MANCHESTER: Former England captain David Gower has little doubt that West Indian legend Brian Lara is the best left-hand batter of all time, but he said the mercurial Rishabh Pant performs what “others can only dream of” and “takes incredible to another level.”
Gower, one of the finest left-hand batters to have graced the game, could not stop gushing about Pant, who came out to bat with a broken foot on day two of the ongoing fourth Test.
The 68-year-old is working with the Lancashire Cricket Club for the duration of the game at Old Trafford.
“Tongue-in-cheek… we have always said left-handers are the best. For some reason, when you look at left-handed batsmen it seems to be more graceful than right-handed,” Gower told PTI.
“I've watched a lot of great left-handers from my days growing up, Gary Sobers for one, Brian Lara of course probably the best of those when I was first starting to grace commentary boxes and describe these things.”
“Now we have a guy called Ben Duckett. He has a very different style to mine but is incredible to watch. Every time I look at him bat, you're kind of wondering what happens next. And you cannot forget, especially in the context of this series, Rishabh Pant.”
Gower said the series would be poorer in Pant’s absence, if the Indian star is ruled out of the remainder of the series.
“I'm actually so sorry that he's injured, and if this foot thing is terminal (and he is out of the series). There is a man who does the things that only others dream of. Some people call them nightmares, but he's an absolutely brilliant, extraordinary player to watch.”
“So, you cannot replicate what he does. You cannot ask a young player, say aged 15–16, to bat like Rishabh Pant, go on, try that, because that would be probably fatal to their career. But when you've got someone like that who plays this most extraordinary version of the game, you cannot but admire it. He takes incredible to another level,” said Gower.
On India’s rising stars, Gower offered praise and some observations.
“Sudarshan looked in good touch here in this game in his comeback. Jaiswal is a very exciting player. At a very young age he has done some exceptionally good things. He's going to be around for a long time and will make thousands of runs, and he does it in a very positive way,” he said.
However, he refrained from delving into technical criticisms, though Sudharsan’s head position has allegedly come under scrutiny.
“I'm not going to get into minor technicalities,” he added.
Among the current crop of Indian players, Gower singled out KL Rahul as the most aesthetically pleasing to watch.
“I've been a fan of KL’s for a long time. Again, easy on the eye… he's very together—that’s not a very good word really, but you know, he's very organised. He's got time. We always say all the way through the history of the game: if someone seems to have time to play shots, be they attacking or defensive, you'd say well, that's a sign of a good player.”
“So, yeah, I'm a Rahul fan because I think he makes his runs in a very pleasing way,” he said.
Gower, who scored 8,231 runs from 117 Tests, also made a strong appeal for preserving the longest format of the game.
“Only the big three play the most. I'm not in a position to advise those that run the game at this moment. But I'm in a position to put the case forward for Test cricket. I was a historian at school, therefore I appreciate the value of history.”
The 68-year-old then offered a curious analogy to drive home his point.
“I liken it to wildlife—beards, to use a potent example of tigers in India—which have made a comeback because people have said we cannot let these animals get to extinction. And the same thing to me applies to Test cricket. If we ever let it get to extinction, we are guilty of as great a sin as you can imagine,” he said.
Gower urged the BCCI, the richest cricket board in the world, to push for keeping Test cricket in a healthy state, along with other influential boards.
“Therefore, it takes those that have the power, and we know the BCCI has immense power, immense influence, but if they can combine with ECB and Cricket Australia, even with the nations that don't have the same resources, Cricket New Zealand, Cricket West Indies, with a bit of planning, with a bit of wits, with a bit of nous, there is still plenty of time to be squeezed to enjoy the best of white-ball cricket and to enjoy the best of red-ball cricket,” he added.
Gower also revealed that he recently decided to auction some of his cricket memorabilia, which had been stored away for three decades.
“A lot of my old kits, so lots of sweaters, blazers, bats and stuff I haven't seen for 30 years. It’s been in an attic, it's been in boxes. And if I'm honest, my entire family, my wife, my daughters, we have accumulated so much stuff, to use a polite word, over the years that we are trying to have a big, big clear-out,” he said.
Out of the lot, one item was particularly hard for him to part with.
“When I first toured for England, which goes back to 1978, we still had the old MCC colours, so the blue blazer but with the bands of gold and red and the St George's badge,” he recalled.