His parents named him Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar but the cricketing world, including fans, call him the 'God of Cricket', 'Little Master', 'Master Blaster' and with many other acronyms. It's a special day for every cricket lover across the world as it is Tendulkar's 46th birthday. The player who took cricket to a whole new level, the batsman who attained a demi-god status in a country of a billion people, the phenomenon whose entry lights up every cricket stadium in the world, the man who dominated every opposition. Yes, that's Sachin Tendulkar for you.
In cricket, the number 10 jersey got its major significance because of only one man - Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar. In the 1990's and early 2000’s, kids only knew MRF as a bat manufacturer, and not as a transport tyre manufacturing company. On 16th November 2013, Tendulkar last entered the cricket stadium wearing the Indian cricket team jersey to represent the nation, but his straight drives and cover drives are still missed by a majority of fans. In his prestigious 20 plus years of career, Tendulkar created many milestones.
Here are some of the interesting facts and stats that you need to know about the birthday boy, or if we may say - the birthday ‘GOD’.
- Before representing India at the international level, Sachin Tendulkar fielded for Pakistan team as a substitute during a one-day practice match against India at the Brabourne Stadium in 1988.
- Sachin Tendulkar is the first and the only player to score 100 international centuries in world cricket.
- The Mumbai-born player is famous for his batting records, but he has also created some magic with the ball, as he has more five-wicket hauls (2) than the arguably the greatest leg-spinner Shane Warne (1) in ODI cricket.
- When Sachin was young, he wanted to be a fast bowler and even went to the MRF Pace Academy but head coach Dennis Lillee asked him to concentrate on batting.
- During the 1987 World Cup, Sachin was a ball boy for the match between India and Zimbabwe at the Wankhede Stadium. He was 14 then.
- The 'Master Blaster' was the first batsman to break the 200-run barrier in an ODI match when he scored 200 against South Africa in 2010.
- At the age of 19, Sachin became the youngest Indian to play English county cricket.
- Sachin Tendulkar's debut Test against Pakistan in 1989 was also legendary allrounder Kapil Dev's 100th match in whites for India.
- His father Ramesh Tendulkar named him after legendary music director Sachin Dev Burman.
- It was in the last Test match of his career when Sachin’s mother saw him play from the stands for the first time.
- Sachin also made a name for himself in T20 cricket, as he was the highest run-getter in 2010 edition of Indian Premier League where he scored 618 runs in 15 matches.
- Tendulkar has immense love for the nation, as he had the Tricolor pasted inside his kitbag during his career.
- He was the first sportsperson to receive the Bharat Ratna, the country's highest civilian award in the year 2014.
- Sachin has won the most number of Man of the Match (9) awards in World Cup.
- Tendulkar holds the record of most number (20) of 150+ score in Test cricket.
- Tendulkar is the only player who has 40 wickets and more than 11000 runs in Test cricket.
- The first car which Sachin owned was a Maruti-800.
- Master Blaster was the first batsman to be given out by the third umpire (run out) in the history of international cricket in 1992 against South Africa.
- In domestic cricket, Sachin has the record of scoring centuries on debut in Ranji Trophy, Irani Trophy, and Duleep Trophy.
- Sachin gave his bat to Pakistan all-rounder Shahid Afridi who went on to score the fastest century (now record broken) against Sri Lanka in just 37 balls.
