The Champ146;s Cramp

At day8217;s end, Tendulkar did something he8217;d never done before: at the daily press conference, he split ranks and questioned the timing of the declaration. He had just accumulated his 33th Test hundred 8212; placing himself one behind Sunil Gavaskar8217;s record 34. It was very disappointing, he said, to fall so tantalisingly short of a double hundred.

For his devotees, the disappointment was not the count on which his innings froze. It was the manner in which he got the runs 8212; there were no trademark flamboyant strokes 8212; even after India had consolidated to assure themselves of a mammoth total, he was inching forward.

8216;8216;It seemed to me that he wanted to reach the target without getting out,8217;8217; says Sanjay Manjrekar, former Bombay and India teammate and a keen observer of the changing cricket of one of the game8217;s greatest exponents. To remain unbeaten, he notes, could have become something of an 8216;8216;obsession8217;8217; with Tendulkar.

8216;8216;Let8217;s be fair,8217;8217; cautions Manjrekar. 8216;8216;A person evolves. From the age of 16 to 31 he cannot be the same. My only worry is the change, where he8217;s going. He8217;s going away from his natural strengths and game too much. He has eradicated all the risks, his focus is on getting runs in every match. He has minimised the risk factor. He has become a collector of runs. Earlier he would destroy the confidence of the bowler.8217;8217;

It used to be an engaging contest. Remembers Aquib Javed, member of Pakistan8217;s devastatingly successful pace attack of the 1990s: 8216;8216;I would try to dominate him with accuracy, not with speed. I would bowl short of length outswing. He hardly moved his feet. I would bowl up to him and a bit short to take him by surprise. Now he has blocked the pull and cut shots.8217;8217;

In a cruel bargain, Tendulkar has traded beauty for safety. He stands on the brink of records that will entirely be up to him to own and to mould. He8217;s been on the international stage for 15 years now. Under the public gaze, that lad of 16 is now a mature man of 31. Those records would always have been his.

But they enthralled us not because they spelt out the various dimensions of mostness, they mattered because they provided pegs to take stock of an unusual talent, a talent which for just a while takes us away from all we have known and shows that dreams are there for the enlarging, that a batsman can summon shots others cannot even imagine and flirt with danger, throughout adhering to some unwritten manual on class, while getting on with mundane activities like run chases.

No longer. In the past two-three years Tendulkar has gathered his game, he has delineated smaller boundaries, he rises on his feet less while playing shots, he has lowered the bar for courage and craftiness.

8216;8216;There is a heavy burden on his mind,8217;8217; worries Manjrekar about this new defensive Tendulkar. 8216;8216;When you are not naturally suited to it defensive play, it takes its toll. He is not enjoying his game as he used to, he is working very hard at every Test innings.8217;8217;

The reasons could be civilisational. Tendulkar is, says Manjrekar, 8216;8216;born in India8217;8217;. He explains: 8216;8216;It8217;s easier for a Lara in the West Indies, if he fail in four-five innings, there is no great reaction. If Tendulkar fails in two innings, there is a crisis in Indian cricket.8217;8217;

There is also that he has become an 8216;8216;accumulator or runs8217;8217;. 8216;8216;I want Sachin to be revered by the cricket world as one of the greatest batsmen that played the game, not as the batsman who scored the most centuries or runs,8217;8217; says Manjrekar. After all, he notes, Viv Richards is remembered not for his statistics but for the manner in which he went about getting those runs.

It shows in his cricket. Says Manjrekar: 8216;8216;The lofted shot has vanished. So has the short arm pull 8212; I can understand that, it happens with age. He doesn8217;t play through the covers off the back foot. Now the emphasis is on the paddle sweep and the late cut. These are new developments in his game. Somehow it is a very burdened man coming out to bat.8217;8217;

Can a batsman who has lapsed from his natural game regain it? 8216;8216;Whether he can revert or not, I don8217;t know. When someone8217;s not playing well, he goes back to his natural attacking self 8212; maybe not the same flamboyance, after all physically he is getting older, cricket is taking a toll on his body.8217;8217;

Aquib is more forgiving, more impressed by the new Tendulkar. Multan, for him, was a moment of maturity. 8216;8216;He was prepared to score a big hundred at Multan,8217;8217; says the man who many would designate Pakistan8217;s bowling coach. 8216;8216;Five-six years ago he never planned. He is a more hungry professional now.8217;8217;

It is a sign of maturity, he argues, when a batsman deletes hazardous shots: 8216;8216;He is the most smart and intelligent cricketer I have ever seen. He is a mind reader, he knows the game better than anyone else in cricket.8217;8217;

Qamar Ahmad, veteran commentator, shares Aquib8217;s optimism: 8216;8216;Earlier he had a tendency to hook. Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis used to get him out at long leg. He plays front of the wicket now, earlier there was a lot of backfoot play, now he plays in the V. Like Steve Waugh his eye is on history now. His main purpose at the age of 31 is to accumulate as many runs as he can for himself and his country.8217;8217;

Once Tendulkar was an artist who happened to accumulate runs. Somehow, somewhere he appears to have convinced himself that there is a choice to made, and he has picked his option. His eye is one the records. Fair enough.

Yet, could it be that the boy who came into cricket 15 years ago has lost connection with the new era in which he finds himself. Amid these slam-bam schedules one performance follows another breathlessly, the numbers becoming just fodder for the tickertape that frames his innings. We see and we forget. What memory retains is majesty.

Tendulkar had an instinct for majesty. Sad that he has forked a road that could have been a multi-lane highway.