India's former spin wizards blamed the increasing number of one-day matches for the decline in the quality of spin bowling in the country, but appreciated the "belated" efforts of the Board of Control for Cricket in India to revive the art.
"One-day matches is the main villain for the decay in spin bowling," said B S Chandrasekhar, as he and other spin greats emerged from a BCCI-organised brainstorming session, held to find ways to revive the art.
Chandrasekhar, known for his deadly leg-breaks during his hey days, said he suggested during the session that there should be no be one-day matches at the under-15 and under-17 levels.
Another former spin great, R G (Bapu) Nadkarni also agreed that too many one-dayers are responsible for ruining the art.
"If you look at the cricket calendar you will find only one-day matches."
The first of its kind, the session was attended by 12 former and present spinners. They all were unanimous in their view that the BCCI's effort to revive the art is belated but "better late than never".
Srinivas Venkatraghavan, a member of the Indian spin quartet in 1970s and now a respected ICC umpire, said, "This type of interaction should have been held much earlier."
Emphasising that there is no dearth of spin bowling talent in the country, he said the initiative should be followed up and, "then only we can get fruitful results".
"We have to educate the youngsters how to perform at the highest level," added Venkat, who has 156 wickets in 57 Tests to his credit.
To queries whether he is enjoying his umpiring stint, he said, "I always enjoyed my cricket, my game and now I am thoroughly enjoying my umpiring. But I must admit that it is a taxing job."
Asked to comment on the recent on-field stand-off involving Australia speedster Glenn McGrath and West Indies batsman Ramnaresh Sarwan, he said it would not be proper for him to do so as he was one of the umpires in that match and is bound by an ICC contract.
Appreciating the efforts of the Board to work on the revival of the spin bowling in the country, Nadkarni said the move is "better late than never".
He was of the opinion that the decline in the country's spin bowling standards is only a cyclical effect.
"The dominance of spin and pace in the world of cricket takes place in a cycle. Now if you look at world cricket you will see a revival of spin bowling, as almost all the teams have world class spinners in their ranks," Nadkarni said.
He strongly recommended a separate spin wing for the National Cricket Academy.
Twelve former spin greats as well as current India spinner Harbhajan Singh participated in the discussion. Among them were Bishen Singh Bedi, Erapali Prasanna, V V Kumar, Rajinder Goel, Padmakar Shivalkar, Shivlal Yadav, Laxman
Sivaramakrishnan and Utpal Chatterjee.
