When Sachin Tendulkar responded to Ian Chappell's criticism, with his bat
Sachin Tendulkar, in his autobiography, titled “Playing it My Way”, has had scathing criticism for former Indian coach Greg Chappell, revealing that he was approached for the Indian captaincy just a few months before the 2007 World Cup and calling him a bad influence on the team during his 2-year tenure as Indian coach.
As it turns out, he does not have much regard for Greg’s elder brother, Ian, as well. The former Australian captain had written a column in 2007 just after India’s early exit from the World Cup, where he asked Tendulkar to have a good long look at the mirror and said that the Indian batsman is a pale shadow of his former self.
"I don't think much about him (Ian). I showed him the size of the mirror in the VB Series (in Australia) in 2007 (he got a hundred in the final), so I don't need to go out and prove to anyone. He has got nothing do with Indian cricket and it was just another opinion. Sometimes, I feel people are given too much importance.
"The guy (Chappell), who was asking me to stand in front of the mirror, has possibly failed more times, so it is an opinion and I didn't want to respond to that and fortunately by God's grace my bat did that.
"But I did tell him (Ian) when I met him in Durban in 2010 when I was working out in gym and he said "this is the secret of your success" and I said "You have conveniently changed sides" and I have put that in my book. It is not that I am hiding it. Nitin Patel (Physio) was standing next to me when I told him that," he said.
Wanted to retire only once in my life: Tendulkar
Tendulkar has himself stated that the 2011 World Cup triumph was the greatest moment of his illustrious cricketing career. There could have been no greater moment than that, then, for Tendulkar to call it quits from the ODI game. So when asked as to why he didn’t retire from the 50-over game then and there, he said that he wanted to retire only once in his life and added that he was glad with the way retirement ultimately worked out.
"Retirement --- I also wanted that to happen once in my life, to play my last game. I discussed at home and I said I just want to walk off the field once in my life and not do it every now and then so that people get confused, whether it was the ODI or Test retirement. I just wanted to do it once in life and I am glad it worked out the way I wanted it to."
On whether there was a dilemma post the victorious World Cup, he added: "I don't think there was any dilemma of whether to continue or not. I just wanted to live that moment and not shift my focus from something I had waited for 21 years to somewhere else.
"I felt that I deserved to do more. And that stage, I just wanted to live in the present and enjoy being World champions, which I waited and worked for 21 years. I was doing well, I was the highest run-getter for our team and the second highest run-getter in the tournament, so I felt it was something that I wanted to do."