Sachin Tendulkar's innings that redefined ODI cricket

Sachin Tendulkar

Mark Greatbatch of New Zealand shook the world in the 1992 Cricket World Cup with his explosive hitting at the top of the innings.

In 1996, the Sri Lankan opening pair of Sanath Jayasuriya and Romesh Kaluwitharana took the cricketing world by storm with their explosive batting in the powerplay. Sri Lanka even went to win the 1996 ICC Cricket World Cup before the other countries could react to the surprise thrown at them.

Sachin Tendulkar‘s back-to-back centuries in Sharjah, in 1998, catapulted his cricket and the nation’s cricket interest to a whole new level. However, if there was a day and an innings that made One-Day International cricket into what it is now, this was it: Tendulkar in 1994 vs. New Zealand

Opening the innings for the first time in his career, he played an innings that lasted just 22 scoring shots, subsequently won the match and announced his arrival as an opener. The image of Tendulkar dancing down the track with disdain against bowlers who had not even completed the delivery stride still remains in the mind of the people who watched the game live.

The impact of the innings was at various levels:

a) With Tendulkar as opener, every stadium was full (sometimes a full 3 hours before the start of the match), and every ODI was watched by millions around the world on TV.
b) Later that year, he scored his first ODI hundred (after 78 ODIs!) and then went on to score century of centuries.
c) The opener’s spot remained his for the next 2 decades except for brief interruptions in 2003 and in 2007.
d) With his explosive batting at the top of the innings, millions tuned in to watch Tendulkar open the innings and tuned out when Sachin got out.

In retrospect, there are many questions that we can ponder:

a) Would one-day cricket have become so popular in India had Sachin stayed as a middle-order batsmen?
b) Would the Little Master have gone on to reach the magical mark of a century of centuries as a middle-order batsman?
c) Would we have reached the semi-finals of the 1996 World Cup or the finals of the 2003 World cup?
d) As a nation would we have become this cricket crazy?

I leave it to you to answer.