What is Commitment?

(Age - 12 years)

Sachin fell in love with cricket at an early age and thereafter he has shown a great commitment for the game. Sahitya Sahawas society, his then home, was the practice place for him. Day and night, he used to spend time in practicing cricket along with his society mates. ‘Wow! Great! Awe!’ like words we get to hear when we see Sachin middling the ball, don't we? He does it so accurately that we feel it’s a natural talent but very few know, what kind of practice methods he has used to get such perfect strokes.

It is an obvious perception that great players are blessed with enormous talent. They often are but that is not the only thing which marks them unique. It is a balanced combination of talent, commitment and a right attitude that adds up to their success.  

Sachin, in his childhood, used to often practice along with society’s watchman son, Ramesh Pardhe, who actually was Sachin’s dearest friend. The little naughty Sacchu never forgot to share his meal with him whenever he got to know Ramesh didn’t have food. They used to often play cricket on the terrace. Now, let me tell you the reason behind the perfection in his strokes. Sachin used to get a bucket full of water on the terrace without telling anybody and used to ask Ramesh to dip the rubber ball in water and then bowl at him. This very action increases the pace of the ball when it travels towards the batsman and also due to wetness of the ball, a ball-mark gets embarked on the bat after the impact. That’s how he used to get an idea where exactly the ball is hitting the bat, is he middling the ball accurately or not, he used to judge accordingly. 

What an idea it was sirji.

This practice used to go for hours and hours. Indeed, he was a boy with sharp mind and born with perfectionism. Mastermind, isn’t he?

Commitment for the game began from that minor age and with time; it has only increased even after reaching the peaks of glory.   

     

(Age – 38 years)

     

I would like to put down one instance here, during the recently concluded World Cup, well before the match between India vs West Indies in Chennai, a practice session of Indian players was going on as usual. The players were sweating hard in the scorching heat. After hard core practice, the players decided to pack up as the Chennai heat was getting unbearable. Everyone left except one man, the Master, he was not yet finish.

After the normal training session, he asked two local players to join him. No one knew what he was upto. He told two of the guys to stand in short cover and short point region for fielding respectively. He himself took to the crease and told the bowling coach to give throwdowns. Sachin’s plan was to try hitting the ball through the gap between those two fielders on consistent basis with his eyes closed.

    

It was a kind of blind training of Sachin.

     

The two localites were amazed to see the Master finding gap on most of the occasions by closing his eyes at the moment of impact. He wanted to make sure that his shots don’t miss out on the gaps in the field during the match and hence practiced it with closed eyes to get the feel of impact of ball on bat.

“How accurate was his timing and shots!” exclaimed one of the local players.

     

More than his accuracy, look at the commitment guys. Twenty-two years of dedication and still he doesn’t want to lose the magical touch which is god-gifted.

Indeed, such kind of passion is necessary to win your dream and eventually he did it, as we all know.

   

This clearly shows the power of commitment combined with talent which should be harnessed all through our career, be it any field. That’s the sign of a great player. I recollect one example where lack of commitment for the game and wrong attitude cost us one extremely talented player, yes, the buddy of Master himself, Vinod Kambli, who was graded with superior talent than Sachin in his school days. Initially, he did put in lot of efforts to make to the International cricket but struggled to show the dedication and attitude required at the higher level. Thereafter, we all know what happened with him.

But Sachin, he was completely focused and committed and still is, Koi shak! He is always ready to learn. Even now after reaching such great heights, the eagerness to learn has not altered. Before every match he still sweats in the nets the same way which he used to do in his initial days. Even if he is not playing any match, he makes sure that he practices at least few hours everyday in nets. He still considers himself as a student of the game and works out whole-heartedly. Remember, you are never too old to learn. Such devotion gives immense motivation to the youngsters in the side and makes them think that if Sachin Sir is doing it with such zeal, then we should do it with double his energy. 

     

Indeed, he is a great motivator to today’s generation.

So What is commitment? This is it.

Never give up hope..!!

Injuries have followed the Master like a shadow all through his career.

      After he overcame with his injury in the year 1999, next major injury struck him in 2004. He got a partial tear in the muscles surrounding the left elbow which left Sachin in pain. This kind of injury is seen more with the tennis players and hence it is termed as Tennis elbow. Not only in Tennis, but this kind of injury is also more common with Golfers. Basically, where the wrist comes into action, this injury may be seen. When the wrist is overused, pressure comes on tendons of the muscles connecting to the elbow which are involved in the movement of wrist and fingers. This eventually invites pain.

      In Sachin’s case, his heavy bat was one of the major reasons for injury. He used to make use of bat weighing around 3 kgs where other’s used approx. 1.7 kgs which is almost half of what Sachin used to use. He was advice by the doctor to use much lighter bat than his normal. From there on, he started using the lighter stick but still the one which he uses now is pretty heavier than normal bats.

      When he was struck with this injury, it was termed as end of Sachin era because he was not able to even grip the bat due to pain. The critics became active and concluded that Sachin would not be able to play cricket anymore, the media adding more masala to this news, as usual, started telecasting the negativities of Sachin over the past few years. This dreaded feeling and thought of not playing cricket anymore gave Sachin sleepless nights. He used to sit with Anjali whole day and night and discuss regarding his comeback, the very feeling of leaving cricket was haunting him like anything. He was so disturb with this that he used to go on drive late in the night to reduce his stress. During this critical period, Anjali stood by him and gave lot of support and boosted his morale which helped Sachin to maintain his self-confidence.

 

      He hoped and hoped till the end to make a comeback and kept his fight on with strong will and determination.

      One day he went down on his knees and prayed, “I want to continue playing for India, don’t take away my passion from me, please recover me fast.”

      Finally his prayers were listened and he made a comeback and what a comeback it was! Awestruck! It’s 2012 now and he is still going strong. Touchwood.

     

                                    When the world says, “Give up”

                                    Hope whispers, “Try it one more time.”      

     

     Similar situation was faced by the cycling champ Lance Armstrong who went through a bad phase of his life facing the dreaded testicular cancer where he was not only about to lose his career but his life. The doctors had minimal hope for him to survive and even if he did, they believed, he would not be able to chase the wheels any longer.

      But Lance was a person of hope and his strong determination made it possible to pull down the cancer from his life, thus making it through to the field of cycling. Coming out from such a dreadful situation, his competitors and sponsors believed he had lost his stamina and ability to cope up with rigorous cycling tournaments like Tour de France and commented it was impossible for him to make a comeback now.

      Lance took these comments as a challenge and showed the world that nothing is big in front of hope and determination.

      He went on to win a record seven consecutive times the toughest of tournaments, Tour de France, after having survived the cancer.

      If you have a strong self-belief and desire to do well, you will surely come out as a winner. Remember, sunset is always followed by sunrise and this cycle goes on. Keep on the fight and sleep tight.

      The bottom line is, ‘Never give up hope, even if things are not on your side, just be patient and hang on to it, ek din aayega and that will be your moment.’

Luck favours Hard work..!!

Is it “ENDULKAR”? was the question raised by many Indians, especially his critics after 2007 world cup. Remember??

In 2003 World Cup, India had at least reached final but in 2007, Indian team was knocked out in the first round itself which was termed as a worst performance by the team ever. Though the whole team was held responsible by the management and by the Indian crazy cricket lovers for the loss, Sachin was the main target of his critics which were turning it up with all fingers pointed against him. Sachin was criticized by then coach Greg Chappell for his attitude. Sachin opposed his suggestion of batting down at no. 4 position and also commented that looking at teams benefit he is well worth as an opener, but no, he was forced to bat at no. 4 slot which eventually didn’t work. Many of them (which includes known names in cricket) even said that his career was taking the last lap.

This very situation gave sleepless nights to his fans.

Sometimes it happens that you keep on trying and work hard but still it is not acknowledge to its creditability. Sachin was trying his best and was working hard in nets to succeed but he was not able to achieve the kind of result he was willing to. Don’t know what was happening to him. There was some superficial thing working against him. Yes, it does always, even if you don't want to think of it. There is one factor called LUCK which rules your life along with the hard work you put in. There’s an old saying that, “90% Hardwork and 10% luck gives you success.”

Luck is something which is not in your hands but working hard is in your reach, so your work can make your luck but luck cannot make your work. So always trust yourself.

Hard work is like ‘stairs’ and Luck is like a ‘lift’. Lift may fail sometime, but the stairs will always get you to the top.

Now read this:

“A paper flying in the air is due to LUCK but a kite flying in air is due to effort. So don’t worry if LUCK doesn’t support. Efforts are always yours.”

Sachin did the same and continued with his hard work until the luck didn’t favor him.

He came back strongly after the World Cup fully charged, making his critics to eat their words.

Boss this one is especially for all those critics, here it goes, “The champions don’t come with an expiry date.”

Following the World Cup, came the series against Bangladesh and ODI series against South Africa which India won convincingly, wherein both the tournaments Sachin was awarded the man of the series trophy. Be it ODI series against England or ODI series against the Australians, Sachin was booming high leading the runs tally in both these series. By now he had turned 34, but he was playing like a youngster full of energy and enthusiasm, and was looking hungry to go out and get runs.

In 2007-08, during Border-Gavaskar Trophy down under, Sachin showed his master class. Though India lost the test series, Sachin was the top scorer with 493 runs in his kitty. It was a controversial series. You must be remembering the Bhajji and Symmonds spat during the second test at Sydney. It went on to be a major racial issue. In the subsequent third test at WACA in Perth, India recorded a historical win. With two centuries in the series and consistent performance bagged him the Player of the Match award.

You must have noted that most of the times when Sachin plays well, makes a century, India looses the match.(Will talk about this some other time) It’s disheartening but it is a fact. I told you, the governance of the factor called Luck, what a ****!! persist in some way.

Whatever it is, go on doing your job, the luck will be taken care by the person sitting up above in the blue sky.