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| Sunday, 7 July 2002 |
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Murali more consistent than Warne - Barney Reid by A.C. DE SILVA Who is the better bowler - Australia's Shane Warne or Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralitharan? This was the burning question that I was waiting to ask another great bowler of his time - former Thomian cricketer Barney Reid who was on holiday here from Australia. Barney Reid needs no introduction to cricketers and fans alike here, as he played a lot of cricket for S. Thomas' during the sixties - 1963 to 1965, played a season or so for BRC in the Saravanamuttu Trophy tournament before making Australia his home in 1968. Muralitharan is a great bowler and Barney Reid is of the view that 'Murali' is going to break the world record for the most number of Test scalps before Shane Warne get to that mark. 'I think Murali has about 30 or 40 odd wickets to get and he will do it in less number of Tests as well," said Reid who added: "They are completely different bowlers - Murali is an off-spinner and Warne a right-arm leg-spinner. I would like them to bowl together in the same team to see who the better is. The off-spinner tends to have a little more control and speaking of Murali he turns his off-spinners more than what a leg-spinner would turn." Speaking of Shane Warne, he doesn't like to bowl to left-handers because the left-handers usually stick the bat and pad together and the bowler for most times can't get past the batsmen. The off-spinner gets the ball to come in and he does it quite often - more than Warne. I guess bowling to left-handers, Murali is far superior to Shane Warne. Speaking of right-hand batsmen, Muralitharan is just as effective," said Reid. Asked if he had a choice between the two, whom will he have on his side? Pop came the reply - It's Murali as he is able to be more consistent because Shane Warne tends to have too many off days besides bowling well on some days." To the Thomians, the name of Bryan Reid - better known as Barney, is a household name. He comes from a family of cricketers - Claude, Ronald, Dr. Buddy and Johann or 'Tiny' being the last of the five brothers. All brothers played cricket for S. Thomas' with Barney playing from 1963 to 1965 and he was a three-in-one cricketer - opening batsman, left-arm seam bowler and left-arm leg-spinner. It was in bowling that he performed best and his best performance came in an inter-school match for S. Thomas' against St. Sebastian's where he got 8 wickets in an innings in his debut performance in the lead-up for the 1963 season. Playing in the Royal-Thomian encounters, he went wicketless in the first year, but got three wickets and four wickets in the two innings of the 1964 and 1965 encounters. In batting, he got one or two scores of 70 and 80 and a few half 'tons' as well in inter-school cricket. After having just one season of Saravanamuttu Trophy cricket for the BRC in 1967 (his elder brother Claude was a stalwart there at that time) and Barney went there purely because of his brother Claude and not with any other interest, as he was due to migrate to Australia soon. He had a good bowl against Tamil Union, claiming 8 for 17 and also played for the Cricket Board President's XI against Hyderabad Blues. Barney Reid is a good cricketer and many followers of the game know this fact, but what many people don't know is the fact that he is a qualified cricket umpire too, besides being a coach. An umpire "Umpiring has done a lot for my coaching than anything else because when one looks at a lot of things from a different perspective, one learns a lot. One comes to know what the umpires are looking for, say an lbw decision rather than what a player thinks of an lbw decision. At times as an umpire, you are prepared to give a decision, but there is no appeal by the players," he said. He officiates in club cricket. Though an Australian citizen, he started coaching in England as a professional. Replying to an advertisement, he was successful when he applied for a coaching job in Durham Senior League in 1978, as the secretary then Ian Lindsay is the President now and Barney's trip to Sri Lanka a few days ago was to be at Lindsay whose son is getting married and Barney is a special guest. When he went to Australia in 1968, he played club cricket with Melbourne Cricket Club where his elder brother Claude was there so that he wouldn't feel lonely and was introduced to the club where Leo O'Brien (who did a coaching stint here in Sri Lanka) was a stalwart at Melbourne Cricket Club. He played club cricket as at that time, Victoria State were not taking overseas players into the Sheffield side. The policy has now changed. When Barney was playing club cricket, Ray Bright was playing for Victoria and Reid had more wickets, but didn't get the chance of playing for Victoria may be for the fact that he was an overseas player. He also did better than Jim Higgs. He is an accountant by profession in Melbourne and went through Melbourne University and did everything he should have done in Sri Lanka. Reid started umpiring and carried on for five years when he finished playing serious cricket due to a health problem and also threw his weight with coaching the youngsters. He umpired in club cricket in Victoria and progressed upto 'A' division level and also did a little bit of under 19 Australian Carnival where all state teams gather and he was one of two umpires nominated from Victoria for the carnival in 1996-97. In coaching, Barney followed Victoria coaching program through Level 1 and Level 2 and coaching at Level 3 had been confined to Adelaide only then, but now each state is to run own Level 3 coaching scheme and Reid intends following that course when he gets back to Melbourne. Cricket coach Right now, he is coaching 'A' grade club and he is in the panel of Victorian Coaches Association. There are 16 clubs in the association, besides Barney, there's the Victorian coach and their under 19 coach in this exclusive club. When asked to what should be done to improve the standard of Sri Lanka's cricket, Barney Reid did not waste time and promptly said that discipline is the most important ingredient in any sport. The batsmen and bowlers alike must have discipline, he said. The batsmen may have all the shots and they want to play them all the time, but when one gets to the high level, one should play only a percentage of shots and one should be 100 per cent sure about the shots that one plays and they must bring value for the effort put in. There is no point in taking risks to get a single. One should drive the ball only when it is right up to you, anything short of that you should block. There is no point going out there and having crack right from the outset and lose a few wickets and be on the defence for the rest of the game. Even in the case of the bowlers, there should be discipline. The bowlers should bowl on a decent line and the line should not be the off stump, it should be six inches outside the off stump and this is the line which will make it difficult for the batsmen. The above should suit both the young cricketers in the under-12, 14 and 16 age groups and the senior cricketers too. Speaking of young cricketers, it is not required to bowl five or six different balls in an over but it more important to bowl the ball on the right spot, but if you do bowl on the wrong spot you are likely to get hammered all over the field. Asked whether the limited over version of the game is suited for young cricketers, Reid was of the view that the cricketers must adapt themselves to both types - the longer version of the game and also limited over cricket. "You should not hang your hat on one facet of the game, because it might not bring you results. So, you should keep your options open and be able to adapt oneself to any eventuality. Sri Lanka's cricketers have been used to swinging the bat and making runs in the one-day game, but now the longer during of the game has taken its place. Test cricket was dying when one-day cricket came in and but Test cricket has been revived 'and now to me, one-day has become terribly boring whereas Test cricket has taken over. In one-day cricket, the bowlers try to keep the batsmen quiet and that's all what the bowlers are doing as compared to Test matches when the bowlers try to get wickets using your brains. In Test cricket one tries to buy wickets. Barney Reid, though 56 years right now, looks still good for cricket and his coaching has made him keep fit. His wife Rani is an Educationist - teaching physiology in the final year in Melbourne University, while sons Sam is 28 years and is manager for Victoria and Tasmania at McDonalds (marketing) and Hemish is a doctor of Chinese Medicine. |
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