Sachin Does it again, can we all shut up now?
By abhishek at 17 November, 2007, 7:51 am
“I have sat in my room and rolled my head back and laughed at people passing comments about the great man. People like him come once in a lifetime. And when they come, you just say, thank you for the memories, thank you for the music…” Harsha Bhogle said about Tendulkar in an audio interview with Indicast.
18 years ago, on this day Sachin, still in his teens, walked out to bat against Pakistan, a country which was reputed to produce fast bowlers like Ford produced cars on an assembly line. Navjot Singh Sidhu, who was batting at the other end had a quite word with the little man before Sachin took his guard. He played out the first few balls with caution. Then, Imran Khan tossed the ball to Waqar Younis, the menacing debutant who came steaming in to the roar of the National Stadium in Karachi. It all happened in a split second. The ball rose from good length and instead of the bat, it took Sachin’s nose. Unlike today, they didn’t have too many advertisements squeezed in when a batsman got injured. So, the whole cricketing world saw every moment that followed; the 16 year old went down on his knees and struggled with his helmet. Before Sidhu could react, the physio rushed onto the pitch. As the cameras zoomed in through the players who surrounded Sachin, the slightly blood stained handkerchief made its way back into the physio’s kit. On being asked whether he wanted to continue, the squeaky little voice spoke admist the din of the stadium, ‘Main Khelega!’ Ask Sidhu about it and he will talk about this incident for hours.
| {mosgoogle} | As a 25 year old, Sachin only rose and kept rising. If his sandstorm knock against the Aussies in Sharjah was memorable, his 138 in the Chennai test against Paksitan will be remembered for more poignant reasons. People got used to seeing the word, ‘Tendulkar’ in the headlines and we coined the phrase, ‘Cricket is our religion and Sachin is our God.’ While the former was true since the time India won the 1983 World Cup, the latter was more contemperory; more divine. We always prayed to our million Gods that this God named, ‘Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar’ should, would and could never fail. But, when he didn’t live up to the Godliness, we burned his effigies. If Sachin scored, it was big news. But, the bigger news was when he “let his country down.”
I am a huge fan of Sachin. But, I am not patronising him. There are times when he has failed with the bat. So, the critisism is justified, but, the crusifiction isn’t. We are talking about a man who has gotten out between 90 and 100 seven times in 2007 alone. Many great batsmen have scored as many centuries in their entire careers. |
Today, at 34, Sachin says that he has more shots in his book than he had when he was 25. But, we insist that he is way different from the Sachin that we’ve built in our minds. Even today, his bat comes down with the same speed like it did when he was 27, but, we choose to talk about his reflexes as a slip fielder. He still runs like a hare between the wickets challenging players 10 years younger to him to complete the third run but we reminisce his past when he didn’t need to run so hard as his bat came down imperiously on the ball which readied itself to be clobbered. He still has the same adrenalin rush and smiles like a child, when he claims a wicket, but, we are engrossed in romancing the flashback, and choose not to wake up from our hibernation.
I hope all of us wake up. Sachin has given us a reason. ‘Tendulkar’ is back in the headlines. And this time, we cannot afford to sleep again and relive the cycle. You would have thought that the same journalists who barked, ‘Endulkar’ and turned themselves into self proclaimed well wishers of Indian cricket with ‘Blood the youth,’ slogan, must have been running for cover when Sachin won us the recent India Pakistan ODI series. But, guess what, they are back with their cliches, ‘The Genius returns,’ and ‘The man of the moment.’ Like Edward Norton’s character in Primal Fear, the Indian media has split personalities and amusingly enough, like Norton’s character, they get away with it as well. Sachin might not bat like a prince on every tour and he may not be as consistent as he was early in his life, but, let’s face it. We need to understand that people like him come once in a lifetime. I have locked myself up in my room and rolled my head back and laughed when people pass comments about the great man… I hope that the nation will echo Harsha’s sentiments… Some day soon.
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