Sports

Scabs On The Sun

Don't write off Sachin as yet. The little big man still has a lot of gale force in him.

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Scabs On The Sun
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Now, for the first time in his grand career, he finds himself in the eye of a storm raging in the media, though not yet in the corridors of cricket power—that is, the team management and the selectors. There have been debates on his current lack of form but chairman of selectors Kiran More and his colleagues do not see any reason to even think of dropping him. "Come off it, there has to be some difference between the average fan, the man on the street and us. We believe that he lends great value to the team," More told Outlook.

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In Pakistan recently, a few doubt clouds assembled over his Test career after he was caught behind off Shoaib Akhtar in Faisalabad and bowled out in both innings in Karachi. The three Tests against England lent some voice to those who saw him approach the autumn of his career. An assortment of TV anchors on the myriad news channels started demanding accountability and performance, fanning passions. Some former cricketers, pontificating on TV shows, saw this as an opportunity to embarrass the selectors, and demanded that they weigh Tendulkar on the same scales as they did Sourav Ganguly.

Will Tendulkar join the ranks of the wonderful cricketers who had to be shown the door by selectors rather than choose to exit the game with grace like a Sunil Gavaskar, a Ravi Shastri or a Javagal Srinath? "I am not even interested in that question now," Tendulkar told Outlook when it was pointed out to him that some had suggested that he consider retiring from the game he so dearly loves.

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Tendulkar, who is not yet 33, will be the first to admit that the returns have not been great in the two Test series this year—68 runs in Pakistan and 92 against England at home—but it must be pointed out that he has not played in all the 11 innings India batted in. To be fair to the man, he did not bat in three of those innings and was unbeaten at 23 in the second innings of the first Test against England in Nagpur. And then, he did look to be in good touch in Karachi and Mumbai, timing the ball through covers and in the straight field with comfort before being done in either because of errors of judgement or a great bat-pad catch in a game that would be remembered for a number of dropped chances.

Of course, these have been times replete with scenes when Tendulkar has not come across as the dominant force and others have chipped in to divert attention as happened in the Tests against South Africa in 2004. Such capitulation as witnessed in Karachi and Mumbai has kept the spotlight quite mercilessly on the little big man of Indian cricket. The collective failure of the Indian batting in the fourth innings of these Tests served to highlight Tendulkar’s perceived decline.

His body has also been protesting. In 1999, he had a back problem during the Tests against Pakistan and skipped 10 one-day internationals. A couple of years later, a toe injury forced him to miss three Tests and five ODIs in Sri Lanka. A problem in his knees kept him out of five ODIs against Zimbabwe in 2002, while he played the 2003 World Cup with a broken finger on the left hand that needed surgery, before a tennis elbow on the left hand laid him low for much of 2004.

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There have been suggestions that the timing of the revelation that Tendulkar’s shoulder needed surgery pointed to a graceful exit, the more uncharitable carelessly whispering that he was faking the injury to prevent being sacked. "Nothing can be further from the truth. The team management and the BCCI officials were aware of Tendulkar’s shoulder needing attention and this was a good time to give him an eight-week window to get the corrective surgery done and to ensure a complete recovery," BCCI secretary Niranjan Shah said.

The Sachin Tendulkar saga has played on for 16 years, making 494 appearances for India, scoring 24,615 runs, including 74 centuries, and taking 179 wickets. It has stuttered a bit in 2006 after he scored his record 35th Test century against Sri Lanka but to conclude that he has gone past the sell-by date and has overstayed his welcome in the Indian team is jumping the gun. Those wanting to write his cricketing obituary would be best advised to wait a tad longer.

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