Is Sachin the greatest ever??

We are at the threshold of yet another tournament, and the one constant feature in every article is Sachin’s 100th century. For the last two years, pretty much everything the guy has done has been some record or the other. I wonder how the media doesn’t get tired of the same stuff, over and over again.

Another annoying part of every tour, is the habit of journos asking others if they think Sachin is the best batsman in the world. Over the years, we have asked former Test players, opposition captains, talking parrots, Ganesha, veteran stars, new Mumbai Indians recruits, and Atul Wassan, if they think Sachin is the best batsman in the world.

We ask the same question, and expect the same answer. We are outraged if one of them doesn’t consider Sachin as the greatest player. It is almost as if we need a certification from everyone in the world that he is indeed, the best.

Along with our craze for fake accents and the Oscars, this is another bit of colonial crap we are yet to wipe off our asses – this constant desire to get the world to acknowledge his greatness.

Fact is, how will an Australian truly understand what Sachin means to us?

The Australian doesn’t know what it feels like to see Sachin go out to bat. The hopes that lie on his shoulders, and the agony of listening to ‘Saala, records aur paison ke liye khelta hai’, the minute he gets out cheaply. How many times would his heart have crashed, when Sachin got out, and the innings crumbled with less than 15 runs to get?

How will the Australian understand that for about a decade, Indian cricket began and ended with Sachin Tendulkar? How can you explain that after Sachin got out, the others to follow would be Sanjay Manjarekar, Vijay Dahiya, Venkatapathy Raju and Dodda Ganesh? How will you explain the agony of winning a test, dedicating it to the 26/11 victims, and then being questioned by the intelligence of Bal Thackeray, if he truly understands what Mumbai is about.

The Australian would never understand the pressure of playing Pakistan in a World Cup. He wasn’t there when Sachin stood rock-solid and unblemished, when the country’s greatest heroes brought shame and dishonour the country. He has not grown up watching ads of Sachin, he has not seen him grow up – from a teen to a father – under scrutiny by everyone in the country, all through his life, and never so much as putting a wrong step.

A foreigner will not understand what Sachin truly means to us. A country with shitty roads, and pathetic public amenities, and daily depressing reports of killings, blasts, corruption and scandals. He will not appreciate that Sachin is the only bright spot in our otherwise morose state of affairs.

There is no need to ratify his greatness. An approval from Courtney Walsh or Shane Warne is not going to make him a notch greater. And a disapproval is not going to make him a lesser player.

It’s just a stupid question, being put forward by a lazy journalist. Pay no mind to it. These are his last few years in cricket, just sit back and enjoy seeing him bat. There is no need of a sanction from others to make him the greatest ever.

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Oh btw, if you ask me, he IS the greatest player of all time!!