Eknath Dhondu Solkar: An Inspirational All-Rounder Who Overcome All the Challenges in His life To Became the Top Cricketer.

Eknath Dhondu Solkar: An Inspirational All-Rounder Who Overcome All the Challenges in His life To Became the Top Cricketer.

“I don’t remember him taking evasive action at all nor for that matter getting hit by a batsman. He was not afraid of fielding close to the batsmen because he had this extraordinary anticipation of catches at the forward short-leg position and could sense when a batsman even offered a half chance that he could turn into a catch”. These are the words of great Indian Off spinner Erapalli Prasanna has said this when he was talking with such a cricket player who could open the inning or could play in middle order as a batsman; he could bowl with new ball or could spin the ball once it became old and revolutionized close up fielder in the game of cricket. He was a left-handed batsman and a left-arm bowler and was known as poor man’s Sobers for his all-round abilities. He had not made any records with his bat and bowl but he was a genius fielder and very few could be compared with him.  He was an extraordinary fielder to the Indian spin quartet of Bishan Singh Bedi, Erapalli Prasanna, S Venkataraghavan and B S Chandrasekhar.  They greatly relied on him to get the breakthroughs. Another great leg spinner Bishan Singh Bedi has said, ‘His close-in catching was really intimidating. We would not have been the same bowlers without him”. As per former England Captain Tony Greig, “Ekki was the best forward short leg fielder during his time”. Eknath Dhondu Solkar was a very useful all-rounder and superlative fielder.

From Yogesh Gogwekar

Eknath Solkar was born on 18th March 1948 at Mumbai to a humble family. His father was a poor gardener of P J Hindu Gymkhana on Marine Drive where Eknath was helping him to change the scoreboards during the matches played at the ground. He grew up with his parents and siblings in one room.  He started learning cricket at Hindu Gymkhana and started bowling to the players in the nets. During the net practices, he was spotted by Madhav Mantri who was doing wicket keeping for Mumbai and also for India. Madhav Mantri made an arrangement for sending him to school. He did hard work to develop his game under the great all-rounder Vinoo Mankad. His consistent performance in the school cricket earned him a place in the All India School Boys’ team in 1965-66. He has been selected as Captain of the team and future Test cricket players like Sunil Gavaskar, Mohinder Amarnath, and Dheeraj Parsana played under him. He played for Sussex Second XI in 1969 and 1970 and had also been selected for the First XI but played only one match for them.

He was selected for Mumbai Ranji team in 1967-68. In one match between Mumbai verses Tamilnadu, Mumbai suddenly lost wickets of their key players and Solkar with the help of his Captain Manohar Hardikar did the partnership of 116 runs against the spinners like V.V. Kumar and S Venkataraghavan and save the certain defeat against Tamilnadu. There is one more story of his resilience when he was playing Ranji trophy match between Mumbai and Bengal. Just before the start of the match, his father had fallen down  on the staircase of Hindu Gymkhana and gone into Coma.  Solkar kept his sorrow to himself and concentrated on the game by hoping his father would be recovered very soon. He picked up three wickets and restricted Bengal to 387; but Mumbai started very badly and they lost five wickets very fast. Solkar with his friend Milind Rege helped the Mumbai team to get a lead in the first inning. On that day, his father died in the hospital. In Spite of this great loss, Solkar lit the funeral pyre of his father and went to Bat and scored 29 runs to get lead to his team and win the match.

Eknath Solkar played his first test match against New Zealand in 1969. In his first test, he only decided to do the field at forward short leg, but he really distinguished himself against the home series with Australia in 1969-70 in which he dismissed the Australian skipper and opening batsman Bill Lawry off Bedi. It was a thrill moment. Even Bill Lawry was thrilled and gave his bat to Solkar. His real stardom had started when he visited the West Indies. His fielding was amazing during this tour. He also proved his ability as all-rounder. He converted the catches out of nowhere and also contributed by bat at the time of requirement. When India was struggling 75 for 5, Dilip Sardesai was the only known Indian batsman batting. Eknath Solkar joined him and put a fine partnership which was blossoming. When they were batting, Ball lost the shape and Sobers. The captain of the West Indies team, asked for the change of ball. When the replacement ball was going on, Solkar asked for a check. Sobers did not like the demand of Solkar and reverted, ”What is the point? You will play and miss it”. Solkar immediately replied to him and said,” You play your game, we will play ours”. Many are remembering the 1971 series for Sunil Gavaskar for 774 runs or for the great batting of Dilip Sardesai and Salim Durani, but Solkar’s contribution was also great. He scored 55 runs and helped Sardesai to score his ton. He did this twice in the series, once at Port of Spain and another at Barbados.

In the same year, after some months, India toured England. In England, in the first test again Solkar rescued India in the first Test at Lord’s. India was 175 for 5 in the first inning when Solkar came to bat. Solkar with the help of tail ender scored 67 and helped India to get a lead of nine runs and saved this match for India. Similarly, he again rescued India in the second Test at Old Trafford and helped India to manage to draw the match. It will not be possible to think about Indian Cricket Test matches from 1969 to 1977 without the contribution of Eknath Dhondu Solkar. 

Eknath Dhondu Solkar was an amazing fielder at forward short leg. This is a very dangerous place to stand. Now a days, players are using protective gears like helmets and shin guards. Solkar used to stand at that position without using any modern protective gears. He was not aware of fear and used to convert the catch when the batsman played a full-blooded shot. He scooped the catches in a great anticipation. It is not possible to categorise his catches because he never waited for chanced but converted them into catches. No batsman in the world had imagined such types of catches. He had taken 53 catches in 27 Test matches but the catch he took to dismiss Allan Knott at Oval in 1971 has been considered the classic catch and considered as a “Catch of Century''.  According to John Arlott, he elevated close-in fielding to an art form. He further said,” He created catches out of thin air, like some Indian magician”.

Today’s Cricket Players are not happy to do the fielding at forward short leg as they think it is considered  suicidal to stand there even after wearing protective gear. Solkar did this without any hesitation. While paying tribute to Solkar, Bishan singh Bedi said,” we would never have been as successful without the catching ability of Solkar at Short leg”.  He was a team man and everyone wanted him in the team. He played only 27 Test matches and scored 1068 by playing 48 innings with an average of 25.02. He scored only one century against West Indies at Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai in 1975 series. As mentioned above, he took 53 catches. He bowled 2265 balls in 44 innings and got 18 wickets at the average of 59.44.  He played his last Test in 1977 against England at Kolkata. He played only 7 one day internationals in which he scored 27 runs in 6 innings with an average of 29.27 and bowled 252 balls in 6 innings and took 4 wickets with an average of 42.25. He took only 2 catches in one day. Apart from Test matches and one Day International, he played 189 first class matches scored 6851 in 270 innings with an average of 29.27 and took 190 catches and took 272 wickets in 21725 balls at the average of 30.

Such a great cricket player died on 26th June 2005 at the age of 57 due to cardiac arrest.  At the time of paying tribute to him, Erapalli Prasanna said, ”Eknath was the best close-in fielder I have ever seen. I watched him field and dive forward like a swimmer even in his younger days at the B J Hindu Gymkhana in Mumbai where the conditions were not conducive for diving. Later on, he proved to be a fearless all-rounder and gave us spinners the opportunity to have a go at the batsmen by merely fighting the ball”. He further said, ”For bowlers like Bishan (Bedi) and me, his presence at the close meant additional pressure on the batsmen. Every batsman had to play with extra care as Eknath would be waiting to scoop up the ball. His best catch was of Alan Knott at the forward short-leg off Venkat at The Oval during that historic win in 1971. We were close friends and our families kept in touch. We used to visit Solkar and his wife whenever we went to Mumbai. It is unfortunate that we let him pass away without taking his services to improve our fielding”.

I am closing this writing about Eknath Solkar with the incident which was recalled by India’s little Master Sunil Gavaskar when India was playing the Test match against the West Indies 1971. Gavaskar said,”Ekki was running backward for a catch, when we heard a spectator from the stand shouting in Caribbean accent Solkaarr, Solkaarr, I will give you my sister if you drop this catch”. When Eki took the catch, we asked him if he had heard something from the stands. He said no, he did not. But when we told him about it, he immediately turned towards the spectator and said ,”you keep your sister as I am married”.

Eknath Dhondu Solkar was really a great all-rounder which India missed today. He was a great fielder, useful batsman and bowler who could bowl with new and old ball. Do not forget as a bowler, he had dismissed Geoffrey Boycott four times in the 1971 series against England In England.

Mumbai

20/02/2021.