Published Nov 06, 2026 | 12:06 PM ⚊ Updated Nov 06, 2026 | 12:06 PM
The book looks at the game through every lens, featuring insights from umpires, commentators, and beyond.
Synopsis: From ducks to the future of pink-ball cricket, Ravi Kaza has effortlessly traced the history of Test cricket with childlike curiosity and a mature perspective. His book, ‘Howzzat! 150 Glorious Years’, beautifully captures Kerry Packer’s animated duck accompanying the batters and the exploits of Donald Bradman and Sachin Tendulkar.
Ravi Kaza’s Howzzat! 150 Glorious Years is a delightful presentation of unique, interesting, unlikely and funny incidents from Test cricket. The author has dug deep into the history of the gentleman’s game, collating it into easy-to-read nuggets that hold the reader’s attention.
It looks at the game through every lens, featuring insights from umpires, commentators, and beyond. Spanning 150 glorious years of Test cricket, the author traces the sport from its 1876–77 origins to the planned Sesquicentennial Pink-Ball Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground
in March 2027.
Divided into 56 chapters with catchy titles — beginning from ‘Prophets & Laws’ to ‘And Quite Flows the Don’ to ‘One Match Wonders’, the narrative flows seamlessly along the 300 pages with illustrations.
From ducks to the future of pink-ball cricket, Ravi has effortlessly traversed the history of Test cricket with childlike curiosity and presented it with a mature perspective. The Kerry Packer depiction of the animated duck accompanying the batters, and the exploits of Donald Bradman and Sachin Tendulkar, are captured beautifully.
There is an interesting chapter on princely states and cricket, and how the game gave easier access to the viceroy—the exploits of Duleep and Ranjitsinhji, Pataudis, Vizzy, et al. during British India. Then, there are the great achievers and misses at the Mecca of Cricket—Lord’s in England.
Ravi has not shied away from controversy in the game too. The infamous, L’affaire Cronjegate of 2000, involving the South African captain, Hansie Cronje and his subsequent death in a mystery plane crash find place. However, the match-fixing allegations against former Indian captain and Hyderabadi Mohammad Azharuddin don’t find mention. Perhaps he was given the benefit of the doubt after the High Court dismissed the case in 2012 for lack of sufficient evidence.
It took more than 25 years for Ravi to publish the book. The former DGP of Telangana State and himself a cricketer, Mr A K Khan formally launched it at the Lamakaan on Tuesday, 4 November.
Over this long journey, he painstakingly compiled, cross-checked, and pieced together the backstories, anecdotes, and nuggets to capture the true spirit of the game alongside its most defining events. The scope of this book is limited to men’s Test and first-class cricket—white-ball and women’s cricket being far too expansive to cover adequately here.
I am glad Ravi did not fall for the temptation of just reducing it to records, trivia and oddities and reduced it to a quiz or book of cricket records, but stuck to his resolve. Howzzat! is not a one-sitting read but a tempting read whenever one thinks cricket, watches a match, or talks cricket. It is designed for non-linear reading and gives readers the flexibility to dive into any chapter at random and freely jump to whatever catches their interest next.
Syed Akbaruddin, former Permanent Representative of India to the UN, has written an endearing foreword. Shreedhar Sutar has done a wonderful job with the caricatures. But Ravi perhaps should have used more illustrations, given the assumption that Gen Z don’t like reading much printed text.
(Views are personal. Edited by Majnu Babu).
