Preserve heritage of golden oldies

MUMBAI: Mumbai's cricket heritage is to rich to be squandered away. This was the view of a lot of senior players gathered at the funeral of Ashok Mankad who passed away suddenly on Friday.
Mumbai has had so many quality players but nothing has been preserved for posterity. For instance when Englishman David Frith wanted to publish a book on spinners he couldn't find good action pictures of Subhash Gupte, who his teammates swear was the best leg-spinner that ever bowled.
Mumbai Cricket Association has a swank indoor coaching facility at Bandra Kurla.They should lose no time in video filming the remaining greats even at this ripe age for their technique will be the same though the movements will be slow.
For instance, they could shoot the easy action of maiden specialist Bapu Nadkarni; the fluent batting of Ajit Wadekar; the bowler's back drive of Sunil Gavaskar; the cunning bowling of Padmakar Shivalkar, the effortless glovework of Sharad Hajare; the masterly swing and cut of Vithal Patil, the Lindwall-type action of GR Sunderam; the correct batting of Nari Contractor.
When one suggested this to Chandrakant Pandit the director of the academy, he said he had indeed written to the MCA that he wanted ���sound bytes��� of the golden greats for posterity and was awaiting their clearance. He should now also press for getting the oldies in whites one day and filming them. These clippings will be vital for GenNext.
For instance when we were discussing how one should play Ajantha Mendis the mystery Lankan spinner former India batsman Yajurvindrasinh related the anecdote of how he was guided by Ramnath Kenny, his senior colleague at Mahindra. They were playing a Times Shield game and Yajurvindra had problem facing Shivalkar whose variations he simply could not pick.
Kenny, former India middle-order batsman, advised him not to wait for the ball to come on to the bat but to hit it as soon as it hit the pitch. Yajurvindra says he saw from the other end how Kenny was doing it and followed suit and was able to do it himself. And the threat of Shivalkar was taken care of.
Alas, we don't have any images of Kenny playing spin, only mental images. He was a batsman coached by the great Duleep. And one remembers him because he had the best follow through a batsman could ever wish to have. Loose-limbed and bat finishing in a lovely arc over the shoulder. And we thought only the follow through of bowlers was important.
In the good old days Sport and Pastime magazine would run a pictorial sequence of players��� actions. It gave us a clear idea of their technique. Alas that has been buried in the past.
Today technology has gone digital and one can get the replays and action studies on CDs and DVDs. One only hopes someone has the sense to use this technology to preserve the greatness of our Indian golden oldies before they pass into history. It's not too late to film the magic of Erapalli's Prasanna's fingers or those of Bedi. Any takers ?