When the Punjab coach used to bat for Sachin

Wielding a bat in one hand and a baseball glove in the other, Arun Sharma was busy giving catching practice to his team’s reserve players at the Roshanara ground on Wednesday. The Punjab coach has ample reasons to feel nostalgic about weilding that piece of wood. Even as the Board of Control for Cricket in India prepares to felicitate Sachin Tendulkar for his world record, Sharma’s pleased for having played a small, but significant, role towards Tendulkar’s 12,000 plus runs.

The former Punjab wicketkeeper-batsman used to procure bats directly from the factory in Jalandhar and knock balls for all Tendulkar’s bats as part of testing, and only after his approval were the bats were delivered to Tendulkar. “It’s an interesting story. Tendulkar used to play with bats made by BAS and whatever willow he chose, it would be prepared and given to me to knock the bat for proper strokes and make it ready for a match. If I liked the bat, it would be approved and sent for finishing touches before being delivered. The rejected bats were sent back to the factory,” he recalls.

It’s a sequence that went along for years; “I prepared all his match bats for a long time, I think the last time was when Tendulkar scored his ten thousand runs in one-day cricket — back in 2001. Nowadays, we have ready to play bats that don’t need any knocking, it can be taken straight into a match. I also left playing active cricket then and moved on to other areas,” says Sharma, who himself scored 1533 runs at the first-class level.

The 50-year-old, who also is a BCCI match referee for domestic matches, is currently enjoying his stint as Punjab coach. “I played my cricket for Punjab when it became the champion for the first time ever, in 1995, and I have been given a responsibility to help the team back to the glory days. It’s a good challenge because the side is young and is in a rebuilding phase. Throughout my playing days, we knew just one thing — not to fear any opponent. I am trying to instill that confidence in my boys now,” he says.