File pic of Sachin Tendulkar and Shoaib Akhtar.© AFP
Sachin Tendulkar’s decorated cricket career saw him score an incredible 34,357 runs in international cricket. The Indian batting great finished his career as the highest run-scorer in both ODI and Test cricket. He also scored 100 centuries and 164 fifties across all formats. According to former Pakistan pacer Shoaib Akhtar, Tendulkar would have scored “1 lakh runs” had he played with the present rules in cricket. The pace great said new rules have tilted cricket more towards batters and that Tendulkar would have made the most out of the same had he played the sport now.
“You have brought two new balls. You have made the rules stricter. You give as much leverage as possible to batsmen. You allow three reviews. Imagine if Sachin (Tendulkar) had three reviews during his time, he would have scored 1 lakh runs,” Akhtar said during a chat with former India head coach Ravi Shastri on his YouTube channel.
“Poor Sachin – I say ‘poor Sachin’ because he initially played against Wasim (Akram) and Waqar (Younis), he played against Shane Warne, then played against Brett Lee and Shoaib (Akhtar), and later he played the next generation of fast bowlers. That’s why I call him a very tough batsman,” he added.
Promoted
“It’s very batting-oriented cricket nowadays. Earlier, as a batsman, you would enjoy watching the fast bowlers approaching you with hair flying, bowling bouncers.”
Shastri had his own suggestion to bring some “balance” to the sport. “If you want to bring some balance, I always say there shouldn’t be two bouncers in an over. That limit should be increased,” he said.
Topics mentioned in this article