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Tendulkar is a great ambassador for the game
Mark Waugh - 24 April 2001
©CricInfo |
Irrespective of the score, whenever Sachin Tendulkar comes to bat he is
under pressure. The pressure comes from all those people who look up to
him, who pray that he gets a century, who cheer like India has already won
when he comes in to bat, and who silently troop out of the stands once he
gets out. When a visiting team comes to India, they know whom the Indians
look up to. While they love watching India play, there is no doubt that
Tendulkar is the player they love watching most. There is a buzz when he
comes in to bat and if he fails, the crowd goes quiet for the rest of the
game.
The great player that he is, Tendulkar gets a fair bit of adulation
wherever he goes. Australians love their sportsmen and know a champion
when they see one. Out here in Australia, he is seen as a great champ and
is highly regarded by everybody who follows the game.
©AFP |
One of the significant reasons for this is the praise that Sir Don Bradman
lavished on him a couple of years ago. Sir Don had said that Tendulkar
reminded him of the way he used to play. While I don't quite agree with that the little I've seen of Bradman on film proves he was in a different league
people in Australia sat up and took notice. Whenever Sir Don spoke,
Australians did take note of what he said, and while some like me may not
have agreed with him on this point, their regard for Tendulkar only grew.
Like most Australians, the first look I got of him was when he came on
tour in the early nineties. He was only 18 years old, but handled the
conditions remarkably well. He scored two Test centuries, including one in
Perth, and negotiated the pace and bounce of the pitches with consummate
ease. All who saw him on that tour knew that he was a player to watch out
for. And Tendulkar has proved just that in the subsequent years.
©CricInfo |
During the nineties, Brian Lara, Inzamam-ul-Haq and yours truly have often
been spoken of as the best in the batting business, along with Tendulkar.
However, I would rate Tendulkar higher than the rest. Lara comes close
because he is a proven match-winner, but he does give the opposition
chances. Tendulkar is technically superior, has every stroke in the book
and some of his own, and above all is remarkably consistent.
But these are not the qualities that set him apart or make him the great
player he is. Those qualities are in the mind. His aggression, his
knowledge of his abilities and limitations and his awareness of what the
opposition bowlers are capable of are what make him remarkable. He always
tries to control and dominate and this makes him an extremely dangerous
player when he gets going.
The only flaw, if one can call it that, is that he can get carried away. I
believe Tendulkar recently admitted that this is a drawback in his game.
Sometimes he gets into the mindset of wanting to hit every ball to the
boundary, and that over-confidence sometimes leads to his dismissal. But
if I know the guy, he will soon be working on that aspect of his game as well.
While Tendulkar is a master of both forms of the game, he has the one-day
game worked out pretty well. This was in evidence in the one-day series
between India and Australia. In the first two games he was in ominous
touch but was dismissed because of his over-confidence. He decided he was
worth more than 35 explosive runs in each match and changed his approach
in the third game. Result: a superb century in which he did not murder the
opening bowlers like in the first two games, but still managed to get a
century at more than a run a ball.
©AFP |
Add to that the fact that he is an underrated bowler and you know why
the Indians love this wonderful cricketer so much. It would be very
difficult to pick any one knock and term it as the best I've seen
because Tendulkar has always saved his best for Australia. It is also
very difficult to predict how many centuries he will get before he
retires. I reckon he'll play another 8 to 10 years, and would be
surprised if he does not get more than 40 centuries.
I personally love to watch him bat from my position in the slips. While I
keep hoping he gets out, I must admit that his strokeplay is a treat to
watch from that position. A great ambassador for the game, he is one
of those players who will be regarded as an all-time great long after he
has stopped playing.
© Gameplan
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