You’ve come a long way, Roger!

Newly elected BCCI president Roger Binny leaves at the conclusion of the 91st Annual General Meeting in Mumbai on Tuesday. Pic/PTI

Dear Roger,

Your appointment as president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India caused me to reflect on your association with cricket.

Three seasons before you made your India debut in the Bangalore Test against Pakistan in 1979, you shot into domestic prominence with a Ranji Trophy record 451-run opening wicket stand with Sanjay Desai (for Karnataka against Kerala in 1977-78).

I happen to have a Sportsweek magazine report of the South Zone round up, which said: "This was an extraordinary match, for Karnataka won by an innings without losing a single wicket. Desai and Binny put on 451 for the first wicket before the innings was closed, the former making 218 and the latter 211. This stand set up a number of records, the most prominent being that it is now the best opening partnership in the tourney, the previous best having been 405 made by MS Gupte and C Chauhan."

Two years later, I was not at full concentration in the first half of the day while in Class-VI while I wondered who won the toss in the first India v Pakistan Test at Bangalore, where you had the honour of making your Test debut on your home ground, the Chinnaswamy Stadium.

You scored 46 in the one and only innings and went wicketless. A fairly quiet Test for you in New Delhi was followed by a good one at Mumbai, where you dismissed three in the Pakistani batting order within 42 runs. It started with Majid Khan, then Zaheer Abbas and Javed Miandad.

Experts reckoned the ball that uprooted Zaheer's off stump was one of two magic balls in the Test, the other being Kapil Dev's delivery to the same batsman that clipped a bail in the second innings.

That the team management picked you in all the six Tests against Pakistan and the Golden Jubilee Test against England at Wankhede was a tribute to your prowess.

On the 1980-81 tour of Australia and New Zealand, you were dropped after India failed to win the opening Tests of those series - at Sydney and Wellington.

The road got hard. You missed out on the 1982-83 tours of Pakistan and West Indies but were among India's 1983 World Cup team. You picked up wickets consistently to total 18 for the tournament and your four-wicket burst (that included the scalps of left-handers Graeme Wood, Graham Yallop and David Hookes) against Australia which confirmed India's semi-final entry, was deserving of the man-of-the-match award. And that image of you, delighted with your caught and bowled effort that sent back Yallop at Chelmsford, must be counted as memorable.

Like several of your 1983 colleagues, you were also part of the victorious 1985 World Championship of Cricket team. The early hours of March 3 ought to have been spent studying for my SSC exams. Instead, I tuned in to watch the India v Australia game which you and Kapil Dev made special with your early inroads into the Australian batting. Wood and Border were bowled and you got last man Alderman, similarly to bring the curtains down on the Australian innings. Reaching the 164-target was no big deal and India entered another major semi-final. You couldn't be part of the final against Pakistan due to ill health and The Sportstar didn't miss out on highlighting your performances with an Adrian Murrell image of you collecting the ball. An extended caption read: "A bout of flu forced him to sit out the WCC final. But Binny can take pride in that he had done enough in the earlier matches to be rated one of the architects of a great victory." Indeed. For, your 4 for 35 in 8.2 overs in the opening game against Pakistan at the Melbourne Cricket Ground played a significant role in Pakistan being dismissed for just 183.

The three-Test series on English soil which ended up in a 2-0 triumph for India, had a Binny performance stamp too. At Leeds, where India assured themselves of a rare series win in England, you claimed 5 for 40 in just 13 overs, to help dismiss England for 102. Two wickets in the second innings were welcome too.

Less than a year later, you played your last Test - against Pakistan at the very ground where the traditional form of the game began for you - Bangalore's Chinnaswamy Stadium. It was not a memorable game for you, but you did something earlier in the series which is quite remarkable - six wickets to dismiss Pakistan for 229 in response to India's 403 in which you got an unbeaten 52. JOLLY ROGER! screamed Sportsworld on their cover, followed by the words, "Recalled Binny salvages the Calcutta Test from boredom."

Your interview in the same magazine after the selectors dropped you for the 1988-89 tour of the West Indies didn't make delightful reading for your fans. We never understood why you were called for the camp, given hope of being part of the tour party and then dumped. We admired your courage when we read about how you left the camp once the team for the West Indies was announced and refused to be a glorified net bowler.

You've generally been a non-controversial figure, Roger. And later, as national selector, you took decisions, or went with decisions, with only Indian cricket's benefit in mind. We have heard how you recused yourself from selection meetings when your son Stuart was being discussed.

Being BCCI president is a different cup of tea. We don't see you rocking boats, but we expect a voice of reason. Be the man you are.

Yours sincerely,
Clayton

mid-day's group sports editor Clayton Murzello is a purist with an open stance.
He tweets @ClaytonMurzello. Send your feedback to mailbag@mid-day.com
The views expressed in this column are the individual's and don't represent those of the paper.