Good bye to Tendulkar.

The superlatives poured in. Slimy politicians were seen in the stands on the second day of the test match on Saturday when he came into bat at 38 not out overnight. Everyone wanted to be there when he scored his last century, but it was not to be. On 74 he tried to steer a slow off break from Narsingh Deonarine and was caught off the outside edge by Darren Sammy standing at first slip. As he walked off Sunil Gavaskar, sitting in the commentator's box, was effusive," Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar, thank you, thank you, thank you." Figures and trivia will keep statisticians earning their pocket money for sometime to come. Age 40 years, played 200 test matches, hit 51 centuries, scored a total of 15,921 at an average of 53.79 and even took 46 wickets at an average of 54.17. He hit 69 sixes and 2058 fours and ran 7275 runs for a total of 1,46,351 kms. He played on 59 different grounds and batted for 688 hours and 21 minutes. We may say that Tendulkar was one of the greatest batsmen of all time but would it have been possible if Sunil Gavaskar had not shown the way? In the fifties and sixties we had no one we could depend on to open the innings against the likes of Hall, Gilchrist, Trueman, Tyson and Davidson. In his very first series in the West Indies Gavaskar scored a total of 774 runs at an average of 154.80 and India won the series 1-0, the first ever series win on foreign soil. But his greatest innings was probably at the Oval in London in 1979 when India was set 438 to win in the last innings of the match. He scored 221, as masterful a display of patience, concentration and strokes as you will see in a lifetime. If the English captain, Mike Brearley had not deliberately wasted time by changing the field after every ball we could have won. For the first time India had an opener we could depend on. There were no helmets in those days so he batted against the most fearsome fast bowlers in the world in a floppy panama hat with the ball whizzing around his neck and head. Tendulkar brought us pleasure but it was Gavaskar who gave courage to Indian cricket. Another great champion is also on the verge of bowing out as Vishwanathan Anand is 2 games down with 6 games left to survive the challenge of Magnus Carlsen. Great people bow out but filthy politicians go on for ever. The tragedy of India.