Natural athelete produced by India

[Atithee]

It’s interesting we keep finding “natural” athletes in cricket. The last place I’d have thought we would find them. For me, the word athlete doesn’t even associate with cricket, let alone cricketers. As I wrote earlier, any game where you don’t participate in the entire passage of the game ceases to be a good case for consideration to judge even the best in those instances. In that sense, cricket (and baseball) may be unique. I doubt if any US baseball player conjures images of being a top athlete either.

[suresh]

Cricket doesn't need natural athletes but it doesn't exclude natural athletes from playing cricket. Jonty Rhodes could have represented SA in field hockey but he chose cricket. In my book, he is a natural athlete.

[Atithee]

Yes, multiple sports international/national level top players who choose one could be a natural athlete. My main point is that cricket doesn’t give a chance to test (and demonstrate) the natural athleticism. Therefore, Kapil Dev and Harmanpreet Kaur haven’t produced enough data to be counted among the best natural athletes. It’s just not possible in cricket to show a sustained demonstration of athletic abilities. It can only be in bits and pieces.

[rajitghosh]

We don't have videos of the great hockey teams of the past to comment on anyone. For e.g. I am sure Dhyan Chand, Balbir Singh, KD Singh Babu, Leslie Claudius etc would have been great athletes. The only 2 hockey players I have watched and call good athletes would be Mohammad Shahid and Dhanraj Pillay. Both had great speed over short runs and natural dribbling skills. I doubt their stamina though.
Same in football for the dream team members like Chuni, PK, Balaram and Jarnail or athletes like Milkha Singh, Henry Rebello, GS Randhawa and Sriram Singh. Never watched them.
From what literature says both the Pataudis senior and junior would have been great athletes. Senior Paraudi played at least 4 sports, cricket, hockey, polo and billiards all at a competent level.

[suresh]

@Athithee I agree with your point. For Kapil and Harmanpreet, one is indeed extrapolating.

[prasen9]

Well, with the Pataudi's their playing different sports may be due to their status in society. How good they were is always a question mark. MAK was a horrible bowler and a mediocre bat. He was made captain at 21 because of his riches/status. Most of us here played four sports. We do not have sycophantic followers who would praise us and say how good we were. History is written by the "winners". Among all the claims here, I think these guys are the most dubious claims. Again, of course, I have not seen either in person play. I have seen MAK in person when I was in a sports quiz finals in Kolkata and he was one of the people conducting it along with the O'Briens. But, not in action.

[PKBasu]

If we are talking skills, not necessarily just fitness, Chuni Goswami.

Chuni Goswami was one of India's greatest-ever footballers (captaining India to the Asiad gold in 1962), and an excellent all-round cricketer. He took 7 wickets for a combined East & Central Zone side when it beat the West Indies in 1966-67, and a couple of years later was the top-scorer in both innings of the Ranji final, making 96 and 84 (Wadekar out-scored him in one innings, making 133 for Bombay).
Chuni was also a very good tennis player. He was the Kolkata number 3 for awhile (just behind Mukerjea and Lall, competing with Akhtar Ali), although his brother Manik became a better tennis player once Chuni focused on the other two sports.

[PKBasu]

The senior Nawab of Pataudi (Iftikhar Ali Khan) was selected to play hockey for India in the 1928 Olympics. He is included in this list of gold-medal winners, although I'm reasonably sure he didn't actually play during the tournament (having chosen not to go because of injury or some other reason):

https://www.olympicgameswinners.com/nat ... dam?page=1

MJ Gopalan was picked for the Indian Olympic hockey team in 1936. This too won the gold medal, but Gopalan chose not to play hockey for India, choosing to go on the cricket tour of England instead.