MASTER LASTER: WHAT THEY DON'T TELL YOU ABOUT SACHIN TENDULKAR
Sumit Chakraberty
Hay House India; Rs 299
It would be tough to find an Indian who has never been a Sachin Tendulkar fan. I was one myself and bought a cake or a kilo of coconut macaroons to distribute to friends every time Tendulkar scored a century. Then this enthusiasm started telling on my wallet and I prudently replaced the sweet treats with a shared whoop and high fives. Later still, with a personal declaration nowhere on the horizon, Tendulkar's centuries - now well spaced out even for the most strained wallet - elicited only casual interest. Therefore, when Tendulkar faced the final ball of his international career recently, it wasn't with too much sadness that I watched him. I saw him play that upper cut into the West Indian slip fielder's hands not with a sense of loss but simply as part of anecdotal history.
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And while the limelight was firmly on India's "God" there were several aspects of his game that lay unseen, un-analysed in the shadows. The bouquets having gone Tendulkar's way, the bricks will probably be hurled in the direction of Sumit Chakraberty, journalist and cricket columnist, who has brought some of these facts into the open in Master Laster: What they don't tell you about Sachin Tendulkar.
Chakraberty's premise is sure-footed: while Tendulkar thoroughly merited his unprecedented popularity, a bit of his pre-eminence seems to be the result of adroit marketing because the figures do not add up. Take, for instance, his fabled partnership with Vinod Kambli in a tournament for schoolboys. The glare is so much on the 664 runs the pair scored in tandem that no one seems to mind that Tendulkar defied his coach's orders to declare when the two weren't even into their double tons. "This keen awareness of milestones and records and the single-mindedness to accumulate them, could remain with him throughout his career," says the author.
Chakraberty substantiates this with statistics that everyone can reel off but only a few have actually digested. Tendulkar had an abysmal record on away pitches, especially seaming ones, visible only on scrutiny after paring away figures of matches in Sharjah and the subcontinent. His handsome World Cup record, with an average of nearly 57, was built around big innings that he played against teams like Bangladesh, Kenya, Zimbabwe, the Netherlands and Namibia.
More startlingly, he compares miserably with his peers on scoring centuries in winning causes. Of his 49 centuries in one-day cricket, 33 came in Indian victories - a win percentage of 67. Among Indians, the one who has an identical percentage is Rahul Dravid, and Dravid wasn't a particularly hardy 50-over batsman. Virender Sehwag returned 93 per cent, Sourav Ganguly 82, Ricky Ponting 83, Matthew Hayden 80 and so on. But this is not a takeaway for anyone who talks about his 100 hundreds in international cricket, which itself is an instance of the hype around Tendulkar since no other cricketer's achievements have been measured in cumulative hundreds in different forms.
It isn't as if Chakraberty is out to demonise Tendulkar for his single-minded pursuit of cricket glory. He fully appreciates the genius of his batting and how, unlike many similarly-talented cricketers, the squeaky-voiced Mumbaikar had the wisdom to adapt his style to his age and diminishing capacities so he could lord over Indian cricket for a quarter of a century. There is a delicious comparison with Roger Federer. Chakraberty recalls the Swiss ace saying that rallies got longer as he advanced in age because, unlike in his more energetic days, he would wait longer for the half chance that he could kill with certainty. In a similar fashion, Tendulkar, too, became less explosive, more solid, as he changed his youthful attacking style to ensure risk-averse batsmanship in his thirties.
Tendulkar's mystique is born of the man's seeming disdain for anything other than a focused progression to an Indian victory. And yet, as this slim book presaged during the partnership with Kambli, Tendulkar proved that he is as fixated on records as any other man. Otherwise, why would he have chosen to air his hurt at missing a double hundred in Pakistan in 2004 when Dravid declared to see if India could force a result? And don't forget his slow, danger-eschewing 138-ball century against a poor Bangladesh attack on an easy batting wicket that cost India the match in 2012 - it was the celebrated 100th ton that Tendulkar so coveted. That he also chose to play 200 Tests rather than retire with an untidy 198 against his name only underlines his frailty for records. Master Laster argues that there is no need to fanatically air-brush the warts out of the picture, for, given his humongous talent, Tendulkar will remain a hero anyway, warts and all.
