Has Tendulkar fluffed the timing of his exit?
Vikram Kapur, writing in the Hindu , says while fellow Maratha Anna Hazare straddled the Indian consciousness like a larger-than-life Bollywood hero in August, Sachin Tendulkar went in the opposite direction with an unconvincing performance in
Nikita Bastian
25-Feb-2013
Vikram Kapur, writing in the Hindu, says while fellow Maratha Anna Hazare straddled the Indian consciousness like a larger-than-life Bollywood hero in August, Sachin Tendulkar went in the opposite direction with an unconvincing performance in England.
His [Tendulkar's] performance in the Test series in England saw him fall from the pedestal of a cricketing god. As the failures multiplied and the hundredth international ton refused to come, he began to look more and more the ageing athlete clinging on after his day had passed for the sake of a record ...
If Tendulkar had retired after the World Cup, the last memory of him in the blue of India would have been of him holding the trophy. And the last memory of him in Test match whites would have been a tremendous century on a brute of a pitch in Cape Town against Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel at their nastiest. An innings that helped India come back undefeated for the first time from South Africa.
Nikita Bastian is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo