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The Boy From Bandrawith 3 comments

Sachin Tendulkar is on a different planet. Like Usain Bolt he’s left the competition to settle matters between

themselves as he blaz es ahead. Can we please have a bo ld 80- point newspaper headline saying ‘He Bats On’?

Three lengthy breaks from cricket and two career-threatening injuries that needed surgeries are now years behind

him and bowlers around the world are paying for the period where he was vulnerable, scratchy and out of sorts.

Tendulkar has been single-minded in his pursuit of excellence and in the past few seasons he’s looked like getting

a big score almost every innings. From January 2008 there has been just one series in Sri Lankaand a solitary

Test aga inst South Africa before thatwhere he hasn’t got to a three figure score and he’s scored one o r more

hundreds in all the other nine Tes t series’ that India has played since then.

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Sambit Bal, the editor of  Cricinfo, wrote a piece on Tendulkar and the art of stealing a single and concluded itsaying: “Fifty Test hundreds are but a formality. A hundred international hundreds are there for the taking. Tendulkar,

though, endures not in the pursuit of milestones, but because he can’t fall out of love with cricket. And ab ove

anything else that’s the reason why he remains the most- loved cricketer.”

Tendulkar has always b een reluctant to take a runner as the single is a v ital part of his ba tting and he has said it

more than once that only he knows the spee d with which he has played the ball a nd also whether he’s played it to

the right or the left of the fielder. He judges a s ingle to perfection. Opposition captains have said that on some d ays

they know they are up against it when Tendulkar is scampering for quick singles and is alive to any poss ibility of an

extra run.

During India’s 2007- 08 tour of Australia Pe ter Roebuck in an a rticle for the Sydney Morning Herald  also wrote about

Tendulkar’s mastery of pinching a run and it came pretty-close to defining how Tendulkar approaches a Test

innings in his new enlightened avatar.

“Among mod ern batsmen, Sachin Tendulkar is the mas ter of the single. In some respects, it is not much of a claim.

It’s a b it like saying Roger Federer has the bes t ball toss around. Tendulkar has many other more colourful

qualities: a blistering straight drive, a cart that is liable to land in the fifth row, a square cut that singes the turf, a fine

sweep and a defensive stroke played with a sculptured left elbow.

Comparatively speaking, the single tucked to mid- wicket seems innocuous. But the true masters do not disregard

the little things. Moreover, four singles amount to a boundary, and can be more safely co llected. Also, a single taken

from a precisely-pitched delivery is profoundly discouraging.”

A mere 2.8 pe r cent of Tendulkar’s Test dismissals have been a result of a run outout of the 250 times he’s been

dismissed in 280 innings just 7 have been run outs. And if one is feeling fair then half of them can be said to b e his

mistakes and the other half that of the partner and we can give an odd one to an exceptional bit of work in the field;

which leaves you with three bad ly- judged runs in a Tes t career spanning 21 years.

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the next six balls that he faced and the rollicking show started.

This is from an earlier piece of mine on how he started his innings at the Eden Gardens aga inst South Africa when

he got back-to-back Test hundreds: Tendulkar joined Sehwag and tapped the first ball he played, a 147 kph full

delive ry outside off from Morkel, to point for a single. That was the beginning of an assured pa rtnership in which

Tendulkar gave another display of his class and his mastery. He played the ba ll with that natural and intriguing

intimacy that he has displayed in the last few seasons. He was solid in defence and gave no bowler even a hint of 

a chance. It was just beautiful batting.

I am leaving the single for now to look at the stratosphere that Tendulkar has made his home in the last three

seasons or so. Just in order to have a frame of reference and make a comparison we can look at the other modern

batting giant Ricky Po nting.

On December 26, 2007 India squared up against Australia in the Boxing Day Test in Melbourne and began their 

long tour of four Test matches to be followed by the last edition of the traditional tri-nation ODI seriesthe

Commonwealth Bank Se ries.

Ricky Ponting and Sachin Tendulkar came to this series hav ing had very contrasting two yea rs prior to this much-

awaited Test rivalry. Ponting was peeling ce nturies from 2005 to 2007 and perhaps had the greatest run by abatsman in the mod ern era. Three times in this pe riod Ponting made a hundred in ea ch innings of a Test and overall

in 28 Test matches he made 13 hundreds and 12 fifties at a phenomenal average of 74.68.

Sachin Tendulkar had a miserable period in which he had two surgeries, made comebacks to the playing XI after 

lengthy breaks, and was even booed by his home crowd at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai against England,

when he got out, ironically in the context of this piece, having scored just a single o ff 21 balls. In 22 Test matches in

this pe riod he made three hundreds a nd nine fifties at a modest average of 42.72. Two of his hundreds came

aga inst Test minnows Banglad esh and o ne aga inst Sri Lanka in New Delhi.

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On that day in Melbourne the bowlers did well but in the course of the Test match the batting let the team down and

India lost the match by a massive 337 runs. Tendulkar made an attacking 62 in the first innings of that Boxing Day

Test and Brett Lee go t him on 15 in the seco nd. Ricky Ponting failed in both innings making 4 and 3 runs.

At the end of the Test match Ponting had 9515 runs at an average of 58.73 with 33 hundreds and 38 fifties in 113

Tests. Tendulkar after that Test had 11366 runs at an average o f 54.90 with 37 hundreds and 48 fifties in 143 Tests.

Ponting’s exceptional pe riod of the past few years and Tendulkar’s miserable run during the same time had

narrowed what seemed like an unbridgeable gap till the end of 2002.

In November 2002, Tendulkar was 19 hundreds clea r of Ponting and in the period that followed and es tablished

Ponting as a modern great he made 21 hundreds as opposed to Tendulkar’s four and the gap narrowed down to

just two after Ponting scored successive centuries at Brisbane and Adelaid e in the 2006 Ashes in Australia.

That was the close st that Ponting ca me as Tendulkar was about to embark o n another streak of brilliance. A

brilliance as captivating as his majestic and dominating batting in the 1990sfor some, and I am one o f them, this

period has been even more satisfying than his demolition of bowlers in his heydays. This is Tendulkar the batting

Buddha; a Tendulkar as close to perfection as an ascetic blessed with benediction after decades of rigorous and

loving pursuit of the Lord.

From December 26, 2007 Ponting has played 36 Test matches (65 innings) and made 2742 runs at an average of 

42.84 with six hundreds and 17 fifties. And from the same starting point Tendulkar has played 29 Test matches (51

innings) for 2951 runs at an average of 65.57 with 12 hundreds and 11 fifties. The overall batting record for Ponting

now stands at 12250 runs in 148 Test matches at 54.68 with 39 hundreds and 55 fifties. For Tendulkar it is 14240

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Use Us: Dig g Re dd it Ema il Print Fa ce boo k Stumb le Up on 1

Written by Deepan Joshi

October 14, 2010 at 2:32 pm

Posted in Cricket, Sachin Tendulkar 

Tagged with Cricket, Sri Lanka, New Zealand, South Africa , Tendulkar , Ricky

Ponting, Australia, Mohali Test, Test Cricket , Sachin Tendulkar , ODIs, Dhoni,

Ishant Sharma , Harbhajan Singh, Cricinfo, Border-Gavaskar Trophy , Dravid,

Shane Warne, Sehwag, Gambhir , Ponting, ICC Test Rankings , Zaheer Khan ,

Donald Bradman, VVS Laxma n, Bangalore Test, Usain Bolt , Peter Roebuck ,

Sambit Bal , Sydney Morning Herald, Bandra, Bowral

« G ive Mo hammad Amir Ano the r Chance O bama And T he Balance O f Exp ect at io ns »

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runs in 171 matches a t 56.96 with 49 hundreds and 58 fifties. So despite play ing seve n Tests (14 innings) less than

Ponting the Master has still surgically o pened up the gap.

In the ODIs there is no comparison as Tendulkar has been phenomenal and has played some career-defining

innings. The first-and- only double hundred in a limited o ver game , a b rilliant match-winning hundred while chasing

in a final in Sydney and a 138 to win a tournament final in Sri Lanka. The magnificent 175 in a losing cause against

Australia and a 160 plus in New Zealand are some of the highlights of his performance.

Overall Tendulkar in 442 ODI matches has mad e 17598 runs at 45.12 with 46 hundreds and 93 fifties. Ponting in 351

matches has 13072 runs at 42.85 with 29 hundreds and 7 9 fifties.

Tendulkar is busy ensuring that only the name of Sir Donald Bradman be taken in the same breath as his. And even

there more and more former cricket grea ts are now handing over the title of the grea test batsman of all times to

Tendulkar; as apart from the Don’s staggering Test average Tendulkar is head-and-shoulders above the

legenda ry Australian in many other significant ways. The Boy from Bandra is more than a match for the Boy from

Bowral.

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Can only say it in Hindi – maz a a gaya, pad ke! Rohit Karir 

October 15, 2010 at 5:13

pm

The Boy from Bowral was the Do n of cricket but the boy from Bandra is the God o f 

cricket. Don’s do leave a mark on the sands o f time but the God o wns time.Tendulkar has exhausted the English vocabulary and forced com mentators to dig

deeper into their creativity in order to talk eloquently about his achievements that are

pouring through his bat like torrential rain at the mom ent.

keshav chat urvedi

October 19, 2010 at 5:41

pm

The Boy from Bo wral is his tory and the Bandra Boy is the present; cricket fans

sho uld enjoy this time when they are getting to see the bes t of the God. Nice piece

007.

Sanjay Bragta

October 20, 2010 at 2:52

pm

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