”.

Terming the spin legends God's gift to Indian cricket, Kapil Dev recalled how he was scared of Venkataraghavan who captained him as a youngster after Bedi, and then, three years down the line, ended up captaining the veteran off-spinner from Chennai.

The conversation veered towards present-day cricket and the ongoing Ashes. Bedi, whose contempt for T20 cricket is well known, said, "When you are sticking with the game as it ought to be played, we don't mind being up till 11.30pm to watch it. We are enjoying the Ashes!"

He felt that the effect of the shortest format was visible in present day cricketers' performances, including the Ashes. "Defence of modern cricketers is not there at all. They only know how to hit the ball. That's the impact of T20. England are struggling, and so are Aussie batsmen," said Bedi. He said cricketers today were being spoilt and spoon-fed by too many coaches rather than thinking for themselves. This, he said tongue firmly in his cheek, pointing towards Kapil who was recently part of the Cricket Advisory Committee which reappointed Ravi Shastri as head coach of the Indian men's cricket team.

However, one player appears to be an exception—Steve Smith, who has been a force to reckon with in the ongoing Ashes series. England bowlers have simply been unable to find a way past him. Asked how many overs would it take him or his spin mates to get Smith out, Bedi said, "Lovely to watch him bat. He is doing it with a vengeance. (Pauses) I would back Chandra to get him very early."

Kapil Dev differed with Bedi's views on T20 cricket saying, "With time, you have to change. I may not like T20 or 99 per cent of cricketers may say they prefer Test cricket to T20 but at the end of the day if only two persons are watching Test cricket, then it is not cricket. A game is when 100,000 people come to watch you play against each other. Spectators make the game go forward."