Sachin Tendulkar: Thank God it's Friday

WANKHEDE STADIUM (MUMBAI): 3.33 pm. India's biggest goose pimple moment — and perhaps, Sachin Tendulkar's too. The departing legend walked down the staircase of the Indian pavilion, looking up, looking back and then, looking forward — this time to perhaps a swan song knock, the last win over pressure, the ultimate response to undying, unreasonable and uncontrollable public expectation.

The West Indians gave him a guard of honour as he rotated his arm, walked through the adulation and reached the pitch to — for the first time ever in his long career —  bend down, pick up some soil and streak his forehead in obeisance.

In ovation, the entire Wankhede was up on its feet, the cheers could never have been louder or the moment greater. For the entire 82 minutes that Tendulkar dug into the crease, not a single person in the stand sat down, the tautness could've not let them anyways. Even Tendulkar was pacing up and down the crease as the West Indians, in the vain hope of trapping a hungry tiger, laid a cordon of a forward short leg, backward short leg and a silly point all around him.

But this was a master magician's last outing and he displayed a streak which has often catapulted him to immortality from mere greatness. Slowly but surely, he brought out all the armoury he had gathered from battlefields the world over and used it one by one — there was caution, there was keenness, there was timing and there was deft placement. Aggression came only at the safest and most opportune moments resulting in six delectable boundaries, each cheered as never before, each as scintillating as a 100 meter dash in record time yet as graceful as the main ballerina of the Bolshoi theatre.

Whatever may have been going on in the little master's mind, he surely kept failure and the fear of it out of the driving seat. Experience and the hunger to succeed like in the past could have been a bigger force behind Tendulkar's refreshingly confident and solid innings in which he got to a well serenaded 38 runs in a chinkless partnership with Cheteshwar Pujara.

Celebrated cricket writer Peter Roebuck once said that to see Tendulkar batting with Ravi Shastri was like seeing a diamond next to a rock. One could say the same about Tendulkar and now Pujara, the emerging rock of young Indian cricket.

Playing second fiddle to the man of the moment, Pujara, a veteran of several long innings, threw up a lot of calming confidence from the other end to help the maestro settle down for his biggest moment. At close of play on Day 1, he was at a sound 31 and the team cruising at 157/2.

After Dhoni broke hearts in the morning by electing to bowl, the spectators hit the jackpot when West Indies got bundled out six minutes to tea and then openers Murali Vijay and Shikhar Dhawan were spun back into the pavilion within just two balls by Shane Shillingford in the 14th over. No one cared how soundly the two had begun, scoring consistently and fast, putting up 43 and 33 respectively to leave the stage for the maestro to unfold a tantalising final act.

Tendulkar was in classic mood, according respect to good deliveries, rotating strike, giving singles a place above boundaries and watchfulness a cause over flamboyance. By camouflaging his aggressive intent in a show of soundness, Tendulkar took just two deliveries to go past sir Don Bradman's duck at departure. He, next, belied all doubts and gave expectations a bait by walking back into the pavilion unbeaten, to make tomorrow yet another day — hopefully of as much caution and wizardry as of razzle and dazzle, of gentle elegance, dogged determination and, of course, the ever inspiring hunger to succeed when failure is threatening imminence.

Not just Wankhede stadium but the entire nation will yet again come to a standstill as the master blaster walks into the middle at 9.30 am on Friday. You can forgive the gentry for not remembering anything but the last 82 minutes of Day 1's game, or for that matter, Pragyan Ojha's five-wicket haul in one session, Ashwin's 100 Test wickets, Dhoni's 250 stumpings or Shivnarine Chandrapaul's flat performance in his 150th Test, much like the rest of his team's which packed up at just 182 in 55.2 tight-fisted overs bowled by Dhoni's Team India in its ‘Only Sachin’ mode.

For now then, it's only hope and awe. As for shock, it failed this Thursday and has since been under a strict BCCI ban for at least the next four days!

Brief scores

West Indies 1st innings: 182 all out in 55.2 overs (Kieran Powell 48; Pragyan Ojha 5/40) lead

India 1st innings: 157 for 2 in 34 overs (Murali Vijay 43, Sachin Tendulkar 38 batting, Cheteshwar Pujara 31 batting; Shane Shillingford 2/46) by 25 runs at close of play on Day 1.  

Source: The Pioneer, November 15, 2013