On the shoulders of giants
Samanth Subramanian - 3 June 2002
Sachin Tendulkar against all bowlers - India innings at Trinidad © CricInfo |
An army may well win a battle with pop-guns and catapults, but
how much less concerned the soldiers and their supporters would
feel if their tank - even one with ailing treads - were rolled
out to back up the infantry. Allegorically, Sachin Tendulkar put
team interests before his shoulder bursitis - tendon inflammation
- and slipped into one-day colours for the deciding one-day
international at Port of Spain.
As it turned out, Tendulkar scooped his 44th Man of the Match
award by hitting a crucial 65 off 70 balls and guiding India to a
challenging total of 260. But the innings itself could hardly be
termed vintage Tendulkar, and his sore shoulder takes prime
responsibility for the nature of the knock.
Tendulkar's MRF-emblazoned bludgeon, treading the line between
"bat" and "lethal weapon" ever so delicately, weighs almost
three pounds, making it difficult to hoist into position with a
painful shoulder. Accordingly, his innings was almost completely
devoid of his pet horizontal-bat shots - the cut and the pull.
Six runs came in front of point and six in the square-leg region,
both areas that would have been thicker in run-density if
Tendulkar had the freedom to unleash the full flourish of his bat
on his shots. Instead, Tendulkar adapted his game to move the bat
as little as possible. He glided 14 runs to third man and as many
as 18 to fine-leg. Eleven runs came in the mid-wicket region,
mostly from effortless nudges off his legs.
At the post-match press conference, Tendulkar admitted that his
shoulder hampered him. "There were some shots that I just
couldn't play," he said. "My shoulder is still a little stiff, a
little sore, but I've been told it's nothing serious. It should
be okay in the next five-six days; it's just an inflammation."
Under such circumstances, Tendulkar's knock was all the more
priceless, as much for its contribution to the win as for the
sheer effort and dedication it exemplified.
© CricInfo