Four times this Ranji Trophy season, CM Gautam has walked in to bat with Karnataka’s first innings floundering and each time, he has walked away after reprising a rescue act
Karthik Krishnaswamy in Hubli06-Jan-2015When CM Gautam walked in to bat against Jammu & Kashmir, the law of averages was against him. He had batted three times before, this season, and had made runs every time. Important, game-changing runs.Against Tamil Nadu, Karnataka were 97 for 5 when Gautam walked in. He made 94. Against Bengal, they were 69 for 5. He made 63. Against Railways, they were 153 for 5. He made 64. Karnataka won each of those matches, outright.Now, on this overcast Monday afternoon in Hubli, Karnataka were 83 for 5 when Gautam strode out to the middle. Surely he wouldn’t do it again?He would. He would score 80, put on 177 with Robin Uthappa, and lift Karnataka to a first-innings lead of 263. What Brad Haddin was to Australia during the 2013-14 Ashes, Gautam has been to Karnataka during the start of their Ranji Trophy season. Their first-innings firefighter.Gautam has scored runs before, in copious quantities. He was the third-highest run-getter overall in the 2012-13 Ranji season, with 943 at an average of 117.87, but he had gone through something of a rough patch since then. Even as Karnataka swept aside all before them in a triumphant Ranji Trophy campaign in 2013-14, Gautam’s run-scoring stalled, and his 436 runs came at an average of 29.06.Gautam ended the first-class season with a century in the Irani Cup, but a knee ligament tear suffered during the IPL meant he had to go under the knife and miss the start of the 2014-15 season. He missed the Duleep Trophy, the Deodhar Trophy and the Vijay Hazare Trophy, but had enough time towards the end of his rehabilitation to iron out a couple of technical flaws that had crept into his game. For this Gautam went back to his childhood coach, RX Muralidhar.”After a long time I’m working with him, after a span of 5-6 years,” Gautam says. “He’s changed my technique a bit, and I’m very comfortable playing fast bowling on seaming wickets.”Last season my head was falling a bit and my leg was coming across, so there was a lot of chance of getting lbw. This year I’ve really worked on it. My head is very still now, and I’ve worked on my grip as well. My bottom hand was getting completely tight, so I’ve loosened it a bit, and I’m pretty much stable and still. That is something I’ve really worked on, with RX, for two months.”During Gautam’s innings against J&K, this change in his technique was immediately apparent. At the same venue last season, Punjab’s VRV Singh had trapped him in front of the stumps, midway through his shuffle across them. Now, after a small back-and-across trigger movement, Gautam was standing absolutely still when the bowler released.”I watched a lot of videos of M Vijay batting, and I spoke to him as well,” Gautam says. “He said he used to have the same problem, playing like this” – at this point he breaks off to demonstrate, his head falling over to the off side, and his imaginary bat having to work its way around and across his front leg to meet the full, imaginary, and presumably incoming ball. “All he told me was, keep your head still.”
“[MS] Dhoni retiring is a big plus for other keepers as well, Obviously if I do well this season my name will come up in the selection meetings, that is for sure. I have been playing well in the Ranji Trophy for the last 3-4 years, consistently.”
The early part of Gautam’s innings against J&K showcased another Vijay-esque quality. On a green pitch pockmarked with dents created by the ball landing on a moist first-day surface, J&K’s batsmen had paid for their eagerness to feel bat on ball, poking at balls outside off stump and nicking to the keeper and the slips. Gautam left a lot of balls outside off early on, and his bat was tucked in, close to his body, even on the couple of occasions he was beaten.When the seamers erred by bowling too short or too straight, Gautam pounced. Each of his first five fours came through the leg side – a leg glance, a clip through midwicket, and three pulls, one of which sent the groundstaff hastening towards deep square leg to retrieve the ball from under a pile of tarpaulins behind the boundary rope.As his innings wore on, Gautam’s more familiar strengths surfaced: the rasping square cut and the steer to third man against the seamers; the sweep, the reverse-sweep, and the dancing footwork against the offspin of Parvez Rasool.Plenty of teams saw these shots during Gautam’s breakout 2012-13 season, and the one major thing that has changed since then is his batting position. From No. 4 in 2012-13 – from where he made 257 against Vidarbha and 263 against Maharashtra – he has dropped down the order to the wicketkeeper-batsman’s traditional No. 7 slot.”I didn’t do very well last season, and I came back to my No. 7 position,” Gautam says. “Probably after a couple of games I’ll again get to bat at No. 4 or No. 5. I’m comfortable batting at four because you get a lot of time and you get to bat with the batsmen. You’ll have time to read the pitch conditions, the situation, whatever it is.”Batting at seven is not that easy, playing with the bowlers. You need to guide them and at the same time you need to focus on your game. So yeah, I’m waiting for my chance. Once I get that chance I’ll grab it.”He reveals a similar sort of confidence when asked about the possibility of an even bigger promotion – of the possibility of filling MS Dhoni’s recently vacated boots in India’s Test team.”Yeah, obviously. Dhoni retiring is a big plus for other keepers as well,” Gautam says. “Obviously if I do well this season my name will come up in the selection meetings, that is for sure. I have been playing well in the Ranji Trophy for the last 3-4 years, consistently.”I have a good chance, I feel, and I feel I’m the right person to replace Dhoni, in terms of batting. I can give the support to the Indian team’s batting line-up, batting at seven, which I have been doing for the last few seasons. So my chances are bright, I feel. I’ve started well this season, and hopefully I can continue to get runs.”