Tributes to Tendulkar

In the Times of India, Ayaz Memon says that comparing Sachin Tendulkar and Don Bradman would be a disservice to both.

In a couple of ways, both are joined at the hip. One is through mind-numbing statistics. Don Bradman’s batting genius is expressed best by his batting average of 99.94. This one simple numerical value reveals more about his skills and performances than would the countless books that have been written about him in the past 80 years. Tendulkar’s Test average, in the late 50s, is clearly not the yardstick of comparison. But 50 Test centuries is a whopping number. Add 46 more in ODIs - plus some more that are surely there in the future — and you could reach a figure that is likely to boggle the mind of all future generations, much as Bradman’s batting average has.

It is unlikely that an unescorted, cricket-challenged bystander at the Indian team’s training session would be able to spot the man who has scored 50 Test centuries among the group of flannelled men. With body language being the only cue to judge a player’s worth or his past record, Sachin Tendulkar, even with 21 years of international cricket behind him, can be mistaken for an edgy upstart or a jittery debutant, writes Sandeep Dwivedi in the Indian Express.

Every newcomer that walks into the dressing room has a Tendulkar story to narrate. It is usually about their observation while watching the legend preparing for the game. Many have tried to emulate him in all earnestness but given up as the standard set was too high and far too many sacrifices had to be made. Moreover, the ingrained meticulousness that Tendulkar has been born with was tough to cultivate. As a senior journalist once said after having tea in Tendulkar’s hotel room, “He prepares tea like he is cooking biryani.”

Tendulkar's achievements need to be looked at not just in a cricketing context but on par with efforts in any field — science, art, literature, etc — to push the frontiers of human excellence, says Dawn

There is no doubt that scoring a half-century of centuries is a remarkable feat in itself. This achievement speaks volumes for the cricketer`s temperament and his ability to adapt to changing times in the sports world. In fact, 20 years is a long time in the international sporting arena. Surviving for that long takes courage and determination. It is, as such, also about having enough passion for the game over that long a period to keep one`s fitness level at the requisite level.

Soumya Bhattacharya traces the starting point of Tendulkar's recent run of form all the way back to the 175 he scored in an ODI against Australia in 2009 in Hyderabad, when he almost single-handedly won India the match. Tendulkar, he writes in the Hindustan times, is still getting better.

As prodigious as he was murderous, Tendulkar exemplified in that innings a 36-year-old veteran who was celebrating, as it were, the teenager he had been, the one a nation could not but adore. We got it all in that 81-ball hundred: the impudent straight hits that disappeared into the stands; the textbook cover drives that split the field; the canny improvisations that yielded runs behind the wicket; the flicks off his legs to backward of square; and the hoicks in the arc between mid on and mid wicket that were destined to be boundaries no sooner had they left the bat.

The Indian Express dwells on what Tendulkar has meant to Indians over the years.

He was the guy, remember, who’d make up on the cricket field for our everyday inadequacies as a nation, for our singular failure to excel at other sports and for his team’s lack of support — he would, for the length of his innings, offer respite from all-round underachievement. Post-Mandal, post-liberalisation, post-Cold War, India’s doing better, other sports and the cricket team too. But he still stands out.

James Lawton pays tribute to Tendulkar in the Independent.

India

George Binoy is an assistant editor at ESPNcricinfo

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