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The Greatest says goodbye to ODIs
Rohit Mahajan
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, December 23
Sachin Tendulkar has retired from One-day cricket, and the game is never going to be the same again. "I have decided to retire from the One Day format of the game," thus spoke the master today. He added that India need to prepare a team to defend their World Cup crown in 2015, implying that it's for this reason that he's retiring from One-day cricket.

matchless stats Most runs 18,426  Most centuries 49 Most Man of Match awards 62

Most Player of the Series awards: 15 Most matches: 463 Longest career: 22 years 91 days Unique triple: 15000 runs  (18426 -avg.44.83) 100 wickets (154) and 100 catches (140) Most hundreds against one team:  9 vs Australia Only batsman to register 8 or more hundreds against two nations: 9 vs Australia and 8 vs Sri Lanka Most innings of 50-plus: 195 — 49 centuries + 96 fifties Most runs in a calendar year: 1894 (ave.65.31) in 34 matches in 1998 Most hundreds in a calendar year: 9 in 34 matches in 1998 1000 runs in a calendar year most times: 7 times Most 90s in a career: 18 Most fours: 2016 Most runs against Australia: 3077 at an average of 44.59 in 71 matches Most runs against Sri Lanka: 3113 (ave.43.84) in 84 matches. Most runs against South Africa: 2001 runs at an average of 35.73 in 57 matches Most centuries against South Africa: 5 Most runs against Pakistan: 2526 (ave.40.09) in 69 matches Most hundreds against Pakistan: 5 - a record he shares with Brian Lara Most runs in World Cups: 2278 runs at an average of 56.95 in 45 matches Most centuries in World Cups: 6 in 44 innings Most runs in a single World Cup: 673 at an average of 61.18 in 11 matches in 2002-03 Only batsman to manage 500 runs in a single World Cup twice: 673 in 2003 and 523 (ave.87.16) in seven matches in 1995-96.

A more significant reason is that he wishes to prolong his Test career; and four months short of his 40th birthday, he can't keep playing all the formats of the game at the highest level. Tendulkar had not been playing One-day International cricket regularly anyway -- his last ODI was against Pakistan at the Asia Cup on March 18 this year. He had played only 27 ODIs in the last three years, and merely 10 since the World Cup final in the first week of April 2011.

Yet, the significance of Tendulkar's is immense —he is indisputably the greatest One-day batsman ever. In Test cricket, there are many in the current era — let alone the past -- who are his equals; but in One-day cricket, Tendulkar was peerless.

He, of course, has had the longest ODI career in international cricket, lasting 22 years and 91 days. The numbers he put up over that time are really staggering, his superiority over his peers quite evident. Tendulkar has scored 18,426 ODI runs, nearly 35% more than the next-best, Ricky Ponting (13,704 runs). Tendulkar has 49 ODI centuries to the 30 by the next best, Ponting (30). Thirty-three of his centuries have come in Indian wins; 11 times he scored in the 90s in Indian wins. First man to hit an ODI 200, the man with the highest Man of the Match Awards… We are barely skimming the top of his record in ODI cricket the list is really endless.

Tendulkar can't be reduced to mere numbers -- his impact on India was much beyond the cricket boundary. His advent coincided with the book in Indian economy, the coming of cable TV, and the consequent ballast of ODI cricket. Before him, India had played 165 ODIs over 14 years, ie 12 matches a year. After he debuted, the number has risen to 644 over 23 years - 28 matches a year.