Goodbye my H’bad mentor and pal

Abid Ali set a great example of supreme physical fitness, extreme athleticism in the field, tireless bowling and positive batsmanship in match after match

Many Indian cricketers of the 1960s and 1970s, Hyderabadis in particular, must have experienced a poignant sense of loss on hearing the news of Syed Abid Ali’s death in California. As someone who owed so much of my career to his mentorship and friendship, I feel quite devastated. He lived to be 83, and I hadn’t met him for well over four decades, but that does not really soften the blow. 

For starters, he was someone I admired from afar long before I first met him and played some of my cricket with him. And what a spectacular introduction on the world stage! He took 6 for 55 in his very first Test innings, bowling first change after Umesh Kulkarni and Rusi Surti, both strictly military medium. He was not express either, but was he a clever bowler, all swing and seam and variations of pace!

Also Read: Sunil Gavaskar’s tribute to Abid Ali

Abid followed up with two identical innings of 33 in the lower middle order in that Adelaide Test, the series opener. And, in the final Test at Sydney, Abid revealed yet another facet of his all-round ability by opening the innings and scoring 78 and 81. Syed Abid Ali had arrived! 

Little did I know then that I would actually meet him hardly five years later. Bowling in the State Bank of India nets at Hyderabad, I  was watched—and approved—by my hero after another mentor of mine, wicketkeeper P Krishnamurti, had invited him to look at this recent unknown off-spinner import from Tamil country.  Abid was looking every bit as trim and sharply dressed in his bank officer’s formal gear and newly-grown mustache as he tended to in his cricket flannels. We did not speak to each other that evening, but we were to enjoy a nice rapport in the months and years to come, with Abid encouraging me at every stage of my burgeoning first class career. He was such an inspiring senior presence in the all-India State Bank team in the Moin-ud-Dowla Gold Cup and the Hyderabad XI in the Ranji Trophy, setting a great example of supreme physical fitness, extreme athleticism in the field, tireless bowling and positive batsmanship in match after match. He made the youngsters in the team feel at home with his general good cheer and unique sense of humour, not to mention his occasional spoonerisms.

After watching him at close quarters as bowler, batsman and fielder, I was convinced that his statistics at the international level hardly did his class justice. But above all, he made a huge impact on most of us with his wonderful human qualities. Life was not always kind to him. He deserved greater success and recognition than he enjoyed.

Chennai-based V Ramnarayan bowled off-spin for Hyderabad and was Abid Ali’s teammate

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