Remarkable Strokes of the Little Master - my version

Now that was a great topic and I am extremely grateful to Ramki for leaving out some of the more scintillating shots for me. I must also admit that despite leaving them out, his picks are absolutely out of the top draw too especially the Irani Trophy one – since I was also in the stadium that time, I know exactly where he is coming from!

Here we go:
Let me begin with the shot that Ramki had mentioned but left the job for me to elaborate:

143 vs Australia at Sharjah

To me there is not a more audacious shot (neither a shot conveying more intent ) played in the game of Cricket. With the team in trouble mid way through the innings, the only thing that mattered to all of us was scoring enough to make it to the finals on net run rate. I can bet that no one who was watching the match even entertained the thought of a win especially after the Indian innings was reduced by 4 overs due to the sandstorm break with just 9 runs less than the initial 285 as the target. And when Sachin flicked the ball to square leg to take a couple to ensure that we reached the finals, all of us were relieved and started thinking about the prospects of somehow India overpowering the Aussies in the finals but this man had other ideas – knowing the man, its not entirely surprising really. But what was astonishing was that with a solo shot he was able to convince everyone around that this match is far from over. Just after completing a hard run 2 to take India to the finals, the next ball Damien Fleming bowls a good length delivery on the middle stump and Sachin moves a little inside out just when Fleming is about to deliver the ball and smashes it overs covers for a boundary – all in a blink! The moment the ball reaches the boundary, Tony Greig would already be jumping up in joy in the commentary box shouting that this man is trying to win this game now! It took just one shot from the genius to bring the mediocrity out of us mere mortals. When all of us were celebrating for reaching the finals, he literally slapped for us for underestimating his capabilities with this shot. I have never been a great believer in Superman, Spiderman and all other fantsasy characters but this one shot changed all that – I believe in Sachin Tendulkar…

Like Ramki wrote genius knows no boundaries!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXRkHervQJc
Forward to 7:46th minute to watch this particular shot

193 vs England at Leeds

CLR.James writes of Learie Constatine as an independent spirit in that masterpiece “Beyond a boundary”. That’s one compliment which is very difficult to bestow upon Sachin however hard you try to as he has to put up with the expectations of a billion people all the time – its almost impossible to be a free spirit with the pressure of having to live upto such monumental expectations. Despite that kind of pressure the fact that he’s played such attacking cricket all his career is a reflection of his extraordinary confidence in his ability rather an expression of free spirit. But this one shot of Caddick in the Headingley test in 2002 was the one that showed us what Sachin could have been if he was a complete independent spirit. On a pitch in which the English press thought conceding anything more than 250 to India would be a bad bowling performance by the home team, Sachin had the cushion of a great start by Sanjay Bangar and Rahul Dravid (who played an absolute master piece) and built a great partnership with Sourav. When they were starting to accelerate the umpires gave them the offer for bad light. They refused and stayed back to play out the next 12 odd overs and what a spell of play that turned out to be – I haven’t seen Sachin play with such freedom in a long long time . Caddick comes into bowl and Sachin doesn’t move an inch till about a micro second before caddick delivers the ball and then at the last instant dances down the wicket and hits a good length delivery on the middle stump across the line over mid wicket for a home run! Failure was never a thought in his mind through the whole process - no second line of defence, no straight bat, no thought of a miscue, just a marvelous execution. Listen to the sound of ball hitting the bat – even if u were blind that day you would have figured out it’s a six! And listen to Boycott going bonkers after the shot - have you ever heard him so excited in commentary?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYGWcwHcWx4
Forward to 3:14 in the video for this particular shot

98 against Pak in Centurion – WC 2003

The first 3 shots that Sachin played against Shoaib Akhtar were astonishing for the sheer audacity of the attack. He lets the adrenalin take him over for that unforgettable square cut six, then plays his trademark flick and follows up with a “nothing more than a forward defence” which ended up beyond the boundary ropes too. But for all the magic of these 3 shots, my favourite is the backfoot drive that he played off Wasim Akram later in the same match – its straight out of heavens. Am I trying to be perverse – c’mon guys, watch the shot and decide for yourself.

The first 3 shots against Shoaib were magical more because of the context of the match rather than the shots themselves – mind you they were great shots anyways but it just reached a higher pedestal because of the circumstances of the match. But this backfoot drive against Wasim Akram would have been special even if it was played in a tennis ball match in my neighborhood Trust Puram ground in Chennai! As Sachin was going hammer and tongs at one end the ever so menacing Akram was bowling at the other end holding his own amidst the Sachin carnage. The first ball of the ninth over, Akram bowls the typical left armer’s ball on the corridor which will have the batsman guessing whether to go on the front foot or back foot, with a vertical bat or horizontal bat? The ball pitches on the off stump and holds its line (which is quite deceptive considering the prodigious swing that Akram usually generates), Sachin moves his left leg a little forward to cover the angle and almost parallely shifts his weight onto the backfoot to be in perfect balance and gets his blade down at 60 degrees to drive that 3 quarters length ball through covers for a boundary and watch that follow through of his after the shot – oh boy even he enjoyed it so much…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwXxGe4bL7M&feature=related
Forward to 3:06th minute in the video for this particular shot

155 vs. Australia in Chennai

Actually I can pick any shot in this innings and that would fit the bill as a remarkable shot! This battle of Sachin vs Warne was one of the most hyped individual battles in the history of the game. Hardly a couple of months back Sachin was dismissed by that little known leg spinner Rawl Lewis from WI in a ODI tournament in sharjah by bowling round the wicket into the rough. Sachin at that stage was generally perceived to be a little suspect with leg spinners bowling round the wicket into the rough and Aussies are sure to have done their homework before they landed on the subcontinent. At the same time Sachin’s preparation for this series is part of cricketing folklore now! And his sensational innings for Mumbai against Australia in the tour match gave more than an indication of what was to follow. But come the first test, the ever so competitive Warne draws first blood by dismissing Sachin for a single digit score. Out walks Sachin in the second innings with the team in a precarious situation and unleashes an array of attacking shots which will last in the memory of all those who witnessed the innings for their next seven births!

Sachin in such supreme form played so many great shots but to me this one shot stands out the most. Shane Warne after taking a pounding from a series of slog sweeps from Sachin, comes round the wicket yet again but this time alters the length by dropping it short but at the same time imparts more spin on the ball, Sachin on seeing the ball pitching short clears his left leg a bit and rocks back on the back foot to be in a perfect position to play the pull shot but with the ball turning square, he had to change his mind – the simplest alternative is to let it go. But Sachin was not in that kind of a mood that day, as if time stood still, on noticing the exaggerated turn he remained in the same posture but paused the pull shot and adjusted beautifully by covering the turn and cut the ball over covers – call it a cover cut if you want. With the pitch biting and turning sharply mere mortals struggle to survive a vicious Warne turner but this man plays two shots in one for the same ball!

I am not able to get a video of this shot on you tube. Will post the link as soon as I find one.

I can spend a lifetime on writing about my fav shots of Sachin, but with time constraints let me just mention two more shots without elaborating much.

That pull off Andy Caddick in the 2003 World Cup a day after Caddick made an audacious statement that Michael Vaughan is better than Sachin!

And that full blooded lofted drive off McGrath immediately after pulling him out of the stadium in the champions trophy in Nairobi – oh boy was that retaliation or what???


This topic is so expansive that it deserves a book more than a blog post...