26 June,2011 07:19 AM IST | | Clayton Murzello
Bishan Singh Bedi lauds Vettori's choice to take indefinite break from ODIs to prolong Test career
Bishan Singh Bedi is delighted that his fellow left-arm spin stalwart Daniel Vettori has decided to take an indefinite break from the shorter version of the game to prolong his Test career. "My reason for taking a break from the shorter forms of the game is primarily so that I can preserve my body and continue to represent the Black Caps in Test cricket," New Zealander Vettori was quoted as saying on Saturday.
Daniel Vettori
"I also believe a break now will give me the best possible chance to take up one-day cricket again in the next couple of years and, if all goes well, make the Black Caps World Cup team for 2015," he added. "It is Test cricket that helps you become a better limited overs cricketer and not the other way around as some people are suggesting. That limited overs cricket will help your Test career is absolute rubbish," Bedi told SUNDAY MiD DAY.
Bedi called Vettori a gentleman cricketeru00a0-- "very much like Rahul Dravid." Asked to recall the time when Vettori had a chat with him on how to be a better spinner, Bedi recalled. "We met at the Kotla before the New Zealand versus India one-day international in New Delhi in 1999.
Bishan Bedi
He asked me how I would bowl to Sachin Tendulkar and I said, I would bowl to get him out because there was no point in trying to contain him. I also told him that in my experience, shorter batsmen are suspectible to driving straight off left-arm spinners and they can get caught and bowled. The next day the scorecard read: Sachin Tendulkar caught and bowled Daniel Vettori 0."
Cricinfo reported that the Kiwi would continue to honour his Royal Challengers Bangalore commitments.
AFP adds: Vettori, who has played 272 one-day internationals and 28 international Twenty20s, stepped down as New Zealand captain earlier this year when the side were beaten semi-finalists at the last World Cup. Vettori was the youngest player ever to represent New Zealand at the age of 18u00a0-- taking 2-98 in his first innings against England in 1997u00a0-- and is now one of eight players to have more than 300 Test wickets and 3,000 runs.
