Former Indian skipper Sourav Ganguly and batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar were among one of the most successful opening pairs in One-Day Internationals during their playing days.

The duo has broken many records with their vital partnerships as well built quite a few in their time.

Recently, Ganguly shared fun facts and trivia about their partnership as well spoke about Tendulkar on a Bengali talk-show 'Apur Sangsar'.

When actor Saswata Chatterjee asked why he most of the time took the strike, Dada said, "Shuntoi na (He would never listen to me)! I had once told him casually, 'after all I am the captain of the team, and you all the time walk out and take the non-striker's end'. In reply Tendulkar said, 'When I take guard and when a ball is bowled in India, there is so much heat and chaos in the ground, I find it hard to focus.'"

He further added, "I rubbished his claim, saying all these are excuses. Tendulkar again said, 'It's all going well, you take the strike, it is just the matter of a single delivery.' I added jokingly, 'that should be considered for me sometimes as well.'"

During the Pakistan series, Ganguly deliberately sent Tendulkar to take the strike. He said about that, "I was having a bad patch. Even after playing 3-4 innings, I could not connect the ball well. I told Tendulkar, 'let's try something different. You take strike in the Jamshedpur ODI.'"

Dada further added on this, "But he always had an excuse ready," Ganguly added with a smile. "He said, 'see, the team is winning, why are you thinking about yourself?'. I said, 'you have excuses for every given situation!' I still requested him, but he was not ready. I did not drag it further."

Ganguly said, "We walked out of the pavilion, talking to each other and proceeding towards the wicket. Pakistan had put up around 280. As we reached the wicket, I went straight to the non-striker's, faced the other way and stood still. Now, all the cameras were panning Sachin, and he could not even ask me to go take the strike and had to do it himself. We won the match, we both scored good runs."

"After the match, when I told him, 'see, you listened to me and we both scored. Let's follow this.' He straight away said a no, saying, 'I am not going to take strike, you will do it from next time onwards.'"

Former Indian captain also praised Tendulkar for his character, "Off the field, Tendulkar is just like a common man. He wants to lead a life, live a life. He has his own tastes, distastes. He wants to do things his own way, which has not been possible for him in India. He belonged to a middle-class family. He has had a normal middle-class lifestyle. But his biggest credit is, his feet were always on the ground. Even after so much adulation and fan-following, for he is the greatest Indian batsman, but you cannot figure that out from his appearance. He always knew exactly where he stood, what is his life, his world. Without this mindset, playing for 24 years would have not been possible."