‘He was North pole and I was South pole,’ Kris Srikkanth calls former India opener a ‘perfectionist’

Srikkanth and Gavaskar opened the innings 55 times for India, scoring 1680 runs at an average of 30.54 with two century and 11 fifty-plus stands.

Kris Srikkanth has called his former India teammate Sunil Gavaskar a ‘perfectionist’, explaining how he was completely opposite to his captain and opening partner in terms of technique. Srikkanth made his debut for India in the year 1981 and in him and Gavaskar, India found a bankable opening pair. Srikkanth said his unorthodox batting style threw oppositions off guard, while Gavaskar remained the epitome of batsmanship.

File photo of former India batsman Kris Srikkanth(PTI Image)

“I made my debut in 81 and in the early 80s, nobody had seen that kind of game,” Srikkanth said on the Cricket Connected Show on Star Sports Tamil.

“When they saw me, everyone went like who is this batsman, who is playing across the line, hitting over the top and I did not worry about technique. Gavaskar on the other hand was a perfectionist. He had great technique, he used to leave the ball and everything so well. It is often said that opposite poles attract each other. He was the North pole and I was the South pole.”

Talking about the camaraderie, Gavaskar once said that Srikkanth “liberated” him as a batsman. In fact, former India allrounder and captain Kapil Dev recently said that Gavaskar and Srikkanth would have been sought-after T20 batsmen if they had played in the current era.

“Sunil would have been a sought-after batsman in T20,” Kapil was quoted as saying by the Sportstar in March. “Srikkanth started T20 in 1985 when he was smashing Imran Khan and Wasim Akram over cover and mid-off. We used to wonder what was this guy doing.”

Together, Srikkanth and Gavaskar opened the innings 55 times for India, scoring 1680 runs at an average of 30.54 with two century and 11 fifty-plus stands. They are India’s fifth most successful opening pairs in ODIs after Sachin Tendulkar-Sourav Ganguly, Shikhar Dhawan-Rohit Sharma, Tendulkar-Virender Sehwag and Sehwag-Gautam Gambhir.