Sachin will return to form: Chappell
Thursday, 02 March , 2006, 16:30
courtesy: Sify Sports
New Delhi: Admittedly ''affronted'' by those who wrote premature obituary to Sachin Tendulkar's career, Team India coach Greg Chappell criticised the naysayers and said he was always confident of the little master regaining his old touch.
Tendulkar's poor return of 63 runs in three innings in Pakistan tour had provoked criticism in certain sections but Chappell felt it was completely unwarranted.
''After the Karachi Test a few people asked me if I was worried about him (Tendulkar). I wasn't,'' Chappell said in an interview with a magazine.
''The signs had been there in the second innings. His footwork looked sharp and there were two or three shots he played against Shoaib (Akhtar). I knew a big innings was around the corner. In the third one-dayer he played a monumental innings, given the context of the series and the difficult conditions.'' Rubbishing the notion that Tendulkar was walking into the sunset of his career, Chappell said, ''When I was a kid, we used to watch westerns on Saturday morning. It was pretty simplistic stuff, with the good guys wearing white hats and the bad guys in black ones... But, I sometimes get the feeling that the media seems to be supporting the black hats.'' ''If we reward the white ones, India can be the best team in the world. If we stick by the black hats, though, no chance,'' the coach went on to say. He said Sachin has been a role model for Team India ''with the way he prepares, the way he takes on challenges and the way he deals with more pressure than perhaps any other man in the history of the game''.
