Kiran More

Kiran More Biography

Kiran More was too good a wicketkeeper to be remembered for wrong reasons, but such has been his fate.

Dropping Graham Gooch at 36 saw the England captain proceed to 333 and marked the lapse as the costliest of drops. Later Javed Miandad jumped like a kangaroo after an altercation during a crucial World Cup encounter. Still later, large sections of the Indian cricket fandom turned against More when, as selector, he dropped Sourav Ganguly.

The Gooch lapse cannot be undone, but More did redeem himself by catching the stalwart unaware and on the line as he whipped off the bails at Eden Gardens in the 1992-93 Test. The Miandad episode showed his value as a ’keeper — his chirping could lift the side as well as get under the skin of the most seasoned of foes. Finally, Ganguly’s figures had been deplorable for a few years at the stage when he was omitted, with his average in the low 30s. The omission rightly placed merit as the prerequisite to selection and also saw the southpaw fight his way back into the side as a better batsman.

But all that aside, More was probably the greatest wicketkeeper to play for India bar, arguably, Syed Kirmani. He was supreme at home, keeping to the spinners with lightning glovework. At Madras, he set a world record as batsman after batsman of West Indies jumped out to Narendra Hirwani and More kept whipping off the bails. On foreign pitches he had the ability to dive and pick up some unbelievable catches. And he could collect throws on the run as none other.

In front of the stumps he was always gutsy and sometimes brilliant. When he matched Kapil Dev stroke for stroke in the Reliance Cup, it led Ravi Chaturvedi to the immortal Hindi line, “Bade miyan to bade miyan, chhote miya subhan-allah.”

In lands of hostile pace, including West Indies, Australia, South Africa and Pakistan, he scored fighting half centuries from the lower order. He did the same in England in seaming conditions.

He scored 49 in the low-scoring Kotla match against Courtney Walsh, Patrick Patterson, Winston Benjamin and Winston Davis. At Bridgetown, he fought for a fifty against Malcolm Marshall, Curtly Ambrose, Ian Bishop and Courtney Walsh after coming in at 63 for 6. At Karachi he did so against Imran Khan, Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis. At Napier and Auckland he repeated the feat against Richard Hadlee and Danny Morrison. At Melbourne he did the same against Craig McDermott, Bruce Reid and Merv Hughes. At Durban he batted five hours against Alan Donald, Meryick Pringle, Craig McMillan and Brett Schulz.

Every time he performed rescue operations when the more established names had been vanquished. It was up to his small frame to carry the burden of the innings. In his early days, on the Bangalore minefield against Pakistan in 1987, he was promoted up the order because he was acknowledged as a better player of spin.

Never was his fighting batsmanship on better display than in the Duleep Trophy final of 1988-89. With West Zone struggling at 117 for 5, the top order shaken by strikes from Kapil and Maninder Singh, More trotted in to score 113 from 144 balls with 12 fours and 4 sixes. It was a spectacular knock.

After his Test playing days, More continued to play for Baroda, often as a specialist batsman when Nayan Mongia donned the bigger gloves. In 1996-97, his penultimate season as a First-Class cricketer, he scored 714 runs at 54.92, including 180 against Maharashtra.

Upon retirement, More launched his own cricket academy and worked as a coach in Bangladesh, Kenya, and Uganda. Later he became the Chairman of National Selectors.

Arunabha Sengupta

Kiran More Batting & Fielding Averages

Career	M	In	R	NO	HS	Avg	BF	SR	100s	50s	4s	6s	Ct	St
Test	49	64	1285	14	73	25.70	3236	39.70	0	7	130	--	110	20
ODIs	94	65	563	22	42*	13.09	806	69.85	0	0	42	3	63	27
T20s	0	--	--	--		--	--	--	--	--	--	--	--	--
World Cup	14	10	100	5	42*	20.00	86	116.2	0	0	10	1	12	6

Kiran More Bowling Averages

Career	M	B	R	W	Avg	EC	SR	5WI	10WM	BBI	BBM
Test	49	12	12	0	--	6.000	--	0	0	0/12	0/12
ODIs	94	--	--	--	--	--	--	--	--
T20s	0	--	--	--	--	--	--	--	--
World Cup	14	--	--	--	--	--	--	--	--		--

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