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A gentle trot to the wicket, a lazy twirl of the left arm, a minimum of
effort, or so it seemed: until the ball landed and fizzed past the
groping bat and headed off in the direction of slip. Sometimes it kissed
the edge of the bat and the batsman trudged off to the dressing room,
watched by Bishen Bedi's glittering eyes, his expression masked by his
Sikh beard. Back when the man from the Holy City made his debut, against
the West Indies in 1966-67, Bedi was coloured clothing in cricket. The
first thing the spectator saw on the field were his turbans, in red,
green, pink or blue. In later years he changed to the smaller and more
convenient patka, yet the colour was always there. So was the deceptive
flight, a ball tossed high in the air, never dropping where the batsman
expected: sometimes seemingly winking out of existence for a moment as
it hit the batsman's blind spot.
Twice he passed 100 wickets in a season
in his five years with Northants in the English County Championship,
but after they had seen his wiles once, England prepared flat Test match
wickets. He had reasonable success in England - four wickets and
Geoffrey Boycott stumped at Edgbaston in 1967; 6-226 at Lord's in 1974,
but at home he was deadly. He took 25 wickets in the series against Tony
Lewis' 1972-73 team and nine wickets at Delhi in 1969-70 when he and
Prasanna bowled Lawry's Australians out for 107 and set up a seven
wicket win. He took 6-127 against New Zealand in Christchurch and in the
return series in 1969, had 6-42 on the old Brabourne stadium in Bombay.
He captained India in the late 1970s, causing controversy when he
refused to let his tail-enders bat against the bouncers of Holding and
Daniel in Jamaica. (Bob Harragan)
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