Sunil Gavaskar Recalls How Sir Garfield Sobers' Dropped Catches Helped Shape His Test Career During India's Historic 1971 West Indies Tour

Mumbai: For Sunil Gavaskar, Sir Garfield Sobers was more than the greatest all-rounder cricket had seen. He was a childhood idol whose presence inspired awe, whose extraordinary skills captivated generations and whose dropped catches inadvertently helped launch one of Indian cricket's most celebrated careers.

Speaking at a function organised to remember the West Indies legend, Gavaskar recalled watching Sobers from the stands at Mumbai's Brabourne Stadium in 1958, long before he imagined sharing a cricket field with him.

"I had watched him from the North Stand when the West Indies came in 1958. We were all disappointed when he got out for 25. Despite being Indians, we wanted to see Gary Sobers score runs," Gavaskar recalled.

The disappointment did not last long. In the second innings, Sobers produced a memorable knock, leaving the young Gavaskar spellbound.

Years later, when Gavaskar finally found himself sharing the field with Sobers, the fascination remained undiminished.

"We were all just watching the man. Watching him walk, watching him practise, watching him talk. We weren't focused on our own practice. Sobers was everybody's hero. We were just in awe of the man," he said.

Gavaskar revealed that his earliest cricketing hero was ML Jaisimha, while Rohan Kanhai and Sobers became his international idols.

As a youngster who fancied himself as a bowler, he even dreamt of dismissing both West Indies greats off successive deliveries.

"My one dream was that I would get Rohan Kanhai caught behind and, off the very next ball, get Garfield Sobers," he said, laughing at his youthful ambition.

But it was during India's historic 1971 tour of the Caribbean that Sobers became an unforgettable part of Gavaskar's cricketing journey.

Gavaskar recalled how Sobers dropped a catch off his bat early in his Test career, allowing him to score a half-century and strengthen his place in the Indian side.

"I went to drive a ball, got a thick outside edge and it went straight to Sobers. He dropped it. I went on to get a half-century and kept my place in the team," he said.

The Indian batting great joked that the missed opportunity had far-reaching consequences.

"If that edge had not been dropped, Adil would have had to look for somebody else to get this function going," he quipped.

Sobers subsequently dropped Gavaskar again, prompting Lance Gibbs to marvel at the youngster's extraordinary luck.

Gavaskar recalled Gibbs asking him, "What do you eat for breakfast? You must tell us. You're so lucky."

Sobers joined the banter, asking why Gavaskar kept hitting catches towards him instead of other fielders.

Then came an amusing reversal of fortunes.

"Sir Garfield said, 'I'm going to come and touch you for luck.' He came and touched me and went on to get a hundred," Gavaskar recalled.

Sobers continued the ritual in subsequent matches, visiting the Indian dressing room and asking for the young batsman.

"He would always say, 'Where is that little fellow?' He would touch me and he got 178," Gavaskar said.

For Gavaskar, those encounters captured not merely Sobers' greatness as a cricketer but also the warmth and generosity of a legend who had once seemed larger than life.