MAY 27- This logger really likes Sachin Tendulkar. Am sure most of you do so as well.
But to hear him say he’s not going to play IPL from now on was not met with any loss or bereavement. It was a quiet moment, icons must go – even if from the madness of Twenty20. But the Master Blaster will still continue to play Test cricket, he’s quit one days quite some time ago.
He continues to play even when he does the thing he’s being doing recently, come and go like every other player in the squad. No set jaw, no ball-focus eyes just lbw or a plumb catch and a Thank-You walk to the pavilion.
Sachin waltzed in on Indian cricket like Dionysus – thulping the pace bowlers when Indians feared pace bowling, smacking the ball to third man and beyond when Indians feared the moving ball, yada yada, blah blah and blech.
But lately, and it’s been lately for quite a long time, the brilliance and the magic of Sachin Tendulkar has remained on YouTube clips. On terra firma and the here and now, he has been like the phantom of the stadium, come in and walk out.
Heroes are important but ones that are steadfast at continuing at creeping pace down the slow decline into history need to be jolted out of the blue. Am not saying let’s call for a referendum, am saying Sachin should hang up his Test boots and do the other things which come with the age (He’s 40, you know).
We as Indians defer to (or respect) everything, especially anything that’s remotely better than us, both in the singular and the collective, we co-opt with our reverence – the mighty West Indians and the all-conquering Waugh-led Australia that waned under Ponting. Marshall, Lillee etc were without doubt fantastic bowlers but since we didn’t have the kind of batsmen that could take the battle to them like Sachin did, we deferred. Now the West Indies are not a power on the field, the Australians are regrouping. Isn’t it time for us to move on and tell Sachin that he must go? Or do we suffer the sight of the stumbling Icon without the mindfulness, the in-the-moment alchemy?
Imagine how many Tests he will play and colour our wonderful memories we have of him – Shining, Sparkling, Smiling and that skyward- thanks after the many centuries on that stat file. Sachin should quit Tests too. Despite all this, the logger still likes Sachin Tendulkar.
