Sachin Tendulkar

A tennis player or a cricketer? Definitely a cricketer. No. Tennis was good fun.

I enjoyed playing tennis. I enjoyed watching tennis, but always, was in love with cricket, and cricket would always be my first love. Talking about the golf ball significance in my life, in fact, it was in the early part of my life when I was only 11 11 years old and I was staying with my aunt.

And I would make her chuck number of balls a day. Golf ball, I had purposely taken a blade and made that into oval shape so that it would hit the floor, and then change direction. It sort of, you know, taught me to play back foot defense, with soft hands.

Also, not being so tall, you know, I had to be. Throughout my career, I had to be on my toes, and I thought somewhere, you know, that golf ball practice had, a role to play in my technique.

And basically, I mean, as a 11-year-old mm, full of energy and in spite of practicing number of hours on the field, I still had to do something to do with cricket, and that's how I killed my time. My interest in bowling was always there.

In fact, as a youngster, I think I was only 12, 13 years old, I went to Chennai to, for, Dennis Lillee's, fast bowling MRF camp, where, he suggested that, you know, I stick to batting because, you know, not knowing that I was actually a batsman wanting to learn how to bowl fast because fast bowling is something which always fascinated me.

Sometimes being a school captain helped because, with the new ball I could bowl seam ups, then semi-new ball I would bowl off spin, and old ball leg spin, and by then the second new ball will be again available. So I continued bowling, and I thought,

And that continued, you know, even in the nets, because, when I played for India for almost the first, 20, 22 years of my career, I bowled to all 10, 12 batsmen in the net. I would bowl seam ups if the wicket was helpful for fast bowlers.

Bowl leg spin, off spin and basically, you know, it's just, playing more cricket and grasping more things in life and then getting to know more about cricket, getting more information from various players. The first time I met Anjali at my place was, Anjali had turned up as a journalist because I didn't know how to invite her otherwise. And she said that, "I'm close to your house.

Can I meet you?" And till then, no girl had visited my house, and this was the first time, so I didn't know how to deal with that. So I said, "You have to walk in as a journalist wanting to interview me, otherwise you have no other chance of coming here."

So I mean, she pretended to be a journalist when she came to my house for the first time. And I had to offer her something, so, you know, offered her chocolate, I would say. In fact, I only had one chocolate, which was, the case because of, me and my family polishing off, all the chocolates, mainly brothers.

And only one chocolate was there, so I had cut that chocolate into small pieces and spread that all over the plate thinking that, you know, there were many chocolates put together to have. So I precisely remember that, you know, that that meeting was, something special. And then, I think my family realized that she wasn't a journalist.

The body language says it all. When, Sara was born, at that time I was at Anjali's house, which is like, you know, 50 meters away from the hospital. And I was with a very dear friend of mine, my childhood friend, Sunil Harshay.

And we were on the terrace of her house, Anjali's house. I said that I cannot, believe that, you know, and in hours from now I'll become a father and life is gonna change. So, you know, we both were sort of, you know, restless and looking forward to what was, gonna happen in my life.

And as soon as, I got, I got a phone call, I rushed to the hospital and I was, I was there. I mean, the, that first glimpse of Sara was special. I can never forget.

I thought, you know, the first phase was, a difficult one and the. There were differences in our opinions. I mean, I felt, the selectors were thinking something different and I was thinking something different.

And I wasn't, I wasn't given the team that I wanted. There were a few individuals that I wanted in the team and which which which didn't happen and which was a big setback and a big disappointment because my only goal was to win matches for India. I didn't want anything else.

And we. I felt we were not on the same wavelength. I mean, we were thinking differently.

And if a captain has to go out in the middle and take his team and want them to play the way I want to play cricket, then I got to have the players that I wanted, which didn't happen. So that was the first thing of my captaincy. The second one was, also a challenging one.

We went to some, you know, tough places. We went to Australia. We went to South Africa as well.

And you know, things were, not happening to according to the way I wanted. All in all, you know, I felt that, we were not putting enough runs on the board. I don't think, we scored three hundred even once in three test matches in Australia.

Six innings, if you don't score three hundred even once, then, you know, you are, not likely to win, but you know, lose that test. We In fact, even, ending up in a draw would have been a great result because Australia being the top side in the world, you know, we we would have been happy with that.

But that didn't happen so more so because, there were not enough runs on the board. Two thousand and eleven World Cup, it doesn't get any bigger than that in cricket. Whole country was celebrating and needless to say that, you know, the dressing room was flowing with champagne and you know, photographs being taken with each and every individual with that beautiful trophy.

And that's when, I had called Anjali. I mean, Anjali saw the, saw the match on television because she's superstitious, and then rushed to the stadium, only to realize that on all the cars, on top of the roof, guys were jumping and dancing and celebrating our victory. The moment they recognized her, they said, "Not this car.

Let's jump onto the other one." And Anjali walked in the dressing room, and the same car went out, and they said, "Now we can jump on this car. She's not there." So those dance were special ones, I mean, dance that I'm proud of.

Fantastic experience. And after that, with all that happening in the dressing room, we went back to the hotel. All the, all the room doors were open with loud music and friends there on the floor. And and in our room, I remember only the two of us were there, Anjali and I.

And the door was open, and we found flowers there. So we both put flowers in our ears, and we started, celebrating with, champagne glass and loud music, and we danced, which, I've never done in my life. That's the only time that I've celebrated any victory, that much.

And then, it the celebrations continued till morning hours. I mean, it was fantastic experience. I mean, it will stay with me for the rest of my life.

My vision was, on my fortieth birthday, we introduced Spreading Happiness India Foundation, where we decided to light up the villages where there is no electricity, and then post-sunset, there is darkness in their life. To imagine something like that exists in our nation is a little difficult to digest. And that's when we decided that, this foundation is going to help light up the entire nation.

You know, it's all about spreading happiness. And that's why we call this, initiative, our foundation also Spreading Happiness India Foundation. India because, India and dia is inside your house.

So India. It's all about, you know, giving a fair platform to disadvantaged communities. And if, we can, we can allow the future of India to study at night, to read books, the backbone of any family, the mother, to cook food in proper light and not in darkness, it's surely gonna change our nation. It's, it's gonna change slowly, but surely, and that is what, we are looking at.

So we'll, we'll I'll continue to give in hundred percent and then make all the possible efforts in lighting up the whole nation. Along with this, the second vertical I'm focusing on in my second innings is, supporting, NGO called Apna Hai. I've been associated with them for last twenty years now.

But after my retirement, you know, I'm gonna be involved even more in raising funds for them. And it's all about, women empowerment, giving them fair opportunity, allowing them to realize their dreams. And I think it's so important for every girl child to dream that she can become somebody big in life and bring laurels to our nation.

And my second innings is more about satisfaction. The first one was more about excitement, pride, and playing for the nation, wearing that beautiful India cap. The second innings is all about satisfaction, giving to the people who've, who've, supported me, who've helped me for a number of years now.