Sachin Tendulkar - A phenomenon even in the shortest format of the game

T20 cricket never really appealed to the Little Master, who quit T20 internationals after playing just one match in South Africa. Nevertheless, Sachin was picked as the icon player-cum-captain of the franchise of his home city, Mumbai which is owned by Mukesh Ambani.

He struggled in 2008 and 2009, as too much of competitive cricket took a toll on his aging body and thus made him suffer from injuries. Despite his exceptional batting skills, he just could not understand how to manoeuvre the ball around. The usual ones and twos came, but not the fours or the big sixes.

But he is not the one to give up. He worked hard on his slogging abilities, and the return of it was seen in the 2009-10 season in one day cricket at home. He smashed 175 against Australia in Hyderabad and the historic 200* against South Africa in Gwalior, being the first man to score a double hundred in the format. What also helped him was his sparkling form in both Tests and ODIS, which renewed his confidence just before the IPL 2010.

Sachin eventually ended up with the Orange Cap in that year’s tournament although his team finished second to Dhoni’s Chennai in the final. Thus, he proved that T20 cricket is not exactly a young man’s game as experience had a place of its own. His captaincy too, made an impact to the team’s declining fortunes to make it to the last four for the first time ever in the tournament. From there on, Mumbai have been a team to watch out for by many.

He was not a part of the 2011 Champions League T20 but his very presence in the dressing room allowed the usually temperamental Harbhajan Singh to be positive on the field as the stand in captain and lead a virtually second string team, to the championship win. If Mumbai Indians has the maximum number of people watching them on television and the second largest fan base in the IPL, it is clearly because of this man.

Mumbai won the IPL 2013, but what struck me was Sachin’s endurance. He was out of form and it was an extremely hot and humid day at the Wankhede when I went to watch their match against Kolkata. Yet, at the age of 40, he had all the power in him to score 40 odd runs off just 25 balls which helped his team the match!

With the 2013 Champions League being his last T20 tournament, Mumbai would strive to become the second team after Chennai to clinch both the titles in the same season and that would surely be a fitting farewell for the great man.