Sachin first presented the elbow to me at Heathrow airport of all places. We were in transit on our way to Holland for a tournament in August 2004. He just asked me to look at it quickly. It didn’t seem to bother him at the time as it was more stiffness than anything from intensive batting in the previous week, hitting hours of wet tennis balls at the mig nets. He did say he hadn’t practised like that for a long time. There are a couple of quick tests we use to help differentiate and localise pain with tennis elbow, and these were positive. I was immediately concerned because I knew that treatment outcomes for this injury are poor. I pretty much told him that I hate treating tennis elbows because they don’t often respond to treatment. I was also concerned because a period of active rest was required, and international batsmen didn’t have the luxury of resting. He gave me a smile and said it will all settle down quickly. So, sitting at Heathrow he was still pretty positive.
It actually did settle quite quickly initially in Holland with intensive treatment and taping. We had him back in the nets facing spin after a few days as he felt pretty confident. He was pain-free and soon wanted to play the pacers. The first pace delivery he faced actually kicked, and the top hand bore the brunt, solidly loading the forearm extensor muscles. It was then that he felt the first sharp pain in the elbow. Every player goes through a range of emotions with a serious injury; Sachin was no exception. But whereas a younger player might be angry with the world, Sachin seemed to be more frustrated that he wasn’t able to play, not noticeably angry.
As he was recovering, the number one question was always ‘when can I start playing?’ But with tennis elbow, nothing could be predicted. To make matters worse, there is no medical consensus as to the best practice management of the injury. The issue with Sachin was that we knew we could get rid of his pain quickly with corticosteroid injections but we wanted to give his body every opportunity to heal naturally initially. Sachin ultimately needed to make the decision about which track he wanted to take for he was keen on not taking injections initially. He liked the idea of trying all conservative approaches at first as there was less chance of long-term repercussions.
Sachin was always completely honest with me about how he was feeling and by that stage I think we had built up a pretty good rapport such that I could tell without him speaking whether he was comfortable or not. It was always a challenge keeping him restricted to a certain number of deliveries/balls faced at each session, especially when he was feeling better. He did always try to find the positives from each session, however. I often look back and wonder if there was anything different that could have been done. But one thing wouldn’t change and that is the pressure for Sachin to play as soon as possible from all directions, including himself. Sachin was back playing before I had left the team and he was very happy to be back playing, even with the elbow braces. He did eventually face a relapse, which was why he went in for surgery in 2005.
To play at an international level in any sport at 40 is simply incredible. The body takes so much longer to recover from any strenuous training session. Combine this with all of the underlying areas that had experienced (chronic) injury and it is a huge challenge for him. I honestly believe he simply challenges himself to keep going and he can do so because Sachin is the most competitive man I know on earth. So he is not going to lose a challenge to himself. Remember that the mind is the most powerful ‘muscle’ in the body and as long as there is fire there he will be able to push himself. Sachin summed things up nicely at my farewell team dinner in Bangladesh when each player stood up and said a few words. He simply said that it was sad to see me leave the team and that I probably knew his body better than his wife did after so many years together on the road. I’ll probably just wish him a very happy birthday and remind him that when he eventually finishes playing, there will be plenty of equally nicely aged red wine waiting for him to enjoy whenever he comes to visit me in Adelaide.
(Andrew Leipus was former Indian team physiotherapist.)
