Sachin Tendulkar is no flat track bully, but one of the reasons why he did not have a one-day international century to his name in New Zealand before yesterday could be because of the bowler-friendly wickets in Kiwiland.
Sachin Tendulkar is no flat track bully, but one of the reasons why he did not have a one-day international century to his name in New Zealand before yesterday could be because of the bowler-friendly wickets in Kiwiland. He has got close to a hundred but the three-figure mark just eluded him. Yesterday, he made more than amends with an amazing 163 in the third one-dayer.
Doubtless, he is enjoying the wickets this time around after the unfair tracks on India's last tour in 2002-03.
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Sachin Tendulkar walks back after scoring 82 off 49 balls in his first ODI as opener at Eden Park, New Zealand in the 1994 series. PIC/MIDDAY ARCHIVES |
"The wickets are great this time. Not only players, but the spectators are also enjoying it. Last time we came here, the bowlers got false confidence and the batters were looking for technical problems which didn't exist," he said after India's 58-run win.
India have got themselves into a position from where they can't lose the series and it will take a lot of character from the hosts to win in Hamilton and Auckland. Asked about the gameplan the India batters employed, Tendulkar said: "We were not looking at a specific total. We basically wanted to play out the first spell and whenever we got a loose ball we managed to put it away.
"Once the seam became soft, the ball came nicely onto the bat. With shorter boundaries there was always scope to come back into the game and strike the ball as hard as possible. With batsmen capable of hitting over the ropes, we knew that we could change the momentum of the game. It was just a matter of timing it correctly and we managed to do that."
New Zealand may have denied Tendulkar from scoring his first ODI hundred here all these years but it can never be forgotten that the blaster started opening the innings here in 1993-94 when regular opener Navjot Singh Sidhu was unfit to take the field. Doubtless, he has come a long way.
