Before Kapil Dev changed the equation of Indian cricket by bowling fast and hitting the ball hard, Mulvantrai ‘Vinoo’ Mankad was accepted as the greatest all-rounder to have played for the country.
With good reason.
Mankad, through his long career, could hold his own as a genuine batsman. He opened the innings in as many as 40 of his 72 Test innings. Blessed with incredible powers of concentration and solid defence, he could also hit the ball hard when required. Possessing a good cover drive and strong leg side strokes, he was perhaps the first Indian batsman to loft balls into vacant areas in the outfield without trying to clear the ground.
As a left-arm spinner, he was one of the best in business. In his early days he toyed with a chinaman, but wisely gave it up to focus on conventional spin. He sometimes punctuated his orthodox slow break with a faster one that deceived the best of batsmen. He could vary his flight and turn — as the legend goes — in infinitesimal degrees till a batsman playing forward for overs at a stretch suddenly found himself beaten, marginally out of his ground and stumped.
Finally, at the end of the day full of heroics with the bat and the ball, his dapper self would never be seen with one hair out of place. He endorsed Brylcreem and used it too.
In The Romance of Indian Cricket, Sujit Mukherjee was almost at a loss about what to name the chapter on this fantastic all-rounder, before deciding on ‘Magnifico’. That is exactly what Mankad was.
Vinoo Mankad was born on Apr 12, 1917.