The day cricket said, ‘THANK YOU!’

कद 5’6”, बल्ले का वजन डेढ़ किलो। करोड़ो के लिए उम्मीद, लेकिन फ़ील्ड पर 11 खिलाड़ीयों के लिए सिर्फ़ खौफ। इनके बल्ले से छूटी गेंद कभी नहीं रुकी। रुके तो बस स्कूल, कॉलेज, दफ्तर, सरकारे। ऊपर वाले को किसने देखा है, लेकिन ये भी कोई आम इंसान नहीं।

सचिन का आख़िरी सिरीज़, लाइफ में एक ही बार दिखेगा। इंडिया vs वेस्ट इंडीज…………. इतिहास बनते देखे।

These words were more than enough to turn the world of a 16-year old fan upside down. School, coachings, exams, everything else could be kept aside. Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar was bidding farewell to cricket!

No follower can picture their religion without god. Cricket was something we never thought could sustain without Sachin and vice versa.

Immediately after the Star Sports promo had ended, which I must say was way better than any movie trailer, I asked my father who was sitting beside me, “Will they allow him to take retirement?”

For someone who wanted to make a living out of talking about sport, this was the dumbest question ever. But for a kid who was used to watching the number 10 Indian Jersey from the day he started watching the game, this was emotions taking over.

This was an national event. This was India celebrating the exploits of its favorite son. While media made sure that it looked like one and so did the fans.

From the next day only I ensured that every newspaper, magazine which came to our place and had a piece or even a column on Tendulkar was preserved with due care in my archives. One which I have kept in my possession to date.

To sum up, a career spanning 24 years, living a billion dreams in a few words is impossible. Books, documentaries, and movies have been made with even the best experts of the game bowing down to the sheer class of Sachin Tendulkar. It is only fair that I elucidate this tale to you as a fan.

The television and market statistics of his last game in Mumbai speak volumes of what the name Tendulkar means to this nation. ESPN, the official broadcaster had fixed the advertisement rate @1.2 lakhs INR for a 10-second slot, the highest for test matches to date. Whereas the usual rate of test series in those days were, 40,000-50,000 INR. The broadcasters charged a 300% premium for this milestone game in the history of the sport.

No these are not expert statistics. Such is the impact that a boy from Bandra made to cricket that even street fanboys who’d rote learn the statistics sounded experts while narrating them. This was his magic, these were his numbers. We were and always will be mere fans.

As said earlier by leading Indian cricket Historian, Boria Majumdar, “The queue of OB vans outside the Wankhede before the beginning of his last game was more than a mile long.” The TRP for the game was sent through the roofs, registering the highest ratings (1739) for any test match in the last decade.

One might argue however that there weren’t many people in the stands, hardly a full house. That is all thanks to the scheme in Mumbai Cricket where two-thirds of the tickets are given out free to members, associations, and VIPs. This more than often leads to empty stands with these busy personnel not turning up. But that didn’t lessen the amplitude of ‘Sachin…… Sachin’ and create a deafening yet majestic effect.

Every brand he was associated with came up with special schemes to honor this monumental occasion. Toshiba introduced a special series of TV sets a month before the game. With Sachin’s signature beneath the LED display, these sets were nomenclatured as ‘Cricket TV series’. Rightly so. They enjoyed their best-ever time in the Indian television market.

If that wasn’t enough to geek out customers, they gave free silver Dhanteras coins with Sachin’s face embossed. To term, these events taking place near the festival of Diwali as a mere coincidence would be to demean faith in religion and god.

Luminous which had signed Sachin as their global brand ambassador in 2010, came up with a tribute of their own. A special series of inverters giving a 200-day extra warranty on the range bought during five days of the test match. Though it would be interesting to see if they kept their word since the test match ended in two and a half days.

I still have the picture of a few moments intact in my mind. 14th November, day one. It was almost 3:30 and that’s when Shane Shillingford got Murali Vijay caught by the captain Darren Sammy. India had lost two wickets in three deliveries and were still trailing by a 105 runs. Never had I heard such a monstrous roar by the home crowd after the fall of their wicket. It was a sign. “भगवान जो आ रहे थे।”

In his last stand on the pitch as an Indian cricketer, Tendulkar scored a classy 74, an innings that displayed his traditional straight drive off Darren Sammy and Shannon Gabriel. And on day 2 when Sammy caught him at the first slip off Narsingh Deonarine, I didn’t feel sorry for him not getting a hundred.

There was pin-drop silence in the ground followed by a standing ovation and I didn’t treat the occasion any differently. The legend had scored 100 centuries in his career, what more could one ask. Now was time to celebrate his achievements, to celebrate his cricket.

As the maestro stepped out of the boundary line, in came a superstar and off the first ball hit Gabriel for a four on the offside. As many would say the baton had been passed from Tendulkar to Kohli.

But will we ever get to see another batsman like Tendulkar or one who surpasses him? With the game updating faster than android mobiles, the number of games increasing and bowlers being left out to watch the bowl sail over the stands, it is hard to digest that even Sachin Tendulkar’s records wouldn’t stay untouched.

Many still keep Sir Jack Hobbs or Sir Don Bradman at the top of the pedestal, above Sachin. Be it the past legends or the current superstars, the likes of Kohli or Rohit Sharma, the answer to the best batsman debate is a subjective matter with opinions based only on hard facts and numbers, typical of cricket fans.

But what should be the real question is whether there would be another player who’d bring a nation and sporting fraternity to halt just by announcing his retirement. Whether there’d be another player who’d influence billions of people across the globe the way Sachin did. Whether there’d be another cricketer who’d make an American President (Obama) watch him bat and figure an answer as to how his country’s production goes down by 5% when the former is on the pitch. Or as my dear friend Rishabh Raj said about his experience of 16th Nov 2013,

“When the last wicket fell, I couldn’t stop the first drop of tear rolling down from my eyes. Just as I looked on the other side of the couch, I saw my father and his father. They both had tears in their eyes too. Three generations under one roof came together to have one last glimpse of their hero. This had never happened before. This would never happen again.”

It was the day when we all just said, thank you. It was the day when cricket itself said,’ thank you Sachin!’.