The argument that Sachin Tendulkar left too late is utter rubbish

“It’s hard for me to imagine a life without playing cricket because it’s all I have ever done since I was 11 years old.” - Sachin Tendulkar In an article titled Farewell Left too Late on ESPNcricinfo , Mukul Kesavan examines the timing of Sachin Tendulkar’s departure. He compares Tendulkar’s exit to those of Sunil Gavaskar, Steve Waugh and Brian Lara, and concludes that Tendulkar not only left too late, but damaged Indian cricket in the process by holding younger players back and allowing his retirement to compromise India’s Tour of South Africa. He lays the blame mostly on Tendulkar’s shoulders, though he concedes it isn’t Tendulkar’s fault alone. I am here to argue it is not Tendulkar’s fault at all. Kesavan points out that Tendulkar’s average over his last 25 innings is under 30 with no centuries, compared to the 58 Gavaskar averaged over his last 25 innings and the almost 65 Steve Waugh averaged before he hung up his boots. Lara averaged just under 45 while even Ponting, with all his struggles, managed 38. [caption id=“attachment_1172805” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] The greatest tend to have the hardest time leaving the field. Getty Images[/caption] It is easy in hindsight to use the numbers to point to Tenudlkar’s decline. But those numbers only exist because he played on. In the 40 innings Tendulkar played before his last 25 innings (between November 2009 and November 2011), he averaged 64.05 with eight hundreds, the last of which was his masterclass against Dale Steyn. Given that sort of form, why should Tendulkar have retired? There was obviously no call for the selectors to drop him based on that form either. Analysis: The myth about Sachin Tendulkar and victory Stats: Tendulkar and Wankhede - Sentiment over stats Cricket will be poorer without Tendulkar: Pak media Photos: From 1989 to 2013 - 24 years of Indian cricket with Sachin Gavaskar may have walked away having averaged 58 over his last 25 innings but there is no reason that Tendulkar had to follow suit. He has every right to keep playing cricket for as long as he wants and for as long as he felt he could contribute to the team. When he was in that sort of form, did he not owe it to his country and his fans to keep going? And when the lean trot began, who was to say this form would not rebound? While there were plenty who felt he should have called it a day after the 2011 World Cup, there were just as many who thought Tendulkar was just going through another lean patch and would eventually emerge from it with, if not his customary panache, at least a reasonable facsimile, even if he was closing in on the big 4-0. That his form would not improve looks obvious in the rear view mirror, but it was not so obvious then. Kesavan says that unlike Lara, Tendulkar failed to repay the faith placed in an ageing genius raging against the dying of the light. But this is not for lack of trying. Tendulkar has not wanted to fail. It is quite the opposite. That he has not produced is not for lack of effort. The greatest tend to have the hardest time leaving the field. Muhammad Ali, the greatest athlete of the 20th century and arguably ever, was a shell of the boxer he was when Larry Holmes beat him in 1980. So much so that Holmes said he held back in the fight for fear of injuring Ali. Michael Jordan came out of retirement to play for the Washington Wizards at the age of 38, and even now, at the age of 50, believes he can compete in the NBA. Besides, the responsibility for dropping Tendulkar, or having a quiet word in his ear, rests with the selectors, not the player. The player’s job is to play; the selector’s job is to select. Waugh as it happens, did not go quietly either. He also happens to be one of 100 Australian Living Treasures. The only other male cricketer to have received the same honour is a certain Don Bradman. But the selectors were willing to take tough decisions. He was controversially dropped from the one-day side in 2002, a decision Allan Border, then chairman of selectors, called one of the hardest and lowest moments of his career. “Behind the scenes Stephen wasn’t totally accepting about the one-dayers and he was saying, ‘I’m going to try to prove you wrong and I’m still available if you need me’”, Border told The Age . Waugh was also told by the selectors in 2003 that he would be picked on form, and not be an automatic selection because he was the captain of the Test team. In Tendulkar’s case there is the argument that dropping a national icon in India would be impossible and lead to a huge backlash, but there is anecdotal evidence to suggest that Sandeep Patil, the current chairman of selectors, was willing to at least consider belling that cat, which is what he is being paid Rs 60 lakhs a year to do. In a profile of Patil in Open magazine , Akshay Sawai writes that “in December 2012, just months after taking over as chief selector, it was Patil who reportedly broached the subject of Tendulkar’s future with the legend, resulting in his abrupt, oddly prosaic retirement from One-day cricket. The 2015 World Cup is high on the selectors’ and team’s agenda and Tendulkar could not realistically be a part of 2015. A few days ago, Patil was back in the news. Media reports hinted Tendulkar had been told that after his 200th Test he would be picked only on form. Patil denied the story.” And there is the quote Patil once gave the Times of India , “If Sachin wants to bat like this (defensively), then he should quit. But if he wants to bat like the Sachin of old, then he should keep playing.” Kesavan also argues that Tendulkar’s delayed departure has held back the team’s development, but there is a counter argument that leaving too early might have destabilised the team. Australia lost Greg Chappell, Dennis Lillee and Rod Marsh after the same Test in 1984. It took the team five years to recover from that blow. Having Tendulkar around after Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman preserved a link to the Big Four and could be argued, eased the transition rather than hampered it. As for the South African tour, BCCI politics are murky and inscrutable at the best of times. The board is on record saying it wants a home season at this time of year as well as wanting to maximise its revenues. All is clearly not well between it and Cricket South Africa. Tendulkar’s 200th Test, and now farewell Test, is perhaps a convenient excuse to shoehorn the West Indies series, but arguably no more than that. To lay the blame it at Tendulkar’s door is to absolve the BCCI of all its machinations. Everyone wishes their idol would choose the perfect moment to retire. Pete Sampras walked away after winning the 2002 US Open. Roger Federer hopes for something similar and so pushes on, trying to catch lightning in the bottle. But there are no guarantees in sports. Tendulkar too would have been hoping for a last great hurrah. It may still happen in his final two Tests, but that it has not happened so far is not due to any fault of his. To think so is to misunderstand not only the capricious nature of sports, but the nature of great sportsmen, who often fight on after their considerable powers have waned because it is that innate self-belief that allowed them to be great in the first place.