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 Vijay Merchant in 1936 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Personal information | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Full name | Vijay Singh Madhavji Merchant | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | (1911-10-12)12 October 1911 Bombay,Bombay Presidency,British India | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Died | 27 October 1987(1987-10-27) (aged 76) Bombay,Maharashtra, India | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Batting | Right-handed | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Bowling | Right-arm medium | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Role | Batsman | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| International information | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| National side |
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| Test debut (cap 15) | 15 December 1933 v England | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Last Test | 2 November 1951 v England | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Domestic team information | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Years | Team | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1929–1951 | Bombay | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Career statistics | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Source:ESPNcricinfo,21 March 2019 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Vijay Singh Madhavji Merchantpronunciationⓘ, (bornVijay Madhavji Thackersey;[1][2] 12 October 1911 – 27 October 1987) was an Indiancricketer. A right-hand batsman and occasional right-arm medium pace bowler, Merchant playedfirst-class cricket forBombay cricket team as well as 10Test matches forIndia between 1929 and 1951. Behind his limited Test appearances, he dominated Indian domestic cricket – hisbatting average of 71.64 is the second highest first-class average in history, behind only that ofDon Bradman.[3] He is regarded as the founder of the Bombay School of Batsmanship,[4] that placed more importance on right technique, steely temperament, and conservative approach rather than free flow of the bat.[citation needed]
His international career included two tours of England upon which he scored over 800 runs. English cricketerC. B. Fry exclaimed "Let us paint him white and take him with us to Australia as an opener."[3] His brother,Uday, also played first-class cricket.
Besides cricket, he was also associated with the Hindoostan Spinning & Weaving Mills (Thackersey Group) and was theSheriff of Bombay in 1970.[citation needed]
Merchant was born in Bombay, into a wealthyGujarati family in 1911.[5][6][2][7] He was an "outstanding college cricketer" who captainedSydenham College, while studying there;[3] his success for Sydenham led to selection forHindus cricket team during the 1929Bombay Quadrangular. He also continued to play for Sydenham and in 1931 he set the record in Bombay inter-collegiate cricket by scoring 504 runs and taking 29 wickets. His continued success in domestic cricket resulted in the call to theIndia national team to play against the visiting English team atBombay Gymkhana, which was also thefirst Test to be played on Indian soil.[8]
Throughout his career, Merchant was involved in a rivalry with the other great Indian batsman of the era,Vijay Hazare, with each trying to better the scores of the other.[9] In the 1943Bombay Pentangular final against the Rest, Merchant bettered Hazare's tournament record score of 248, set in the previous match against the Muslims, with 250not out. Hazare responded with a 309 out of a team total of 387 in the same match.[10][11] Less than a month later, Merchant topped that by amassing 359 not out againstMaharashtra in theRanji Trophy,[12] setting a then record for the highest score in Indian first-class cricket.[13]
Merchant's Test career spanned 18 years but during that time he played only tenTest matches, and was unfortunate that some of the best years of his career were lost to theSecond World War, when no international cricket was played. He also missed tours to Australia and the West Indies due to poor health.[3] However, Merchant went out to score 154in his last Test match against England inDelhi, which was also his highest Test score. A shoulder injury incurred while fielding in that game forced him to retire. All ten matches of Merchant's Test career were againstEngland.
Merchant had a particularly successfulEngland tour of 1946. Despite facing difficulty againstswing bowling when the ball moved away after pitching on the leg stump, he scored 2,385 runs including sevencenturies in the 41 innings he batted, at anaverage of 74.53. In his column, former cricketerLearie Constantine wrote, "... this (Merchant) world-beater so adapted himself to the circumstances that he produced cricket of the highest class, never refusing the challenge to score when the dice was not too heavily loaded against the side."[14]
Merchant went on to become a cricket administrator, broadcaster, writer and national selector, and charitable advocate of the handicapped.[3]
"Cricket with Vijay Merchant" was a radio programme hosted by Merchant. It was broadcast on Sunday afternoons[year needed],[15] onVividh Bharati, Anu D. Aggarwal quotes a survey, which revealed that it was one of the most listened to sponsored programmes.[16]
Although Merchant played only ten Test matches, he is widely considered to be one of the greatest batmen of his era.[3] He was an attractive stroke maker, who "developed fine footwork, and built a stroke repertoire featuring a lovely cut, grasscutting drives, a delicate glance and late-cut, and, until later in his career, a brilliant hook stroke."[3] Hisbatting average infirst-class cricket was 71.64, putting him second only toDon Bradman of Australia. In India's domesticRanji Trophy matches, Merchant fared even better, averaging 98.75 in 47 innings. His record is especially impressive as his runs came at a time of uncovered wickets. He was one of the fiveWisden Cricketers of the Year in 1937. Merchant is also the oldest Indian player to score aTest century. He scored 154 when he was 40 years 21 days duringEngland's 1951–52 tour of India.[3]
During his career, Merchant scored eleven double-centuries in first-class cricket, the most by an Indian batsman. The record stood until November 2017, whenCheteshwar Pujara scored his twelfth double-century batting forSaurashtra againstJharkhand in the2017–18 Ranji Trophy.[17][18]
TheBoard of Control for Cricket in India named its under-16 domestic cricket tournamentVijay Merchant Trophy in his honour.[19]
Perhaps the most emphatic illustration of the old-money attitude to Indian cricket is provided by Vijay Merchant and his family firm of Thackersey of Mumbai. This is one of the old established mill-owning families of Bombay, part of the Gujarati textile owners who shaped the city. Merchant's name should have been Vijay Thackersey. But when he was trying to explain his name to his English principal, he took so long and got so involved in the intricacies of the Gujarati family, that the principal decided that, since Vijay clearly belonged to the merchant class, he would have the surname Merchant.
Great names of this era include Vijay Merchant, from a family of wealthy Gujarati industrialists.
Though they came from vastly different social strata, Amar and Vijay Merchant became great friends—their common mother tongue of Gujarati perhaps being one reason. Outside royalty Merchant was one of the wealthiest Indian cricketers of his time.
Merchant was Gujarati, a very wealthy businessman, and therefore set somewhat apart from the public that acclaimed his feats.
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