I’ve been mulling over Sachin Tendulkar’s achievements on and off for a while. Athers has a fine piece in today’s Times which has jogged my memory:
Tendulkar’s genius is how lightly he has carried this last burden. Since his teenage years he has been public property: every innings, every statement, every movement scrutinised. It was both his good fortune and his curse to play at a time when India emerged as an economic powerhouse, looking for heroes on the world stage. Rupees have flowed into his bank account but he has not been able to enjoy the fruits of his labours. He must drive his Ferrari at night to avoid attention, lives in a security compound and enjoys the relative anonymity that spending time in London and America brings.
Success brings adulation. We know that. But the acclaim Tendulkar has attracted over his career says as much about India as it does his own unique sporting ability. The raucous, almost hysterical reaction of his fans give evidence of a country who were (and probably still are) in desperate need for iconic heroes and role models. He was an entire nation’s representative on the world stage, which could explain why cricket is so revered in India. Only in the last decade has their economy begun to explode; cricket has been India’s emotional outlet for years, but also one of the few areas in which they felt on level terms with the world’s powerhouses. And Tendulkar is their cheerleader in chief, a beacon for hope and global respect.
As Atherton says, Tendulkar’s genius lies in his ability to succeed under the greatest pressure any sportsman has had to bear.
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"under the greatest pressure any sportsman has had to bear"
give me a break! There are worse things in life, even for top sportsmen and women, than being the favoured son of a nation, born into a high caste with loads of talent, the status and the temperament to carry it all, strolling round in the gentleman's' game, with nothing much more than some elbow injury and some loss of form to bear.
Without even thinking about it too much, I think Lance Armstrong, cancer-ridden, in a sport with a much higher pain and endurance element than cricket, winning the gruelling Tour 7 times
Or marathon runners whose bodies begin to "devour" themselves as they run…
or Oscar Pistorous running on no legs.
or some of the Chinese athletes at the Beijing Olympics, being trained up like machines since they were very young, without any comfy home life, ….
although you make a very good point steve…you're referring to physical pressure as far as I can gather from your post. however, maybe not so much today but if in the mid to late 90's and the early 2000's you stepped onto an India road when sr10 was batting you wouldn't see a soul and if you did they'd be huddled outside shops selling tv's, watching him bat. that is pressure. physical pressure is probably a given for any sportsman and more so for athletes than a cricketer. so i believe your point is moot.
Well, maybe I should have been clearer about what I meant regarding pressure. I was talking solely about the pressure of playing for India and what it means to Indians. That is his greatest achievement, not only coping with it, but succeeding. I can't think of many other sportsmen who have done that.
cast where did cast come from if it was upto cast to decide ho wud play for india there wud hav been no yuvraj or dhoni in the side
Hey hey chill with the caste certificates.Except for the fab 5 who by & large play just test cricket almost every young new player that india has is not an upper caste.Don't bring caste into this.If you're saying no1 calls for his head coz he's upper caste then that's ridiculous.The greatest cricketer india ever produced was a vertain kapil dev nikhanj who's from the trader community.
Steve,
I am an Indian and an exception at that I am not a fan of SRT. These days, I feel he plays purely for records. And as a test batsman, I would rate him way below Dravid. However, what you have posted is pure rubbish. Frankly speaking, I didn't know he was a Brahmin till you told me. The fact that he is a Brahmin has nothing to do with his popularity. It's mainly to do with the fact that he played a brand of attacking cricket when he was just a kid. Caste doesn't have anything to do with his popularity. For that matter, when Irfan Pathan made a sensational debut as a 19 year old, he was the toast of the entire nation. And he was a not even a Hindu, forget Brahmin. He was a Muslim. No one ever thought about it.
Seems like Steve doesn't know much about or India or how the whole social structure of society is exploited by politicians as a means to an end. The caste system is as prevalent in India today as racism is in the western world.
Not many other sportsmen are born these days into the "upper classes". Tendulkar is a Brahman – if he had been from a lower caste, then you might talk up how he has coped so well with the pressure.