Field Marshal Kapil proves that where there is a drill, there is a way

Venkatesh Prasad, with his drooping shoulders and throwing worries, is not much of a hit with those who relish fielding as a spectacle. As a slip, Prasad has the potential to be a force.

While Sadagopan Ramesh, who looks lost in his own thoughts, is alert like a hound looking for a prey in the cordon behind the batsman.

“The other day Saurav (Ganguly) was getting worked up. He was wondering if the time is nearing for him to drop a catch in slips. He hasn’t dropped any in the last couple of months,” said Kapil.

Ganguly picked up a stunningcatch off Michael Slater’s slashing blade in the opening over off Javagal Srinath in the second innings of the Adelaide Test which started a bowling and batting revival on the third evening and much of fourth day.

But his best was in the four-day game against New South Wales (NSW) at the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) early this month when he dived to pick up captain Shane Lee low to his left.

Kapil has words of praise for Prasad. “Venky (Venkatesh) is an athlete. You only have to look at his movements, he makes things appear so easy. He can be developed into a good slip fielder.

“He has a natural ball sense and moves quickly into position. Besides, his long hands and legs give him a good reach,” explains Kapil while adding that the only thing the medium-pacer needs to work upon is bending well in slips.

Then come the likes of Ramesh and Laxman. It may not look credible to keen followers of Indian cricket, but in the match against NSW, Ramesh dived full length to his right and picked up a catch atthird slip.

Laxman, too, is hitting straps, so to speak. His two catches in the slips in the Adelaide Test were keen efforts.

Slip-catching in slips is not without its pitfalls. When Shane Warne dropped the hat-trick chance off Damien Fleming in Adelaide, cricket experts in Australia furiously asked should the most famous bowling hands in today’s cricket world be exposed to injuries from sharp chances?

Former Australian coach Bob Simpson offered a good defence, stating there is little chance of Warne suffering injury to his hands. “He’s got good hands and we’ve trained him well. He loves it and gets a great kick out of it. It keeps him in the game and that’s good for him. If he had a bad catching action, there’s no way in the world you’d have him there. We worked very hard on him and technically he is very good. As such he shouldn’t get anything damaged.

“If you have the right technique and concentration on taking the ball soft, you’re going to be okay. But this is problem typical with a bowler,more so with a spinner. In case of batsmen, it is not much of an issue. You only have to look at Sunny Gavaskar, Gundappa Viswanath and Mohammad Azharuddin’s records in slips to be convinced.

“It could be an issue with a batsman who have a playful back as is the case with Sachin Tendulkar who briefly flirted with standing in the slips in a tour game here but then has gone back to mid-off, sensing capable replacements are being developed in the cordon,” said Simpson.

Mark Taylor, the most experienced and successful slip in the history of the game — he took 157 catches — says in his early years he still was thinking deep down that he’d rather the ball didn’t come his way. “Ten years later, I loved being in slips, relished the chances I got and caught more of them than I had at 24.”

Taylor feels a calmer slip fielder is a better one. “When your heart races, your technique can fall away a bit, and you can tend to snatch at the ball.”

Going by this yardstick, Indians have a better chance inGanguly, Prasad, Ramesh and Laxman developing into a good slip team in the near future.