Sachin at 50 – An exclusive interview: Lessons from a life in cricket

So many facets are condensed into the years that make up the playing life of a professional sportsperson. While a regular career builds slowly, usually starting when a person is in their early 20s, an athlete typically starts out earlier than that — with a bang, on a stage of fireworks and applause, while contending with the uncertainty of how long it will last.

And there are a few, just a very few, who defy time and convention even within these norms.

Sachin Tendulkar stepped on the international stage as a 16-year-old phenom and retired at 40 as a veteran and one of the most admired cricketers the world has ever seen. As he turns 50 on April 24, a look at life lessons he learned from playing the game. Lessons that defined a generation, and lessons for all generations.

The earliest recollection of the name Sachin Tendulkar, for many fans, is the record partnership between you and Vinod Kambli in school cricket in the Harris Shield in 1988. Can you tell us a bit about that?

First of all, we didn’t know it was a record. We just played, and after a few days my classmate Ricky Couto’s brother Marcus (both would later go on to be umpires) told us, “I think it is a world record!”

We just wanted to bat. Laxman Chauhan, our assistant coach, kept trying to send us messages while we were in the middle — “Sir (coach Ramakant Achrekar) has asked you to declare”, and more such directives — but we were not responding. There was hardly any time left for lunch and we were having fun, so we wanted to continue batting.

At lunchtime, Laxman said, “You guys are in trouble… Sir has asked you to call him.” Vinod and I started discussing who would make the call. Vinod put it on me because I was the captain. We were in the khau galli (food-stall lane) at Cross Maidan, and I called. “Sir, Vinod is requesting that we bat on as he is on 349,” I said. Sir said, “Give him the phone”, and then said to him, ‘Right now, you are going to declare.”

His lines, loosely translated, were: “No point flogging a dead horse. If you’re truly good, go and do it in the next match as well.” He said we had scored over 700 runs, and if we couldn’t win after that we didn’t deserve to.

After that, we were playing a game against Anjuman-i-Islam in the Giles Shield and we were going to field with 10 fielders because I had batted, bowled, and gone to play another match. They scored 370-odd and I went there and scored 178 not out, and we went on to win the match. That was the defining year for me because I scored 125 at Cross Maidan and 26 not out at Shivaji Park, 200 not out in the Harris Shield quarters, 326 not out, and then 178. And then in the Harris Shield final, I scored 346 not out. With that, things got accelerated. People had heard about me but this being a world record made them think, “this is something special”.

The final was at CCI (the Cricket Club of India) and (Dilip) Vengsarkar was playing at Parsi Gymkhana. Milind Rege and all these people asked him to come and watch. Raj bhai (former BCCI chairman Raj Singh Dungarpur) was also there, as was (Sunil) Gavaskar. With all of them watching, I batted for almost two days in the final. That is where I feel Vengsarkar decided to invite me to the India nets. He sent me a message through Vasu Paranjpe. While I was batting there, he got Kapil Dev to bowl to me; the spinners were there too. I batted towards the end and there was some shooting going on as well. Aamir Khan was there. All this happened within a month-and-a-half. Then Vengsarkar gave the green signal to the Mumbai selectors to include me in the probables. In the first year, I did not play. I travelled with the team, went to Baroda, but didn’t play. The following year, I got my chance.

Lesson 1: Strike while the iron is hot. If you get an opportunity, make it count.

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Did you feel the struggle of stepping up from junior to senior cricket?

It didn’t happen to me. The only time I doubted myself in my entire career was in the first Test I played — against Wasim (Akram), Waqar (Younis), Imran (Khan) and (Abdul) Qadir. That was the only time. After I got out in the first innings, I came back to the dressing room and asked myself whether I was good enough to handle this level of cricket. I questioned myself because I didn’t realise that I was playing possibly the leading attack in the world at that time. I thought it was all happening too fast for me… that I wasn’t ready.

There was a question mark — “Where am I? Is Test cricket too high a standard for me?” There was a huge gap between Ranji Trophy and Test cricket. If I had played against a side that didn’t have a great fast-bowling attack, I could have still handled it, but I was exposed to express pace and I had not experienced that. Nobody had… At age 16, it was an acid test.

In the second Test, when I went out to bat, I didn’t look at the scoreboard because my target was the clock. I told myself, “I want to bat for half an hour, and we’ll see what happens.” At the end of those 30 minutes, I told myself, “I can manage this… this is not beyond me.” I scored 59 and I was absolutely fine with that.

After I had got out in the first Test, I spoke to a lot of guys. Chandu Borde was there, as were Ravi Shastri and Kris Srikkanth. That helped. Borde and Shastri said that I can’t play as if I am in a school match. “You need to give yourself a little more time.” That stuck in my mind.

Lesson 2: Give yourself time. Time to succeed or fail or find your bearings.

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In the early years, the numbers weren’t that great…

Well, in ODIs I was batting at 6, sometimes at 7. So, I was going in towards the end and just trying to score some quick runs. It was only after the 1992 World Cup that I finally moved to No 4.

We also have to remember that the game was played differently. Averaging in the mid-30s was good in those days, and at my position in the batting order, it was good. My job wasn’t to build the innings. It was to go and play explosive innings. Overall, in world cricket, one could have counted the number of guys who were averaging over 40.

Possibly because of the brand of cricket we were playing, the thought process was different. The rules were different, the balls were different, the timing was different. Not many understand that when they look at pure numbers. In those days, there were 9am starts, sometimes even 8.45am. So, the ball would seam and, later in the afternoon, under the sun, the spinners would come into play. There were more fielders outside, plus there was a red ball that reversed and got soft. Today, that doesn’t happen and, at the most, you are playing a 25-over ball in the 50th over. So, however hard you try, for instance, very rarely do you get reverse swing.

I was speaking to some bowlers recently and they were saying that the introduction of five fielders in the ring doesn’t even allow them to change the line. They are worried that if they falter, they will pay a heavy price. It’s a different ball game, a different mindset, because of the rules. Go back to the same rules and the game will change again.

Lesson 3: Every era has its challenges. Don’t get too drawn into comparisons.

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Your first ODI century, against Australia in Sri Lanka… how did that feel?

It felt like a monkey off my back. I wanted to score a hundred and I had got close but was never successful until then. It wasn’t bothering me as such, but you want to be a major contributor.

When I started opening the innings, the whole idea was to go after the bowling because that didn’t happen in Indian cricket. The strategy used to be to not lose early wickets, to build partnerships, and finish strong. But I was part of the tour committee on the tour of New Zealand which would decide the team. I knew what I could do; I could play shots at the start of innings too. So the thought process was about putting the pressure back on the bowlers and not just looking to save wickets. Give me one chance, I told them. If I fail, I won’t come back to you… you won’t have to deal with this again. It wasn’t planned or discussed very much. It was a decision in the spur of the moment.

Lesson 4: Follow your instinct, seek and you shall find.

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Despite that, you didn’t always open…

There were a number of speed breakers along the way, and it was always from the other end. I never said I want to go down (in the line-up). It was always either the team management or the selectors or the coach. I was open to discussion and that was because the team believed in that.

In the lead-up to the 2003 World Cup, I was batting at No 3 or 4 and the thought process of a few guys in the field was that, up front, if there is movement, I was too important a player to lose. I said if that is what you feel, then maybe you need to think differently, because I don’t feel like that. I will go there and control the game. I don’t think of getting out as I am walking out to bat. But if the team wants me to bat at No 4, I am prepared to do that.

We played two or three practice games and we lost miserably. That is when (then India coach) John Wright came to me and said: What do you want to do? I said, I will do whatever the team wants me to do. He said, “Forget about the team, what do you want? The team will play around you.” I told him that if I have to bring the best Sachin to the table, then opening the innings is where I would be able to contribute more. That is my thinking. And he said, “You are opening tomorrow.”

Lesson 5: Back yourself, belief is key.

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In the ’90s, India was not a team that travelled well. How difficult was that period for you?

I feel that later on, around 2000, we started getting players who were playing at a different level. They were match-winners. In ODIs and even in Tests, they travelled better because there was more ammunition. We had the ammunition to counter-attack. But in the ’90s, it was almost as if we were being asked to box with one hand tied behind our backs. We were just defending more than attacking. We felt like that as a team. There were some decent names earlier also, but the consistency as a team was missing, is what I felt. There were some challenges as well… we all know that world cricket… Indian cricket… went through a dark phase. It was unexpected and that is why I say that post-2000 was a new chapter, with new faces in the team, new vision, new energy.

Lesson 6: To win, you need to find the right ingredients.

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You were first made captain in the ’90s. That seemed like a natural progression, but things didn’t go according to plan. How did you make the decision to step back?

If you look at my record as captain of the Mumbai Ranji team, I think it was 100%. There are a number of elements that come into play. As I said, it was a dark phase (the match-fixing scandal), so let’s not overlook that. There were challenges when I was the captain, opportunities that were not converted — sometimes due to luck: India were winning in Johannesburg when it started raining and the Test was washed out; we were winning against Sri Lanka and it started raining in Mumbai in December; then we were chasing 120 to win in Barbados… we had never won there. So, we couldn’t chase 120. I captained in South Africa, Australia and the West Indies; at that time, all three were leading teams. So, when we are assessing, we also need to get into numbers — how many batters scored how many runs when it was needed or how many bowlers got how many wickets, how many times as a team did we go past 300 runs… if you aren’t going to go past 300, how will you win Test matches? Personally, I never want to go into that, but if we are assessing then we need to do that… I wanted to win, whether it was as captain or player. I was playing for India. I didn’t want to settle for second place. That continues even now. I was playing in the Legends League and I told all my team mates, I am here to win.

Lesson 7: Analyse where you stand honestly. Know when to move on.

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Under John Wright and Sourav Ganguly, things changed. How did you adapt?

Everything was changing around the game. The game was changing. Support staff was being added to the team. I continued in exactly the same way as before. Yes, there was more awareness about fitness and diet. There wasn’t a huge culture around weight training and looking after your diet before. We would generally run into an experienced guy and learn from him… that is what I did. For instance, my pre-match meal used to be pasta. I would avoid masala and stuff. I would load my system with carbs, and I continued that for quite some time.

Lesson 8: Move with the times. Learn from new trends.

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What was your training method for yourself?

For me, it was very important to not be bulky. I was training so that I could perform better, not look better. Fitness is all about what you are able to do once you have crossed the rope, and if I could better myself there, I was doing the right things. It was more about strength; reps. I realised I knew my body well. I had my fair share of injuries and I knew what was happening with me and how much I could take.

Later on, it got to a point where physiotherapists would trust my judgment. Training methods changed, but were also largely quite set. I didn’t want to try out new things because my body didn’t respond well to that. The whole idea was that if I could feel strong and fit, that was enough. Whenever I tried new things, I would get injured or my body would send signals… and I would tell the physio, something is wrong. If we still went ahead, I would invariably get injured.

For example, I was playing my last Indian Premier League match for Mumbai Indians and I hit a six. While hitting the shot, I heard a click in my wrist. Nitin Patel, the physiotherapist, came out and I told him, “I think my season is over.” We still had five weeks to go in the tournament. He said, “Your hand has gone into a spasm. Let’s wait and see how it goes.” At the end of 72 hours, I could not play. I met a specialist later and he said I’d cracked my bone.

Lesson 9: Know your body. Know your limits.

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Your instinct and intuition are famous. There is, for instance, the way you can tell if a bat is good…

I would ping the bat. It was a childhood habit of mine. My brother (Ajit Tendulkar) would also do that. The sound would just tell me whether the bat was good or not. I could tell players which should be their No 1 bat and which should be No 2. (Trinidadian cricketers) Dwayne Bravo and Kieron Pollard once played a prank on me. They showed me four bats and asked which one Bravo should use. I gave each bat a rating and he said he would keep these in mind. Then I checked out his practice bat and said, “My friend, your best bat is lying in your kit bag.” They burst out laughing. That was his match bat. I told him to try my method. The bat speaks to me. I know. When I hear the sound of the blade, I know what it is telling me.

Lesson 10: Pick your weapons wisely. Listen, and they will talk to you.

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Did you consciously change your game? It almost feels like a career in two parts…

See, things change with age and injuries. A number of my injuries were in the upper body. After the finger injury in 2002 (operated on after the 2003 World Cup; he was out of play for four months), I felt that the original strength in my middle and ring fingers was missing. That, almost subconsciously, changed my grip a little. When certain parts of your body are not functioning at optimal levels, the brain adapts. For certain shots, I couldn’t grip the bat the way I used to.

In 2004, I had tennis elbow and injuries to a shoulder, bicep, wrist. In one season (in 2009), I had tennis elbow in the other arm, and golfer’s elbow. There were phases when both my arms had bands. Even before the season had begun, I had both these things but I also had my previous experience of dealing with tennis elbow. That really helped.

Lesson 11: You are rarely going to be at 100%. Learn to work with what you have.

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How difficult was it to say goodbye to the sport?

It wasn’t. I was sitting in Delhi and we were playing in the Champions League and I missed a couple of sessions. I didn’t practice, I didn’t go to the gym. I had never done that before in my life. It made me wonder whether my body and mind were telling me that these things didn’t matter anymore. I was comfortable sitting in my room and watching TV. So I came back and discussed it with my brother and (wife) Anjali. I kept taking gradual steps. I was very clear that when I retired, I would play my last game only for India. I was always going to do that.

Lesson 12: Follow your heart.

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You turn 50 tomorrow. If you were to write to your 16-year-old self, what would you say?

A number of things… When I look at your career, I am a content athlete. It is all about the experience, and that last experience was wonderful for me. I would not change it for the world. It has been a great journey and I take a lot of pride in saying that. How many players get to represent their country for 24 years? I would say, if you’re going be there for that long, there are going to be highs and lows… it is a package deal and I wouldn’t settle for anything else.

Lesson 13: Enjoy the ups, expect some downs. That’s life.