Century of international centuries

Century of international centuries

Sachin Tendulkar made all Indians mighty proud when he reached the rare milestone of scoring “a century of international centuries” on March 16 against Bangladesh — a feat no other batsman has achieved. It was also his first one-day international (ODI) century against Bangladesh.

It took little more than a year to score his 100th century, the 99th having come on March 12, 2011, against South Africa in the World Cup. In this period, he was dismissed twice in the nervous-nineties and once on 80. He was also unlucky to be run out on 40 when Graeme Swann’s attempt to stop a powerful drive by MS Dhoni ended in his deflecting the ball on to the nonstriker’s stumps while Sachin was out of his crease.

After reaching the milestone that has eluded him for a year, Sachin shared his distress over the media hype around his 100th century, and also caused by nonstop reminders from his fellow Indian admirers everywhere: in restaurants, in hotels, in stadiums. They would keep reminding him of nothing else but his 100th century. Only a man with extraordinary nerves of steel could withstand such mental pressure.

To add to his distress, he was given uninvited “advice” from all and sundry. The worst came from India ex-captain Kapil Dev, who himself refused to retire and played 30 innings to get 33 wickets to surpass Sir Richard Hadlee’s then-record 431 wickets. Another piece of advice came from another ex-captain of India, Saurav Ganguly, who had reluctantly announced his retirement only when he realized that he would get his marching orders otherwise. But there were sane ex-cricketers who said that he should be left alone to decide when to hang up his boots.

On the way there were times when umpires like Steve Bucknor gave many grossly wrong decisions against him that cost him his wicket. These are the cases where incidents, when replayed, were displayed his wrong decisions clearly. Finally, during the India–Australia 2007-08 series and after further wrong decisions, ICC had to remove him as an umpire after the Sydney Test when Indian team management complained strongly about his umpiring, though in those cases the decisions didn’t involve Sachin.

Asoka de Silva also gave many wrong decisions against Sachin, which were confirmed to be clearly wrong on replay.

Compared to the regularity with which Sachin hit centuries, a gap of 33 international innings between his 99th & 100th century is surely an exception. Perhaps, to an extent, it happened because he was under media microscope. That he remained sane and focused in spite of media hoopla tells us more about his greatness.

But, in the end, the larger-than-life figure of Sachin, the ultimate cricketer, prevailed. He completed his “ton of tons” on March 16 and almost all cities in India erupted in celebrations.

It should be noted that Sachin was out in his “nervous-nineties” in a total of 28 innings: 10 times in tests and 18 times in ODIs.

Now, with the tension over his 100th international hundred behind him, I am sure that Sachin’s batting will blossom again with many dazzling performances.

K. B. Kale, Jakarta

First published in JP on 27/03/2012
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2012/03/27/letter-century-international-centuries.html