How did the greatest ODI player ever get such a low key exit?

[Vikas Bhatt]

India has the best batting depth in the world' date=' but they are stuck in domestic cricket getting nowhere. Faith has been put in the wrong players for years, from an outsiders point of view. Raina, Yuvraj, Mukund, Nohit, these guys are average non-ODI/IPL players. Rahane is pure go.d Pujara too (good he finally got a go), i like even Mukund, and even Badrinath (though his time has passed now i guess). Chand looks great. Invest in youth, always, much like India did in 1989. I can recall Darren Lehmann (yes i know he isnt Sachin) saying in 2004 that he would give up his test spot for Michael Clarke, as there was no future in him playing tests whilst standing in the way of a possible great young player. Team must move forward, always. Most 34+ year old players retire too late, its just how it is, ends up being sad for most to go out with a wimper. But hey, they are just sportsman, they are not the most intelligent people in the world.[/quote'] Spot on mate. But for some fans and unfortunately even cricket boards under corporate pressure, certain sportsmen must ply at all cost instead of taking a sane retirement. For some fans having SRT get a glorious exit is more important than team rebuilding or winning. They would rather India lost 10 tests and SRT failed just so they can see him score a huge one in 11th test so he can retire on a high. As if there can be any high in such a scenario. With such warped priorities is it any wonder we lack the ruthless professionalism of boards like Aus, SA and Eng? Nowhere can a non-performing senior, no matter how legendary can choose his own retirement if it is costing the team badly. Even guys like Waugh and Ponting were given a tap on their shoulders. The stupid BCCI, some fans and certain idiots in media are so sold on SRT's cult status that they wrongly think he is untouchable for as long as he wants to play. team India can go to hell. SRT is all that matters for them. The joke would then be on them if he never 'regained his form' back and ended his career in utter humiliation. They would fancy that probably. Like there is any form to look forward to from a batsman who will be 40 in 3 months time? If a player recognizes gracefully his time is up, he gets to go on a high as he can time his retirement over a good personal result while the going is still good. If a players fails to realize mother nature's tap, than nothing can save him from a humiliating fall from grace. These people won't accept this cold fact that SRT missed the glorious retirement bus and has no chance of boarding it now.

[JaFanatic]

simple master din plan his retirement:((

[Bumper]

That TOI report was coke-and-bull anyway.

Bullsheet. Common sense suggests Tendulkar announcing his retirement shortly before the squad was announced = His retirement was likely forced. But you guys believe what you want to!

[Vikas Bhatt]

Hah! Did IPL kill Virat Kohli too? No, you wouldn't say that because Kohli got some success. It's so silly to say that Rohit got killed by IPL, just because he couldn't make it at the international level in ODIs. On the other hand, Rohit keeps scoring runs in Ranji (which is probably a format he's more suited to). If IPL had made Rohit so lazy, he wouldn't have made all this effort in the Ranjis which no one watches. IPL has its own issues, but blaming every failure on IPL is simply juvenile and shows a clear lack of understanding. The same Ashwin who took the fastest 50 Test wickets for an Indian debutant has become a fall guy due to IPL :hysterical: because of one bad series. How about acknowledging the fact that he ran against a superior opposition and did not know how to counter it, and will probably learn from the experience and emerge better? It has nothing to do with IPL to start with. Pujara's technique looks okay despite playing a few IPL seasons.

But then for all your arguments there is just one Kohli among many? There will always be an odd duck who can survive. But the others clearly haven't. Thats because they have fallen by the wayside playing for IPL money and their techniques have been shot to the point where they can't survive more than 10 overs. IPL not only messes a players's responsibility and priorities [more than double the money than one gets playing a whole year for India on national duty], creating a situation where younger players want to play IPL and give a damn of playing for India. It also creates a situation where evens enior established players don't give 100% in the firled before IPL in the fear of missing IPL to injury and save their fitness for IPL. Excess T20 and ODIs have turned the bowlers into containing defensive bowlers. It has especially been harsh for spinners. Ashwin got fast 50 wickets at home more because weaker inept teams like WI and NZ didn't play him well. Fact is he has no variety and can't flight the ball and deceive good batsmen as we have just found out. This is another curse these commercial pajama cricket has inflicted on us. That the likes of Zaheer burn and injure themselves playing 2 months non-stop junk and then struggle for 2 years to get that fitness back. Whether it is the discrepancy of money, technique, focus, priority many factors of IPL have taken our players and teams in a horrible direction. Our seniors over the years never played domestic cricket. The younger players never got a chance to see and watch SRT, or Ganguly up close. This most important factor of making all players in country in domestic cricket was sacrificed by BCCI first to play more stupid one day matches and now for 2 months of IPL. The India A and B tours overseas was stopped to divert a bigger pool of reserve players in IPL. So now if players in domestic circuit were not benefiting from playing with seniors in domestic cricket where their experience could benefit them, we now have a situation where no one wants to either play domestic cricket or for any national side. We have lost a master spinner like Kumble but from dozens of spinners we have none who can compete with intensity, sincerity and pride playing for India should bring. We have lost close to 4 great batsmen and we have people who can only play 5 overs of slog and who can't even survive 5 overs in tests. And you find nothing wrong with the scenario? Pujara came through because he always focused on India slot and worked hard in domestic cricket scoring big. But thats maybe one in a hundred players with the correct priorities and correct attitude. There was a time when all the 100 players in fray wanted to play for India. Now IPL has changed that. All want to play IPL. And want the instant glamour, fame and money it brings. Suddenly every youngster in the nation was aspiring not for a slot in India A and in end for Team India but for a slot in IPL? You don't find it worrying? Strange? This is precisely what IPL has done mate - killed the desire to play for the nation, kill the need to aspire for a national cap and kill the hunger to keep playing well for a spot in the national team. Same goes for seniors who have lost both the focus and hunger and are now happy when they get that odd 100 or 50 needed to survive in the team. And you don't see the pitfalls of the situation? Coming to Kohli, even there the glass is half empty. He has no mental strength to handle pressure in tests coming up when knocks where the rubber is lost and dead and with no pressure left to perform. he can only play those innings when his position in test side gets shaky. Let him perform consistently well in the first half of a fresh test rubber and we will talk more about him! The likes of Sharma blow chances offered because they don't care anymore. Under any case playing mediocre bowler on flat tracks is more easy than playing against professional bowlers in pressure in a real international match so maybe he isn't fit for international cricket. Thing is to be noticed in IPL like in national team you still need to do well in domestic cricket. Thats still the root script to move forward. IPL has opened a window to play and make money elsewhere and national team is no longer the only place to aspire for opportunities. If only BCCI had put a domestic structure where ever player be it seniors or juniors played 2 months of competitive cricket for 4 days per game, the results would well and truly have been different for india today. At the end of the day for every SRT who chose to play IPL over national duty in WI [biggest example of how bad IPL has changed priorities and how the whole WC winning side chose to play IPL through injuries but avoided national duty later to get fit] there will be Michael Clarke's who will skip playing IPL for the sake of their national team season. There will also be a few like Gayle and Symonds who will stop playing for the nation and become commercial freelancers after IPL. This is just one of the bigger dangers facing cricket.

[Vikas Bhatt]

I don't know man, the grass always looks greener on the other side. I personally think Indian cricket is screwed forever. BCCI has killed the golden goose with excessive dose of this IPL poison. IPL has not only killed the technique and temperament of potential test players, but also their hunger. Rohit Sharma of 2008 was the next Tendulkar in the making. After 4 years of million dollar pay cheques and royal life style, the lad hardly looks motivated to play for the country. Murali Vijay looked like a great test prospect few years back. Few years of IPL, he can't buy a run at the international level anymore. Our supposedly promising spinners like Ashwin have no patience or aptitude for the longer version of the sport. Rahane, Pujara, Mukund and the likes belong to the last generation of players with some aptitude for test cricket, as they grew up on proper first class cricket. The next gen players will grow up on a heavy diet of T20 sh*t and their career ambitions will start and end with IPL. To make matters worse, the bufoons manning our cricket board & selection committee do their bit. They dont give a damn about the sport that made them so rich. Its all about milking every last penny the game has to offer and doing enough lip-service to keep the fans and the media interested. We deserve where we are now.

:hatsoff:

[Vikas Bhatt]

The way you are quoting examples, you dont even seem to understand a young cricketer's psyche. You are a teenager and you grow up on a heavy diet of T20 and see a genuine opportunity to make a good living playing IPL and you see a dozen teams with more than half a dozen spots per team. What are you going to do ? Fight for years for those 2 or 3 spots in the national team or simply go for the low hanging fruit ? And exactly what kinda technique do you think a T20 aspirant is going to develop ? And worse if you have already made an international appearence and therefore eligible for a big pay packet, are you still gonna be as desperate to break into the national team again ? Among RP Singh, Murali Vijay, Rohit Sharma, Munaf Patel & the likes, i dont see any desperate cricketer trying to get back into "this" side on a permanent basis - esp, when it has never been easier to make it to an Indian team than now. Kohli has succeeded and therefore IPL theory is bullsheet ? LOL! First of all, Kohli is yet to establish himself as a test player. The fact that he is a shoo in just reflects the poverty of our cricket. Second, one exception does not prove or disprove anything. Your Raina Jadeja, RP Singh examples are irrelevant, they dont prove anything, as they are hardly successful test cricketers. In fact, i'd say the way an unfit RP Singh showed up in England hobbling in to deliver the new ball just bolsters my point about cricketers losing their passion to play for the country after their stints at IPL. You think RPS could have afforded to be so out of shape and depth, if his success in 'that' one game was the difference between extending his career as a pro cricketer vs consigned to the bins ? He does not give a rat ar about whether he's picked again for the national team, he's made it already! Besides budding cricketers, IPL has taken its toll on established cricketers as well. Never heard of Sehwag delaying his shoulder surgery to play in the IPL or Gambhir playing with his finger injury in the IPL ? And LOL @ Ashwin's failure attributable to a superior team. What do you expect ? All teams will play him like NZ & WI, two teams with the poorest technique against spinners ? Against good teams, he wont get wickets by just bowling an odd carrom ball, he needs to work on the batsmen over a spell. Ever heard of Kumble bowling Gilchrist around the legs after setting him up for several overs at a stretch. I still like Ashwin, its unfair to write him off after one series, but you gotta wonder about his temperament for test cricket. KP ? LOL! I am not sure it strengthens your argument. The fact that at the peak of his international career, he even acted out like that was because of IPL. Besides there are many others like Malinga, Shaun Tait, Shane Bond (and almost Gayle) who gave up test cricket for T20. Overall, the fact that some cricketers have shown the right intent in spite of their T20 riches is hardly a good enough argument to advance your point. IPL has shifted the incentives in a irreversible manner and players no longer look at international cricket the same way they used to. Honor ? My ar:hysterical:

+1

[Vikas Bhatt]

I buy that point that IPL should not be the primary agenda of all players, and I give credit to Ishant for not playing it last year. I also agree that IPL should have a salary cap and not pay out obscene amounts to cricketers - and these are some of the vices of IPL. But finally, the onus should lie on the cricketers, and if they don't have it in them to give their all for the ultimate honour, it is an unfortunate thing for the country. I'm also sure that there are enough cricketers in the domestics who would love to grab their opportunities with both hands if given the chance.

I agree with this post of yours however..... +1

[CG]

Oh Ok. On most other forums' date=' you can't do that. Only the admins can! So this one has such tricks built in....LOL.[/quote'] Btw You a batman Fan? Do you play some batman games on pc also.

[velu]

most probably selectors might have told sachin that its not possible for them to arrange his 50th ODI century :(( then he retired

[Vikas Bhatt]

Btw You a batman Fan? Do you play some batman games on pc also.

Huge fan. I have both Arkham Asylum and Arkham City games. I have about 500 Batman comics and 100 graphic novels/trade paperbacks of his comics. In all I have about 5,000 comics and 500 graphic novels in collection. :giggle:B->:yay:

[Sooda]

Huge fan. I have both Arkham Asylum and Arkham City games. I have about 500 Batman comics and 100 graphic novels/trade paperbacks of his comics. In all I have about 5,000 comics and 500 graphic novels in collection. :giggle:B->:yay:

OMG. At the risk of derailing this thread.. Are you more of a DC or Marvel person..? I do like to read comics though I dont as much as Id like to... definitely not a hugely avid reader as you seem to be...I read Batman- off and on kinda thing- until Batman and Robin just prior to 'the return of Bruce Wayne'. Need to catch up on A LOT like what happens after, esp in the New 52 world which has been getting rave reviews More up to date on Marvel-though Ive only just finished AvX and started on Marvel Now avengers etc...

[Kriterion]

Criticize his record, because thats what fans do, but to criticize a man on a personal level is plain wrong. Although I am the first to scrutinze and nit-pick his stats and records, I consider myself an SRT fan because of the purity and beauty of his batting. I do not believe he was the best Test batsman of his time, nor maybe even on his team, but I do think he was at least as great as Viv Richards as an ODI bat and probably better given the bowling attacks he faced. However, there is no denying that he has been both the most talented and the most pure batsman of not only his generation but probably of all time (never saw the Don, but the few clips I've seen don't impress me in this regard). If I was SRT, I'd have chased every record he has. In fact, I'd have stayed on to try and reach 20,000 ODI runs, being so close. Sure, maybe he should have retired after the 2011 WC, and sure maybe his staying on has hurt the team's fortunes and near future. However, maybe his greed for records is not about selfishness per se, but passion for the game which has consumed more than half of his life thus far.

[Sooda]

I think I see Sauravs point as- it depends on the players- hence the examples of Raina working on his technique and wanting to play test matches despite being a good IPL player. Hughes skipped the BBL to work on his technique and Bopara turned down an offer from RR to play for Essex and win his test spot back. His words were (along the lines of) 'money isnt everything and test cricket is paramount' Why cant our players see their priorities the same way, for a start. Rahane and Pujara, their FC success pre dates the IPL they have seen players get into the test team via that old fashioned way and have wanted to do the same. The fact is that the route to test cricket- for a batsman at least- remains FC cricket. The question is whether our young cricketers want to play test cricket at all - like Clarke and Bopara and Hughes- and something must be done to make sure they do. Perhaps a ruling that no player under 23 can play IPL. Salary caps and also increasing the interest in test match cricket. A proper A team programme with good fees for players who play for India A and who are selected based on FC form...so players want to play for the A team.

[Vikas Bhatt]

@Sooda - Oh man thats a lot of catchup to do. I collect all brands depending on my av characters, good story or art, be it DC, Marvel, Image. Batman is top on my list since childhood. I have a bit of partiality for DC. Problem for DC is they have rebooted their continuity at least 5 times last 15 years after original Crisis of Infinite Earths. New 52 is the 5th such reboot. For me nothing has much changed. For a zillionth time they are changing a characters costume, origin and background story without changing too much. For many fans like me we now selectively buy comics. Its saturated hopelessly with too many reboots and continuity messes. The current reboot would have worked for me if it wiped out everything that happened below and started completely new. But it has conveniently ignored some aspects of the previous continuities and retained some of them without logic. So for guys like me it is still a total mess because events from GL books through Blackest Night are partially valid, events from Batman R.I.P and batman Inc. are partially valid while some of the others stand invalid. Teen Titans and Red Robin continuity is completely different so reference points to events get more blurred. If you want any clarifications PM me or start an off topic thread and invite me. In your case You can maybe start from batman RIP if you want Batman books. I wouldn't like it but its obvious Batman Inc and events of his return are still refered to [like Dick replacing Bruce as batman is refered to by Joker in current stupid Joker's Death of Family storyline]. But for most New DC is probably good for you. And if you want far back then maybe you can collect Infinite and Fimnal Crisis, important story arcs. In GL, you can pick up war of Green Lanterns and Blackest Night runs that ran through DC universe. In Marvel AvX was a good arc. Punisher and Daredevil are well written. New Avengers which ended a run was refreshing. Spiderman books are well written. The current expected 'shock ending' in Amazing Spiderman 700 has turned me off now. These stunts to sell books have gotten too old to work for me. You could maybe like it. I don't read X-men much these days. Too many books and too many directions and alternate timelines and references to keep track of. You cannot keep up with it unless you have infinite money and patience. Spideman and Avengers also have too many books out. Ultimate Spiderman volume 2 with that African-American kid is a good run. I can give you a list of Batman TPBs and Graphic novels to buy if you want. These days I enjoy reading more off beat and non-superhero books with good exciting stories like many Image mini series, Thief of Thieves etc.

[Vikas Bhatt]

I think I see Sauravs point as- it depends on the players- hence the examples of Raina working on his technique and wanting to play test matches despite being a good IPL player. Hughes skipped the BBL to work on his technique and Bopara turned down an offer from RR to play for Essex and win his test spot back. His words were (along the lines of) 'money isnt everything and test cricket is paramount' Why cant our players see their priorities the same way, for a start. Rahane and Pujara, their FC success pre dates the IPL they have seen players get into the test team via that old fashioned way and have wanted to do the same. The fact is that the route to test cricket- for a batsman at least- remains FC cricket. The question is whether our young cricketers want to play test cricket at all - like Clarke and Bopara and Hughes- and something must be done to make sure they do. Perhaps a ruling that no player under 23 can play IPL. Salary caps and also increasing the interest in test match cricket. A proper A team programme with good fees for players who play for India A and who are selected based on FC form...so players want to play for the A team.

Salary cap is a must on IPL surely. One of the states took a decision that none of it's players under 22 years will be allowed to play IPL. Thats a great decision. Maybe it needs to be extended to 25 so people have to go through the whole development cycle and learn to value those dollars when they come.

[bharat297]

Salary cap is a must on IPL surely. One of the states took a decision that none of it's players under 22 years will be allowed to play IPL. Thats a great decision. Maybe it needs to be extended to 25 so people have to go through the whole development cycle and learn to value those dollars when they come.

I think a better idea would be to change the domestic structure to allow IPL franchises to control all 3 forms of the game, and make Ranji Trophy one level below IPL. That would be IPL 4-day, IPL ODI, IPL t20. A player purchased must play in all 3 formats, so this would make IPL franchises question the true value of a player. Each franchise owns a few Ranji teams , e.g. CSK might own Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Foreign players can only be bought for the T20 format, so the emphasis would for other formats would be to find domestic talent and nurture them. Incentivise winning the longer formats by perhaps having a $1m prize for winning the 4-day comp (which can be used in the next auction) and a $0.5m prize for winning the one-day comp. I'm just making up numbers but the idea is to extend IPL to be more than just T20. This way the BCCI continues to capitalise on the IPL revenues and the Indian domestic competition gets revitalised by capitalising on the IPL's commercial success.

[King]

This thread is quite comical, Tendulkar has retired already... Move on. There's a debate whether he timed the retirement or not? Who cares the teams still in a shocking as for batting is concerned. His staying or not staying will have made no difference whatsoever.

[Vikas Bhatt]

Not retired from tests where he is still blocking the way of a younger player.

[CSK Fan]

Sad to hear that bro. I used to respect him for what he had achieved as a batsman. But after his 100th 100 against Bangladesh, the selfish way he played and lost India the match and after he joined Rajya Sabha I've lost all respect for him. When he said its selfish to retire, I knew this guy isn't the one knew. He has lost respect from a lot of his fans, if he doesn't retire soon, he will be left with no fans at all. He will have a disgraceful exit from cricket. I hope I'm proven wrong. I consider him one of the greatest batsmen, but an average cricketer. He just knew the art of batting. Nothing more. No sense of cricket at all, never played for the team. Dravid and Ganguly were much better cricketers than him. They are my most favorite Indian players.

Do you want me to list how many matches dravid played slow in ODIs or is it only when Sachin plays slow that it counts? Do you realise how much he was struggling before that Bangla innings yet you are not willing to cut him some slack? It was not as he was in the form of his life and hitting sixes at will before that match You say you respected him but your respect went after 1 match over a 21 year career? Yes, you really did respect him, lol And you lost respect because he joined the Rajya Sabha, one of the highest honor any citizen of the country can get? What kind of hypocrite are you? Dont worry true fans in all countries will respect him for what he stands for. As for Dravid and ganguly being much better cricketer, you are wrong there, they are just your personal favorites and you are taking pot-shots at Sachin to bring him down just so they can be considered greater. Never going to happen

[TestPlayer]

Do you want me to list how many matches dravid played slow in ODIs or is it only when Sachin plays slow that it counts? Do you realise how much he was struggling before that Bangla innings yet you are not willing to cut him some slack? It was not as he was in the form of his life and hitting sixes at will before that match You say you respected him but your respect went after 1 match over a 21 year career? Yes, you really did respect him, lol And you lost respect because he joined the Rajya Sabha, one of the highest honor any citizen of the country can get? What kind of hypocrite are you? Dont worry true fans in all countries will respect him for what he stands for. As for Dravid and ganguly being much better cricketer, you are wrong there, they are just your personal favorites and you are taking pot-shots at Sachin to bring him down just so they can be considered greater. Never going to happen

Dravid naturally plays slow. That's not the point. Point is he always played for the team. Dravid batted at no.3 position. His role was to hold the innings together. Not to play glamorous shots with strike rate over 100. That is what his team required him to do and he did that with perfection. Yet, I have seen him play a lot of innings in ODIs where he tried to play with a better strike rate because the team required it. At a point in time, Dravid started keeping wickets, just for the interest of the team. Nobody would have blamed him if he didn't want to play as a keeper because he isn't a genuine keeper. Yet he did keep. Remember the t20 he played against England in England (2011)? He hit 3 sixes. Hitting sixes doesn't come naturally to him, yet he tried to play them because the team required it. He might not have succeeded. But he tried. Unlike your Sachin. You say that Tendu wasn't in his form of life when he played the Bangla innings and he wasn't hitting sixes at will. How? He could score 80 runs from 80 balls then why did he need to score the last 20 runs in 40 balls when the team required him to play big shots at that time? He wasn't hitting sixes at will, you say. Agree. But why didn't he at least try to hit them? He might have got out. But at least some other players (who could hit sixes at will) would have got the opportunity to hit sixes. Why didn't he try? Because he is a selfish person who cares about personal milestones and not the team. If he had got out 80 from 80, that would have been a much better innings than his 100th 100. Rajya Sabha membership an honour? You know one thing? With great power comes great responsibility. When you have right you also have duty. Agree it's an honour, certainly yes. But why Sachin only took the honour but not duty and responsibility also? Can you tell me what has he done as a Rajya Sabha member? Has he done anything at all as a member of Rajya Sabha? Please let me know. I'll be very happy if he has done a thing. Ganguly was my most favorite ODI player and Dravid was most favorite in tests. Ganguly remains my most favorite captain in both forms of the game. None of them played for personal milestones, sacrificing team's interest.