It is very rightly said, if cricket is religion in India, then Sachin is God...When the 'Master Blaster' came out to bat, jam packed stadiums across the world reverberated with chants of 'Sachin Sachin' and their hero dint disappoint his die-hard fans and often delivered the goods with the bat.
Like all other champions, Sachin too stepped up his game at cricket's biggest stage of all, the ICC World Cup. Sachin's exemplary record for India at the showpiece event is testimony to his superlative batting.
There are very few batting records against which Sachin Tendulkar docent have his name written. If one were to do some real number crunching, Sachin is the highest run getter, leading century maker, leading run getter in a single edition of the World Cup.
But Sachin's World Cup sojourn goes beyond his magical numbers. For almost two decades across six World Cups, Sachin was the backbone of the Indian batting order. Be it on the batting friendly Indian subcontinent pitches or on the bouncy tracks of South Africa or in the seaming conditions of England and New Zealand; Sachin stood tall against world class bowlers and lead the batting onslaught opening the innings.
The Mumbaikar was part of a powerpacked batting lineup which had some greats in Mohammad Azharuddin, Ajay Jadeja, Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid, Gautam Gambhir and Yuvraj Singh.
There were glimpses of the teen sensation's batting genuis in the 1992 World Cup Down Under but Sachin proved to the entire cricketing fraternity that he was a notch above the rest when he amassed 523 runs in the 1996 World Cup to help India reach the semifinals. Sachin single-handedly helped the hosts clinch convincing wins over Australia, Sri Lanka and the West Indies with some magnificent knocks in the group stages.
They say that the real character of a man comes out when he faces adversity. Sachin lost his father amid the 1999 World Cup in England and had to fly back to India to perform the last rites. However, he chose national duties over personal grievances and came back with a bang, scoring a resilient ton against Kenya. The diminutive opener was only second behind Rahul Dravid in India's run scoring charts at the event.
Sachin was at the peaks of his prowess at the 2003 World Cup in South Africa when he scored a mammoth 673 runs, going onto become the leading run scorer of the tournament. Sachin's moment under the Sun came in the semis against arch rivals Pakistan when he smashed a whirlwind 98 run knock against the fearsome pace trio of Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis and helped India secure a final berth. India made it to the finals against Australia largely on the back of Sachin's purple patch with the bat in the tournament.
In a nutshell, it wont be wrong in saying that Sachin Tendulkar has set some lofty benchmarks with the bat for others to emulate. It is now upto the likes of the modern day greats in Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma if they can carry forward the legacy of their illustrious predecessor.