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circketer Erapalli Prasanna
Erapalli Prasanna Profile
Full Name: Erapalli Anatharao Srinivas Prasanna
Born: May 22, 1940, Bangalore, Karnataka
Major teams: India, Karnataka, Mysore
Batting style: Right-hand bat
Bowling style: Right-arm offbreak
Achievements:
- One of the famed Indian Spin Quartet
- Took 25 wickets in four Tests to help India record its first overseas series victory (against New Zealand in 1967-68)
Erapalli Anantharao Srinivas Prasanna, commonly known as E.Prasanna or simply Prasanna, has been an Indian Cricket player and a specialist of Off Spin Bowling. Prasanna was one of the 4 legendary Spin Bowlers constituting the famous Indian Spin Quartet, the other 3 being Srinivas Venkataraghavan, Bhagwat Chandrasekhar and Bishen Singh Bedi apart from him. He was one of the most difficult Off Spin bowlers to play even at good pitches, and was considered to be a Cricket player with the prowess of a Chess Grandmaster, owing to his mysteriously deceptive bowling.
Early Life and Test Debut
E. Prasanna was born on the 22nd of May 1940 at Bangalore, Karnataka. He played all the Test Cricket, First class Cricket and the List A Cricket matches during his Cricket career. Although he began playing Test matches at an age of 21 years, after playing just 2 matches, one against England and another against Wes Indies, he left playing Cricket for some years in order to finish his undergraduate studies. In these 2 matches he scored 33 runs, took 4 wickets and gave away 161 runs in total.
After finishing his studies he reappeared upon the Cricket scene in the year 1967, and played his 3rd Test match against West Indies at Chennai on 13th of Jan 1967. He took 5 wickets and gave away 224 runs in this match, scoring 25 runs. As a matter of fact, the reigning Captain of the Indian team, Nawab Pataudi Jr. was very fond of his abilities, and offered him a number of chances to play in various matches. Still, a number of times he became a victim of the team and selection politics wherein he dropped out several times in order to benefit S. Venkataraghavan, a yet another member of the Spin Quartet.
Peculiar Tactics
Prasanna was famous for spinning the ball in a looping fashion, often leading the batsman to hit the ball up in the air. He also used to bounce the ball quite high, and used to calmly lure the batsman to commit a mistake for long overs.
The Last Moments
Following a tour to Pakistan in the year 1978 after which Bishan Singh Bedi and Bhagwat Chandrasekhar also left the team, Prasanna declared his retirement from playing Cricket. In his last Test match that he played against Pakistan on 27th of October 1978, he took no wicket giving away 94 runs. He scored 5 runs in this match.
Overall Performance
In his overall Test Cricket career, E. Prasanna played 49 Test matches in which he grabbed 189 wickets and gave away 5742 runs with an average of 30.38 runs. He scored 735 runs in these matches with an average of 11.48 runs and a highest score of 37 runs.
Other Achievements
Prasanna has written an autobiography titled One More Over. He was conferred upon with the Padma Shri Award in the year 1970 and the Castrol Lifetime Achievement Award in the year 2006.