from Sylhet, Bangladesh. It is a pity that a player of Prasanna's calibre has not been evaluated. The superficial statistics sometimes may be misguiding. Comparing 189 wickets of Prasanna with 688 of Murali is not a pleasant observation. Imagine whom did Prasanna play with ? Who were his competitors in the team ? What was the standard of opposition batsmen ? What was the average number of test matches per year ? Was there any alternative of Prasanna ? Is there any Clive Lloyd today ? Any Vivian Richards ? Any Majid Khan to score century before lunch on the first day of a Test Match? Any Gary Sobers ? Considering all these and many other related factors, Prasanna was one of the greats of the then time. Murali is one of the greats of the present time. One should remember that Prasanna had an alternative in the team, Venkat. Murali has no such competition to face. Even a few years ago, Murali used to bowl where the opposition used to play a long innings and bowling for 70/80 overs he got many wickets. On the other hand, Prasanna used to bowl one third of the spin overs and sometimes one fourth (team playing 4 spinners)on an average. If Prasanna had the scope of playing today with he as the only spinner, he will have to be a bit cautious about Lara, Ponting and Heyden. Most of the others would find it difficult to play him and the number of wickets would be difficult to believe since teams like Bangladesh, Zimbabwe, West Indies are in the total race. Moreover, Prasanna had a c
