The great off-spinner on his dream team

Vinoo Mankad: He is the best opening batsman ever and the best left arm spinner.

Sunil Gavaskar: The all-time great opening batsman.

Vijay Manjrekar: One of the best batsmen India has ever seen. He was the only one who could play both pace and spin with equal ease.

Sachin Tendulkar: He is really a prodigy. Undoubtedly, one of the most attacking players I have ever seen.

Mohammed Azharuddin: A great batsman and excellent fielder.

Gundappa R Viswanath: The most accomplished player and an excellent close-in fielder.

Kapil Dev: An all-time great fast bowler, excellent batsman and fielder.

Syed Kirmani: The greatest wicket keeper India ever produced.

E A S Prasanna: I am really the only good off-spinner the game has ever seen.

Javagal Srinath: He is the fastest bowler India has ever produced.

Subhash Gupte: An all-time great leg spinner that the country could ever be proud of, and this game could ever see anywhere in the world.

Here is the logic for my team selection:

I have two fast bowlers, Srinath and Kapil Dev, backed by three spinners Prasanna, Gupte and Tendulkar, who can bowl with any type of wicket. Then we have an all-time best wicket-keeper, Kiri, and five batsmen, one of whom, Tendulkar, is an opening batsman-cum-bowler. Two of the others, Mankad and Kapil Dev, are all-rounders.

All five batsmen I have chosen are people who have more than 200 runs each per innings, and have performed marvellously on foreign soil.

My choice for 12th man would be Eknath Solkar, as he is the only player who could field very well without headgear. I would love to have him any time, any moment, on any team I chose, because he is such a good fielder.

As told to M D Riti

Tell us what you think of this list?