BCCI President and former India captain Sourav Ganguly has revealed how he actually became an opener for Team India in the ODI cricket and how Sachin Tendulkar played a role in the same.
Ganguly, one of India’s most successful captains, has revealed that Tendulkar has advised him to open for India in the ODI cricket and he took the advice and the rest is history as the two greatest cricketers gave world cricket one the most iconic opening pairs in international cricket.
The left-hander had played 10 ODIs at the middle-order in his career before being asked to open in the 1996 Titan Cup tri-series and then played 301 ODIs at the top of the order for India. He has 11363 runs with the highest score of 183 including 22 centuries and 72 fifties to his name in ODI cricket.
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Ganguly said in an interview with Republic Bangla: “Before I started opening in one-day matches, I used to play in the middle order. Sachin came to me and said that you bat at No. 3 in Tests, we do not have an opening batsman, you try and open. I said fine, I'll do it. From there, that's how I became an opener.”
Meanwhile, Ganguly also revealed how he was elevated as India captain in the year 2000 during the home ODIs against South Africa after a devastating Test tour of Australia under Tendulkar.
He signed off by saying, “I have this thing that if you give me responsibility, I will give my best shot. I don't know what it is. When Sachin quit captaincy in 1999 (2000), I didn't even know I would be taking charge.
Back then Sachin and I were of the same age, no one could think someone other than Sachin could become India's captain. He did not want to do it, so I took over and I did.”
Noteworthy, Tendulkar and Ganguly added 126 runs in their first outing as openers for India with both openers scoring a half-century.
The two legends opened the batting 136 times for India in ODI cricket and went on to score 6609 runs at an average of 49.32 with 21 century and 23 fifty-plus stands. The pair of Tendulkar and Ganguly is considered as one of the most successful ODI batting pair in the world.
