Venkatesh Prasad picked 96 Test wickets and 196 ODI wickets in 194 international matches for India from 1994-2001, but he is really known for his one spell against Aamir Sohail, Pakistani opener during the high voltage India-Pakistan tie in the Wills World Cup 1996 quarter-final in Bangalore.
India had batted first and thanks to amazing batting by Navjot Singh Sidhu and Ajay Jadeja piled up a total in excess of 280 in their 50 overs. However, Pak openers Sohail and Saeed Anwar went hammer and tongs at Indian bowlers until Anwar fell on a team score of 84 in the 11th over.
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Sohail continued and made 55 but then made the folly of aggravating Venkatesh Prasad by using some choicest words and gesturing after hitting him for a four over the point fielder. Trying to repeat the shot again the next ball, Prasad bowled him and gave him a terrific sendoff which is still highly viewed on YouTube.
Talking about the same, Prasad said, "There's not even a single day that goes by without anybody, whoever sees me, come what may, would definitely ask me, every single day from the last 24 years.”
"He should've just gone back to his crease probably after getting that, but there was some exchange of words and a gesture that he made which didn't really go well. Obviously, with the entire nation and spectators who were watching, and of course, with me as well. My blood was really boiling and we needed a wicket,” he added.
Talking about getting penalized for his sendoff to Sohail, Prasad thanked Srinath, Tendulkar, and other teammates for coming to his rescue.
"I would've been penalized for that sort of gesture because that's when the ICC Code of Conduct had come into the picture during the '96 World Cup; so I had to be very careful. And Shepherd was the umpire, so Azhar, Srinath and Sachin, everybody came to my rescue, otherwise, I would've probably been penalized or maybe banned," he said.
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After retiring from the game, Prasad turned coach for the U19 team for the Youth World Cup in 2006 and the likes of Rohit Sharma, Cheteshwar Pujara, Piyush Chawla and Ravindra Jadeja were under his tutelage.
Now talking about the colts he helped groom for the international stage, Prasad said, "These three guys -- Piyush Chawla, Cheteshwar Pujara, Rohit Sharma -- I had no doubt about their talent and their capabilities. I knew very well that they're going to go a long way. In fact, the moment the U-19 World Cup (2006) was over, I did write to BCCI in my report saying that these players should be fast-tracked into playing Ranji Trophy or the zone matches, this is what I had said," he told FanCode.
Prasad was also the bowling coach of the Indian team when they won the inaugural ICC World T20 in 2007 under the captaincy of MS Dhoni.
(IANS inputs)
