God is Retiring !!!

Yes,that's true ..The God of Cricket ,Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar is retiring in couple of weeks .Absolutely adore that last picture !!!Right from his childhood as the picture indicates above ,even then his batting stance was spot on.

Cricket to millions of Indians is about one man named Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar. Right now the world is the middle of celebrating his retirement after 24 yrs of cricketing brilliance by SRT.It just speaks about his endurance,his will power and above all his sheer passion to play cricket for India.Truly amazing.

It has been an incredible journey for Sachin and India , a trip that figures alone cannot define,although it would be hard to imagine anybody getting 100 international hundreds,playing 200 test matches or scoring 18000 plus test runs !!!

God given talents apart his sheer dedication and ability to work out the pitch and bowlers real real quickly. "Sheer passion" as one of my friends used to say was inbuilt in sachin right from the time we all saw him playing .It takes me to the memory lane- getting bloodied by waqar as a 16 yr old ,smashing abdul qadir in the same debut  series,that wonderful century in perth ,1992 world cup match against Pak..the ball which got aamer sohail ,sheer exuberance in bowling the final over against Donald and macmillan in the 1993 hero honda final ,the desert storm in 1998 ,2003 WC innings featuring the upper cut six  against shoaib,waqar & wasim ,241 in Sydney in 2007,the winning second innings century in chennai against england in 2008,the one day double hundred against SA  and lots more ; lots. Truly amazing that one person has given so much majestic moments in cricket for Indians.

That coveted #4 position in Indian Test  batting  line would be tough to fill by anyone once sachin goes ,be it kohli ,Rohit ,Rahane or whoever gets to bat in that position this December in south Africa against probably the best pace attack in the world .Who would be that unlucky guy ???Anyway that's another discussion ...

There are many times we literally prayed for sachin to stay in the crease especially in the 1990's when he was the one man batting army. As we look down into the great man's retirement after his 200th Test in a few weeks time,it seems that one constant factor is our life will be gone after November ,i.e watching sachin  playing that awesome straight drive or that paddle sweep or the perfect cover drive or even the mandatory semi sit-ups while  taking guard to the first delivery

Salaam Sachin & Kudos to the greatest ever !!!

Cheers

-Hari ...

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