Sachin Tendulkar is certainly one of the greatest cricketers of all times and there is hardly any bowler of his time who hasn’t been hit by him all over the ground. Cricket fans have witnessed some great battles between Sachin and few really good bowlers such as Glenn McGrath, Brett Lee, Allan Donald, Wasim Akram, Muttiah Muralitharan, Shoaib Akhtar, etc. over the time and recently the Rawalpindi Express aka Shoaib Akhtar made an interesting revelation in an interview.
Shoaib Akhtar stated that when he started playing international cricket, he had no idea of the stature enjoyed by the Little Master because he was always lost in his own world and kept on thinking about his bowling and tried to understand what the batter was thinking. He added that it was his teammate spinner Saqlain Mushtaq who told him about the legendary former Indian cricketer.
Though they both (Sachin & Shoaib) have competed intensely against each other on the field, they respect each other too and share a good bond.
Shoaib Akhtar further talked about his mindset while playing the game, he said that the Pakistani pacers used to look for excuses for bowling, for example if he gets to know that the ball is reverse swinging, he thinks that if he gets a spell, he will tear apart the batting line up of the opposition or he will take a fifer and win the match for his country. He adds that a player can’t become a star until he wins matches and he used to win matches for Pakistan.
The arch-rivalry between India and Pakistan is well-known in the cricket world but currently they don’t have any sport ties between them and no bilateral series has been played for quite a long time now. They have faced each other in major tournaments and now they will clash against each other in the Asia Cup 2022 on August 28. While the Pakistan side will be led by Babar Azam, the Indian squad will be led by Rohit Sharma and the Asia Cup 2022 is quite important for all the teams because it will give them an idea of their chances in the ICC T20 World Cup 2022 which is going to be played in October in Australia.
Which team do you think will win the Asia Cup 2022?