Happy Birthday Sachin Tendulkar: Recalling the day God became human

If you grew up in the 90s, then you’d relate to this scenario. Think of a cricket match where India plays an opponent. If it’s a Test match in India, you know that you won’t be disappointed because Anil Kumble will run through the opposition, but in the other scenarios – a Test match outside the subcontinent or an ODI, whether at home or away – there is a sole factor that ensures you’ll watch the match. And if Sachin Tendulkar gets out early, you turn the television of and say, “Nahi dekhna hai, yaar. Baaki sab bhi out ho jaayenge.”

That was India’s dependency on Sachin Tendulkar. And on most occasions, he would take up the challenge and live up to the expectations of his teammates and the billions of fans who were glued on the television or the radio.

Whenever I’d read a scorecard the day after an India match, Tendulkar, even if he had gotten out early, would have scored over a run a ball and given India a decent start before the rest of the team collapsed after him. He was the one-man army when it came to batsmen in the Indian side until Rahul Dravid, Sourav Ganguly, …read more