Thursday, November 5, 2009

In awe of the man called Sachin Tendulkar!

(I'm writing this just after India (347/10) lost their match against Australia (350/4) in Hyd.)


Just a while after India lost the match, I get a message from one of my good friends, who says "more than winning, we lost because of Tendulkar". And that was the last thing I thought anyone who had watched the match would say...

I wrote back to him telling the same and adding in the end that it is time for Sachin to retire... we Indians don’t deserve him after all...

It is sort of impossible for me to understand how someone can blame him for this loss. How easily we forget that he is human at the end of it. Even he can play a wrong shot; even he can have a lapse in concentration.

But no, he is not allowed to, coz he is Tendulkar! He is expected to score a century in every match. He is expected not only to score a century, but even a double century (which he almost did) if that is what it takes for the team to win. We so conveniently forget that there are 10 other batsmen too in the team!

Well, I guess it is but natural that people expect so much from him. We are so used to, aren't we? More so because he has been living up to the expectations for so many years now. Many would argue that that is not true. But again, as I said most would forget that even others in the team are supposed to contribute!

I wonder how his heart must have sunk to see the team lose in the end. There was so little they could have done wrong to lose from where he had left, and they did exactly that!

Considering the kind of innings he played, they should have at least won it for him. May be Jadeja should have shown some maturity, may be Praveen Kumar could have dived in the end and then may be Munaf could have hit a boundary off the last ball...!

Coming back to Tendulkar, I couldn’t help being in awe of the man! He was in the groove today. I could see the Tendulkar of yore again! And felt as happy as I had felt as a child! And suddenly remembered how I couldn't wait to get back from school when there was a cricket match! What if India was more likely to lose, we had hope...we had Tendulkar!

Really, he is the greatest, isn't it? There is very little reason to believe otherwise. The times that he has played in, the kind of opponents he has played against, I don't think there ever was or will be another one like him!

His amazing consistency, undying dedication, child-like enthusiasm, insatiable hunger for more, combined with down to earth simplicity ... really, not many of us can relate to him.

We can only look up to him and be in awe of the man he his... and proudly say that yes, we lived in the times of Tendulkar, Sachin Tendulkar!

5 comments:

Kinshuk said...

The first thought that occurred to me even as sachin was playing that knock was that this man is really passionate about his game. Nothing else could have spurred a man to try this hard in spite of knowing that misfortune and incompetence (of others playing in his side) have combined in various proportions over the years to deny him that epic knock with a truly happy-ending.


And when he was dismissed i knew that India in spite of all these intervening years spent trying to master the art of the difficult run-chase, would do a Chennai all over again to sachin and we won't win this game, and it made me ask the question: "Why does every Sachin epic have a tragic end?"

Franky... said...

With Sachin in Indian Cricket Team, Cricket never ever felt like a team game!

Ekanthapadhikan said...

Are Sandeep bhai! You are in the blogosphere too! That's exciting!!

And thanks for commenting on my short story. And answering your question - maybe you do not know me too well. But you know me enough to believe that I'm not capable of a murder. I didn't do it, rather couldn't do it when I must have. You know the story, right?

Now, coming to your post, well, I do not follow Cricket any more. I'm not even familiar with the names of the players. But about Sachin, I can say for sure that, it's high time he retired. Not because he plays any less nor because India do not deserve a player like him. But 'coz Sachin has been a persistent road block in the development of India as a team. Ever since he reached stardom, every match India wins is 'coz of him and every match we loose is 'coz of him. I'd agree that he's the most indomitable batsman the world of cricket has ever witnessed. Yet his presence as a one man army which can win and loose every other match is ridiculous. Why should we have the rest of the players then? Every team has their strong players (Ponting in Australia, Gayle in West Indies, Smith in S.A and so on), but no other team has this tendency to make their strong player more than a player. This is a typical Indian mind set. We either make people Gods or throw them in ditch. Are! At the end of the day, every man is as much human as the next person. Why should he become a God or a worthless person just 'coz he has been endowed with certain skills or 'coz he lacks some? Why should anyone become God? It's ok to appreciate and respect someone's talents. We should do that. But to over hype it is not healthy. I guess, India has a God in every street!

Sandeep Patil said...

Agreed dude... that was the idea behind this post too... he aint God.. he is human too and should be treated that way... (Of course, an extraordinary human)

But again, its unfair to blame him for the Godly image, no... he didn't ask for it after all... it is mostly the media that has been painting that image of his...and the people who think of him that way...

I guess it is to do with the way we Indians are... we are used to seeing our heroes as Gods, be it filmy heroes or sporting heroes... Probably we just haven't evolved enough yet... :)

NilayPatil Blog said...

manu times in exams when i had very bad paper i used to ask God pls pass me this time because i knew it is beyond any human efforts to pass that paper now...Why i am saying this here...
I have more times in my life asked sachin pls save this match for india because no other human could win from there for india..
You can argue he failed lets say 50% of those time but even god didnt pass me each time I had bad paper..But still I beleive god and Sachin too..
when we were small india was relatively poor had more problems but there was some movments when sachin was bating we all used to forget everything. the joy we used to get and still get when he smashes bowlers for bounderies its beyond expression for me.. For me and lot of my frnds he is not greater than god but no less..