Sachin begins march towards history

WANKHEDE STADIUM (MUMBAI): For the ungracious, it was a Mad Sachin Disease. For the gracious, however, it was always about forming the Great SRT Forever Wave. But from both sides of the spectrum, it was Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar (SRT) who was the ultimate currency in and around an exploding Wankhede Stadium on Thursday.

And, though the story is always around his fans, it was a larger than life moment for Sachin Tendulkar too. Not because it was his farewell Test but because, for the first time in his 24-year long career, his mother, Rajni, agreed to come to the stadium to watch him play live.

Always nervous about her son’s performance, she would prefer to watch the highlights on TV long after her son had scripted a masterpiece in the middle from all corners of the globe. But for SRT 200, she made an exception.

Sachin’s half-brother Nitin, wife Anjali, son and daughter accompanied his mother, along with his first coach Achrekar, who were whisked away by attending MCA staff to the President’s Box to mark the momentous occasion before 9 am. 

Sachin’s mother Rajni is his father’s second wife, the younger sister of his first wife who passed away unexpectedly leaving behind three children. Sachin is Rajni’s only child. She, and not Aamir Khan, was the cynosure of all eyes as, wrapped in a shawl she rocked in her leathered comfort chair nervously, joining the rest of the 25,000 spectators in the nation’s biggest goose pimple moment as her son walked out to bat at 3.33 pm.

Early in the morning, the sea of humanity queuing up for the stadium shamed the waves lashing the Marine Drive rocks. It was not anything like a Test match crowd — more of a T20 or, say, a World Cup final rush.

Outside Gate No 2, the legendary dabbawallahs, unable to afford tickets to this showstopper event of cricket, waited for over two hours to salute their maestro. Indulgent cops allowed this equally legendary delegation to stay on in the high security zone, till Tendulkar arrived in the team bus. Seeing the dabbawallahs saluting him, the maestro got up from his front seat to reciprocate.

The delegation went back satiated but the hunger for Sachin had, meanwhile, reached manic proportions in the stands, populated by a much televised Aamir Khan in his lucky World Cup final T-shirt and Nita and Mukesh Ambani to name a few.

For Aamir, as for the ordinary mortals, including the twitter-centric US fans who had kept awake to watch Tendulkar in action, skipper MS Dhoni broke hearts when he elected to bowl. “To the disappointment of fans, we will be bowling first,” he said after winning the toss with a coin especially minted by the BCCI to commemorate the moment.

Dhoni was booed but he was not taking any emotional chances, not when at stake was his idol’s last outing. The special coin, meanwhile, presented by BCCI president N Srinivasan who accompanied the two captains into the field, has the little master embossed on one side, the side which turned out to be Dhoni’s trump call.

The MCA, meanwhile, worked overnight to give Sachin a grand farewell by quickly removing the embarrassing hoardings of Virat Kohli and a fairness cream ad which had dwarfed those of Sachin’s 51 Test 100 moments on the super rim of the stadium.

On his part, Dhoni presented a special baseball cap to the little master with Sachin and his 200th match logo embossed on it. Another matter though that when Tendulkar came down the stairs to join his mates for a huddle in the field, he had forgotten to wear this memento and had to scurry back to get it and replace his floppy hat with it.

Tendulkar walked in to bat following Murali Vijay’s dismissal, amid a deafening chant of his name by the crowd even as the giant screen flashed the message -- ‘don’t even blink’. The West Indies team lined up to give him a guard of honour before he joined Cheteshwar Pujara at the crease.

The Board brought in special jerseys for Team India, something that the players will savour forever. The jersey has ‘Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar 200th Test’ embossed under the BCCI logo. This is the first-ever such privilege accorded to any departing batsman, not just in India but all over the cricketing nations. A Harsha Bhogle tweet told you how official commentators got these special jackets too, to show off on TV. “New jackets arrived this morning. Smart you think?” Bhogle said with a picture.

As for the legend himself, there was not much he did in the morning except soak in the love of millions. No catches, no bowling and very little fielding even though every time he came to the ropes, the stands exploded. But, in a poignant moment in the afternoon, for the first time ever in his career, he paid obeisance to the pitch by bending down, scooping some soil and streaking his forehead.

And then, it was business as usual - defeating pressure, tackling expectation, hungering for runs, waiting, watching, planning, executing and building a portfolio of runs that have defined Sachin as the one and only legend to have given the gentleman’s game its textbook class. 

Source: The Pioneer, November 15, 2013