Pravin Amre - Another lost talent in the 90s

[Real McCoy]

Pravin Amre scored a debut century in Durban on a difficult wicket and coming in at 38/4 against Donald, Schultz, Pringle, and McMillan. After that lost in contention because they didnt want to drop Shastri and Manjrekar who turned out to be duds. He was asked to play in the veterans' squad along Sandeep Patil when he was 29 . Our selection policy in the 90s were really weird and regional. He even played for Boland, a South African first class team. I found these interesting articles on what Pravin went through.

 

http://m.rediff.com/sports/1998/jul/31a.htm

https://www.cricketcountry.com/articles/pravin-amre-scores-a-gem-of-a-hundred-on-debut-211143

https://www.cricketcountry.com/articles/pravin-amre-an-unfulfilled-international-playing-career-but-promising-future-as-a-coach-29927

 

Edited January 16, 2019 by Real McCoy

[mani sha]

he was a bery good player of fast bowling . better defende than dravid 

he couldnt get in primarily cos india had middle order filled up with azar jadeja sachin kambli and manjrekar

 

by time any spot opened he was not in contention . remember that this was also the tie of serious regional quota - mumbai had too many players and so u would get crazy selections 

 

noel david from hydrerabad for example

dodda ganesh ... 

 

a good bowler like kuruwilla was taken after his prime ( he was a145 k bowler and after years of toiling in domestic cricket he was taken when bowling at 130 k trundling speed)

 

90s was all abt winninh test matches at home( read three spinners and turning pitches ), touring abroad with hopes of at least one draw and lots of corruption

[Number]

Mumbai Karnataka quota ruined our cricket in 90s.

The most unfortunate was Ashish Zaidi. Tall fast bowler who could bowl in 135 140 range. Never got a chance even likes of Dodda Ganesh played ahead of him.

[Real McCoy]

What pissed me off was he was considered second best to Manjrekar and Shastri which is not true. Gavaskar was still playing in Ranji trophy in the late 80s it seems. And he was shuttled from Railways to Rajasthan to Goa etc and finally back to Mumbai. By then RD and Saurav had been established and kicked the useless Manju for good.

 

If Amre was given a chance to play few more series, he would have come good. What and all we used to watch. Venkatesh "legcutter" Prasad, Dodda Ganesh, Kuruvilla, David Johnson, Ajay Jadeja opening, Nayan Mongia opening. I was very young by that time but my older relatives used to tell me he showed a lot of class and match awareness. Amre could have strengthened our batting in overseas tours where we used to lay eggs

[diga]

Amre played in the 92 series.. The middle order of Jadeja/MongiaDravid/Ganguly & the bowlers Prasad/Ganesh/Johnson all played in 1996 or later.. 

Amre could not hold onto his position during those 4 years from 1992 to 1996. Whats the story here?

[GolGappe]

Kind of hard done by.

If I remember correctly, he played couple of domestic seasons in RSA.

 

[Real McCoy]

 

 

In the ODI match, he was partnered by V Yadav who scored 20 something in 15 balls. He was wearing a cap when facing Donald.

[Pollack]

1 hour ago, Real McCoy said:

What pissed me off was he was considered second best to Manjrekar and Shastri which is not true. Gavaskar was still playing in Ranji trophy in the late 80s it seems. And he was shuttled from Railways to Rajasthan to Goa etc and finally back to Mumbai. By then RD and Saurav had been established and kicked the useless Manju for good.

 

If Amre was given a chance to play few more series, he would have come good. What and all we used to watch. Venkatesh "legcutter" Prasad, Dodda Ganesh, Kuruvilla, David Johnson, Ajay Jadeja opening, Nayan Mongia opening. I was very young by that time but my older relatives used to tell me he showed a lot of class and match awareness. Amre could have strengthened our batting in overseas tours where we used to lay eggs

Amre may or may not have been good if he had proper chances. Don't know why people are over reacting. A good coach does not necessarily mean he would have been successful batsman too. Infact most of the times it's opposite. I have read articles regarding bangar helping players out with technique. Now bangar wasn't exactly a specimen of great technique.

Edited January 16, 2019 by Pollack

[zen]

Should have got more chances .... was moved around the batting order and no one took the initiative to settle him down. Much like how Rahane is being supported now, others in the team were given preference 

[Real McCoy]

9 minutes ago, zen said:

Should have got more chances .... was moved around the batting order and no one took the initiative to settle him down. Much like how Rahane is being supported now, others in the team were given preference 

Ironically Amre is Rahane's coach and was critical of Kohli dropping Rahane in SA.

[neel roy]

Pravin Amre s misfortune was after Indias tour to South Africa India did not have a tour abroad for 4 years when Sourav Dravid came in..during 1992 to 1996 India was playing at home and thrashing hapless English team with sub standard pitches,Wadekar as a coach and Azhars amazing luck in winning tosses while playing in India (it as like a vodoo,he would always win important tosses)..so for these 4 years Amre had few opportunities to prove he was a genuine player of fast bowling..Tendulkar Azhar was at their prime..Kambli debuted and scored those double centuries,manjrekar prodded along and we had Sidhu opening..Amre played in few tests but couldnt cement his place..

Edited January 16, 2019 by neel roy

[Real McCoy]

21 minutes ago, Pollack said:

Amre may or may not have been good if he had proper chances. Don't know why people are over reacting. A good coach does not necessarily mean he would have been successful batsman too. Infact most of the times it's opposite. I have read articles regarding bangar helping players out with technique. Now bangar wasn't exactly a specimen of great technique.

Nobody is connecting his coaching abilities to his career as a barsman. I'm just wondering how he got dropped after he got a successful start. He may or may not have been successful but I feel he was dropped soon. And India didn't have batting talent coming through the ranks in the early 90s.

Edited January 16, 2019 by Real McCoy

[ShoonyaSifar]

He was a prodigy. IIRC when he was picked for India in 1991, his FC average was 85-86 and was playing for Rajasthan! Was with the team for over a year before making his test debut but did not get backed enough.

 

Great to see him contribute as a coach now.

[sandeep]

3 hours ago, Number said:

Mumbai Karnataka quota ruined our cricket in 90s.

The most unfortunate was Ashish Zaidi. Tall fast bowler who could bowl in 135 140 range. Never got a chance even likes of Dodda Ganesh played ahead of him.

How is picking Jadeja (Saurashtra) ahead of Pravin Amre (Bombay) an example of "Mumbai quota"?  

[ShoonyaSifar]

2 minutes ago, sandeep said:

How is picking Jadeja (Saurashtra) ahead of Pravin Amre (Bombay) an example of "Mumbai quota"?  

Amre played a season for Mumbai at the start of his FC season and moved to Railways then to Rajasthan which is when he made his India debut. Was not from Mumbai quota. Only later in his FC career he moved back to Mumbai But he did lose out to Manjrekar in 1994-95 despite being in better form. 

[maniac]

This Mumbai quota or even Chennai quota bs started after the IPL.

 

Sure regional quotas existed but if anything 90s was more like a Karnataka quota where anybody and everybody representing Karnataka got a shot at test cricket thanks to Brijesh patel . Sure there were a few who deserved on merit.

 

Shastri never played after the 92 SA series and Manju was in and out in the mid 90s even though in 88-91 he was hailed as the next big thing even ahead of Sachin.

 

Keep dumb IPL out atleast when you are having a proper cricket discussion

[maniac]

In the 90s India hardly played test cricket. Meanwhile Likes of Greg Blewett played 46 tests lol. We had a dumb triangular odi every other week amidst series. Didn’t we play a trainagular series over lapping with a odi series once?

 

Amre had a poor Odi record and was dropped from tests based on that which was unfair too but back then such separation of tests and odi didn’t exist like now

 

 

[Number]

32 minutes ago, sandeep said:

How is picking Jadeja (Saurashtra) ahead of Pravin Amre (Bombay) an example of "Mumbai quota"?  

Amre played for Mumbai after 1998. 

[Number]

16 minutes ago, maniac said:

This Mumbai quota or even Chennai quota bs started after the IPL.

 

Sure regional quotas existed but if anything 90s was more like a Karnataka quota where anybody and everybody representing Karnataka got a shot at test cricket thanks to Brijesh patel . Sure there were a few who deserved on merit.

 

Shastri never played after the 92 SA series and Manju was in and out in the mid 90s even though in 88-91 he was hailed as the next big thing even ahead of Sachin.

 

Keep dumb IPL out atleast when you are having a proper cricket discussion

Self contradiction ?

[Vijy]

4 hours ago, Real McCoy said:

Pravin Amre scored a debut century in Durban on a difficult wicket and coming in at 38/4 against Donald, Schultz, Pringle, and McMillan. After that lost in contention because they didnt want to drop Shastri and Manjrekar who turned out to be duds. He was asked to play in the veterans' squad along Sandeep Patil when he was 29 . Our selection policy in the 90s were really weird and regional. He even played for Boland, a South African first class team. I found these interesting articles on what Pravin went through.

 

http://m.rediff.com/sports/1998/jul/31a.htm

https://www.cricketcountry.com/articles/pravin-amre-scores-a-gem-of-a-hundred-on-debut-211143

https://www.cricketcountry.com/articles/pravin-amre-an-unfulfilled-international-playing-career-but-promising-future-as-a-coach-29927

 

he was a very good player. in the 1990s, prior to ganguly-dravid-laxman, we had only 3 batsmen in total who averaged over 40 - sidhu (opener), SRT and Azhar, as well as kambli during his short career. apart from this trio, I'm quite certain amre was better than the rest. a shame that he was discarded so soon.