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The Marathoner's Wall

Why, despite the superlatives, does Sachin have only one first-class double century?

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The Marathoner's Wall
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Even as India is in the midst of another Test series, there remains a haunting, taunting mystery: why, despite all the crores of superlatives and rupees showered on him, Sachin Tendulkar has till now only one solitary first-class double century—the one he made for the Mumbai team against Taylor’s Australians earlier this year. A treble century by Tendulkar transgresses even the realm of mystery.

The subject wears a tinge of irony and pathos considering that the apparently ‘yuppyish’ Vinod Kambli, 15 months older than the sober Tendulkar, got two double Test hundreds in the space of a month or so in 1993, at the age of 21 years, but now struggles for a place in the Indian team.

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Talking to some cricket savants in Mumbai was one way of clearing the air on Tendulkar’s elusive two-ton treasure.

First was the possibility of pre-mature fatigue of the right arm and shoulder, leading to a fatal falsely-timed stroke caused by Tendulkar’s unusually heavy bat. Sudhir Vaidya, the eminent cricket statistician, has, in a note to me, put that bat’s weight at 3 pounds (lbs), 2 ounces (ozs) or 1.42 kilograms (1 lb = 16 ozs = 0.45359237 kilograms). However, ‘Baboo’ Nadkarni—a well-known supplier of cricket gear to the big names from Sunil Gavaskar downwards—contends that Tendulkar’s bat weighs 3 lbs (1.36 kgs) but concedes it could be the villain which denies Tendulkar the staying power at the crease required for a double century. According to him, a batsman tends to use a lighter bat with advancing age, and that, as far as he knows, only two extraordinarily endowed men—Clive Lloyd and Viv Richards—used bats as heavy or heavier than Tendulkar’s.  Gavaskar’s 221 at The Oval Test in 1979 was made with a bat weighing 2 lbs 5 ozs. Lara, the Test and world record holder of the highest innings, wields a bat which is between 2 lbs, 4 ozs and 2 lbs, 5 ozs, while Azharuddin’s bat, says Nadkarni, "is like a cigarette" at 2 lbs, 2 ozs. But while advocating that Tendulkar should try out a lighter bat for Tests, Nadkarni feels that the bigger problem is that Tendulkar is "contented with what he’s got in life—all of it so early—but if he only makes up his mind, he will be able to get what he wants."

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These thoughts are echoed by Mohini Amladi, 74, who has been involved with cricket coaching for nearly half-a-cent-ury and who had Tendulkar as a ward in a Mumbai Cricket Association coaching camp about eight years ago. Amladi does feel that Tendulkar is perhaps far too exuberant, too desirous of a quick kill of the bowlers, in contrast to Bradman’s mode of first studying a bowler and then grinding him to destruction. "But no, it’s not his heavy bat which is the villain," says the veteran coach. What’s more, he believes that marriage has definitely been a steadying influence on Tendulkar’s batting and that "the undoubted genius" will soon amass runs and break Allan Border’s record for the highest Test aggregate. Amen.

Former Test star, Polly Umrigar, 72, who has been intimately associated with various facets of cricket for some 50 years, believes that the development of one-day cricket has led to Tendulkar’s tendency to play too many strokes and, therefore, his getting tall scores in Tests is a high-risk proposal. When reminded that  Jayasuriya, the fastest scorer of a fifty and hundred in one-day cricket, batted a few months later for 800 minutes and 573 balls to notch 340 in a Test, Umrigar said: "That’s the mental adjustment which Sachin has to make."

However, Ramakant Achrekar, 70, the famous coach of Tendulkar, has absolutely no suggestion to offer, no solution to propose, for resolving the mystery of the missing two-tonners of his pupil. As for the bat, he says Tendulkar sported a heavy even in his school days. And, believing that Tendulkar is god’s gift to cricket, Achrekar says: "One fine day the double century in Tests will surely occur; it will simply burst upon us"— like the Leonid shower presumably.

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But, unlike the astronomers, Tendulkar’s army of fans can’t wait for 33 years, can they?

Meanwhile, our genius would do well to ruminate over what Don Bradman once confessed to the celebrated writer, Neville Cardus, as being the secret of his success: "Concentration. Every ball for me is the first ball, whether my score is zero or 200." If Tendulkar uses that unpatented secret, the wet and cold of Kiwiland may well warm the cockles of millions of Indian hearts.

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