“As for my batting, the best part about it is I have never changed it. I have never changed my thinking, I have never changed my batting style.”
“April 2nd is a memorable moment of my cricketing career.”
“Fitness has nothing to do with age.”
“I don’t like to party. I like to spend time with family on my birthday.”
“Like life, the beauty of sports is that no two periods are identical.”
“Every player has his own mantra of working on his physique.”
“If you know your game, you can handle pressure; you can handle any kind of situation, back yourself, and play your own game and get success.”
“I have a gym at home where I do weight training as well as cardio. I love doing bench press but cannot share information on how much weight I lift. I also practise Yoga. My guru Sadhguru taught me different kriyas like Surya Namaskar, which I do for my personal well being.”
“Til the day I didn’t play under-19 World Cup, nobody ever celebrated my birthday. And the moment I played for Indian team, my family got excited and ordered and cut a cake for me in front of 40-50 family members.”
“My father was a farmer, and we have had some farming land in Haryana. Maybe I would have followed his footsteps and become a farmer.”
“There are very rare occasions when you get a good wicket to bat on, but whatever wicket you get, you have to play at least 20 overs for your side.”
“Someone enjoys your batting, and someone, your humour. Since I’m not batting any longer, I can at least say some words, so people enjoy and give me compliments, too.”
“In my view, if you have good or bad technique, it doesn’t matter. But you will survive if you can adjust your game at international level, you are mentally strong, you know your strengths and how to score runs.”
“It doesn’t matter if you have one billion rupees in your bank account or one rupee. This is one life you get, and you’d rather spend it enjoying whatever you have, rather than thinking, ‘Oh, I should have scored seven more runs, or I should get more money.’”
“When I was growing up, I played a lot of ten- and 12-over games, and I would bat in the middle order. I got only ten-odd balls to face, and I tried to score as much as I could. I applied the same approach in domestic and international cricket, and people were appreciating my strike rate being more than 80 or 90 in Test cricket.”
“Cricketers are worried about their milestones, worried that they should score 5000-10,000 Test runs, but I am not fussy.”
“Playing for India was a memorable journey, and I tried to make it more memorable for my team mates and the Indian cricket fans. I believe that I was reasonably successful in doing so.”
“If any IPL team wants me to be a mentor or a batting consultant, I would love to do that. I can share my knowledge with the youngsters.”
“If I had planned to score double and triple hundreds, I would probably not have made them ever.”
“Because I knew I had got success at Ranji level, I was confident I would get some success in international cricket too.”
“The most important thing for any athlete is to know his ability. If you know your ability and have even a little bit of a strong mindset, you can get success, because your ability takes you to success.”
“To participate in a World Cup is a great honour and achievement. I’ve played in three World Cups. The whole world watches you during a World Cup and expects you to play innings to win games for your country.”
“When I was a kid, my first dream was to play Test matches, and the second one was to play 100 Test matches because there are very few people who have played 100 Tests for India.”
“When a person becomes satisfied, he doesn’t run after things, doesn’t worry about it, and doesn’t make efforts.”
“I try to hit the ball along the ground, especially against fast bowlers. I also like the bat to come down in the right position and check if my body position is correct. If I’m really watching the ball carefully, then automatically I’m in a good position to hit it down the ground.”
“One should always be happy, irrespective of what you achieve in a match or in life. That’s how I live my life.”
“There is no point playing in the IPL when I have retired from international cricket. I did not want a youngster to miss out because of me.”
“I would love to be a coach, mentor, or a batting consultant. I would love to commentate in Hindi, as most people who watch the game are more comfortable with Hindi in India rather than English.”
“Every coach desires to bring in his own support staff.”
“Many stories come from the dressing room that one doesn’t speak when you are playing but can do once retired.”
“I write what I like. I don’t bother what people think about it.”
“I don’t bother about image.”
“During Rahul Dravid’s captaincy, Dhoni got the role of a finisher. He got out a couple of times playing a bad shot, and he was also reprimanded by Dravid during one instance. But from that instance, he completely changed his approach and became a very good finisher.”
“If you are disciplined, it shows you are organised.”
“Only great players can have two shots for one ball, like Tendulkar does, and a big reason is that he picks the ball very early.”
“I learned from Tendulkar how to get big hundreds.”
“I have never been able to play consistently with soft hands.”
“When I began my life journey, we’d survive on Rs 500 a month as a family. As time passed and I started playing for the country, this Rs 500 multiplied manifold, but it was not the money that mattered: it was the fact that I was fulfilling my ambition of playing cricket on the highest platform, representing my country.”
“I never thought of breaking a record. The only ambition I had was to become the fastest century maker for India, which I did when I broke Azharuddin’s record.”
“I lose around a couple of crores every year on the school, but even if I was to make profit from it, I would never use it for myself. I’d plough every penny back into improving facilities for the school. Just as I do with the cricket academies I run around the country. These are not for making money; for that, I have other avenues.”
“Once I took to Twitter and shared those jokes, they became a huge hit. My following grew, and some of the posts got thousands of retweets. With so many shares, money from sponsors followed.”
“Whenever senior players are missing, its ideal for youngsters to avail of these opportunities.”
“I believe in wishing my colleagues and other celebs in a manner that brings my wit out and gives people a talking point. But there are people who love and those who hate you. That’s part of a celeb’s life.”
“I don’t know how to troll people, but there are many out there talking with that intent. I just write something funny that would make people laugh.”
“My best India v. Pakistan moment is from our first match in the ICC World T20 2007, which was a tie.”
“When I play a cover-drive, I play it to score runs.”
“My style is my strength. It is my natural game. That is how I grew up and scored most of my runs.”
“I have matured in my shot selection but will not discard my style. I don’t believe in wasting balls.”
“I curse myself if I get out without making a 100 after crossing 40.”
“I don’t care whether I am politically correct or not when I tweet.”
“If I feel strongly about something, I don’t bother what will people say, especially when it is about the country and the Army. But my cricketer friends are all politically correct when they tweet.”
“When you start the game, coaches will tell you to do stuff in a particular way, and kids do that. But the moment you start first-class cricket, the coach needs to tell you, ‘Try this, try that,’ instead of, ‘Do this, do that.’ If you feel comfortable, you can take it; otherwise, leave it.”
“I was a middle-order batsman who was too good against spin and hit sixes consistently in Under-19 and Ranji cricket, and I still have the same confidence.”
“It doesn’t matter whether you move your feet or not; if your head is still and body is in balance, you can score lots of runs. This I learned from Tendulkar.”
“When I faced the likes of Shoaib Akhtar and Brett Lee for the first time, I had a little bit of fear in my mind. My thoughts were, ‘Would I be able to face them? Would I be able to play them? Would I be able to hit boundaries?’ There were so many questions and fear, also, that if the ball didn’t hit my bat, it might hit me on the body.”
“A youngster should know his game first. If he knows his game, he can modify it at the top level if required. But if he doesn’t know his game, then it is difficult to get success at international level. You will get success occasionally but not regularly.”
“There were a lot of players who gave me suggestions when I was young. At times, they were very good suggestions, and I took them seriously, applied them to my batting, and got success after that.”
“I love to score runs rather than defending or leaving the ball. That is an important aspect of my batting: I don’t want to waste balls in any form of the game.”
“When I was growing up, we would play a 10-over or 15-over game, and the asking-rate would always be high, and I would end up scoring 30 or 40 runs in 15 balls, so I built that mindset right from the beginning and still continue to bat in the same manner.”
“I batted with contact lenses in the IPL while playing for Delhi Daredevils. I wasn’t picking the ball early. So I went back to the glasses.”
“During the peak of my career, I used to pick the ball as soon it was released from the bowler’s hands. And I hit the ball through the line.”
“Sometimes, you just need to get out of the game and should do things which you want to do in life and like.”
“My shot selection has to be good to score big runs.”
“You don’t think of these things when you play. When you retire, you look back and see that my Test average outside Asia is 40, and it is 49 overall. If I can change something, I’d like to change that average outside Asia. I tried as hard as I could outside Asia, but I couldn’t do that.”
“I used to prepare in advance on how the bowler is going to bowl, whether is he going to bowl an outswinger or an inswinger? I used to watch the videos of the bowler and used to prepare in advance.”
“I thought I could have breached Brian Lara’s 400 runs. When I scored 319, I was unbeaten at 309 but then got out. So I think I could have reached that mark, but unfortunately, I missed it.”
“I would want to change my name to Sachin Tendulkar if I could do it. He has tons of records; I am not even close to him. He is called as the ‘God,’ and who would not want to be a God in this mortal world?”
“We never thought that there would be another Sachin Tendulkar. But Virat Kohli has changed this mindset. I think Virat can surpass Tendulkar’s records.”
“Anyone in the game can make any score.”
“Whenever I have played a game of cricket, whether it is under-16, under-19, or State level, my approach has been the same.”
“In international cricket, the atmosphere changes, and the interest level is higher, but for a cricketer, it is still a game he has to play.”
“After you score 300 runs in one innings, you begin to feel that every innings should be close to this one. Of course, I know that won’t happen. But I will be disappointed if I get going well and am unable to convert it into a huge score.”
“As a cricketer, everybody has a dream to play for your country.”
“When I took up cricket seriously, I wanted to play for India. When my dream was achieved, I thought what next? Then a fellow cricketer told me, ‘Playing for India is easy; playing for 10-15 years is difficult.’ Then I changed my dream to play 100 Test matches. I achieved that as well. Now there is nothing to achieve, so I am just enjoying things.”
“Does it make a difference if I score 8000 or 10,000 runs in Test cricket? Not in anybody’s life.”
“I was scared of facing only one bowler – that was Muttiah Muralitharan.”
“I am the superstitious kind: I never praise a shot because I fear the moment I do so, the batsman gets out.”
“I always tell myself to bat the full day, and if there is a ball to be hit, just hit it.”
“Sachin Tendulkar was one of the fittest players.”
“I have been successful as an opener, but who knows, maybe I would have been more successful in the middle order.”
“People say I take too many risks. But the fact is, there is risk involved in every shot. You can get out trying to defend a ball as well.”
“I think if you think so much, you simply cannot bat.”
“When I grew up, I tried to score off every ball, be it a 10-over-match, a 20-over, or even a Test match. If I stay in the wicket for, say, about 30 minutes, I want to make the most of it and score maximum runs possible. You never know when you get out; try to score as much possible before that.”
“I never thought of coaching the Indian cricket team. I was given the offer… BCCI secretary Amitabh Choudhury and MV Sridhar came to me and requested me to think on the offer. I took my time and then applied for the position.”
“There are days when you make runs, and there will be a dry spell. Like in business, every year you don’t make profits.”
“Experience always enables you to handle pressure better.”
“Australia always gives a tough fight, and that’s why every player wants to perform against Australia. When you perform against Australia, England, and South Africa, you automatically earn more respect.”
“As an international player, the players have to adapt to the condition no matter what the situation is.”
“Players like Ravindra Jadeja, Yusuf Pathan, Warner, Glenn Maxwell were noticed at IPL first. It is a platform for players all over the world.”
“If a player is playing IPL and earning money, it’s not his fault that he’s not playing for India. He is not quitting. He is playing first-class, one-day cricket and IPL. If selectors don’t pick him, what can he do?”
“There has been the negative impact of spot-fixing and match-fixing, but it is the individual player’s responsibility to look after that because if a player wants to do that, it is difficult to stop him. It is the individual player’s responsibility to play fairly.”
“If I do commentary, write articles, or am an expert on a news channel, I can still earn money.”
“I would never want a guy who is not a natural keeper.”
“No Indian wants their sports persons to get left behind or any particular sports to get left behind.”
“It’s the duty of the federations to make sure that the funds reach the athletes properly. They need to make sure that the athletes get proper facilities so that they can win the medals for the country.”
“To say that I wanted to become the captain is entirely incorrect. When Dhoni became captain and I played under him, we won the T20 World Cup.”
“No doubt, if you go through records, Dhoni is India’s best captain to date. Beating Sourav Ganguly, he won the Tests, ODIs, and T20s, won both the World Cups. Nobody can deny that, but to give credit to a single person is not good; others should also get credit for winning the Cups.”
“To say that the captain makes the team lose or win is not correct.”
“I don’t think it’s correct to blame the captain. He at least tries to keep all together so that the team plays well, plays positive cricket, and wins the match for the country, and not think about only winning and earning a name for himself.”
“God has been kind, and I have done what I wanted to do – on the field and in my life.”
“I would like to thank all my captains who believed in me and backed me to the hilt. I also thank our greatest partner, the Indian cricket fan, for all the love, support, and memories.”
“I have lived my dream and played at the finest of cricket grounds across the globe, and I want to thank the groundsmen, clubs, associations, and everyone who painstakingly prepare the arena for our performances.”
“A sort of sadness shall always remain in my mind that I was not allowed to retire while playing, but anyway, it’s all a part of life for a sportsman who, while playing, never realises when he should retire, but he starts thinking about it when he is dropped.”
“I would like to ask, Should not a player who has played 12 to 13 years for his country deserves a farewell match?”
“If a player fails to perform in four or five consecutive matches, he should be dropped irrespective of whether he is a senior or a junior player.”
“The officers and jawans of CRPF have sacrificed a lot for the nation.”
“We don’t need to run 5-6 kms, even in a Test match.”
“I have never hidden my injury before, or fitness problems. Even my shoulder operation was planned after consulting the then coach Gary Kirsten and skipper MS Dhoni.”
“Coach should be a friend, not a coach. And at international level, all you need is a friend who can motivate you. Technique doesn’t matter.”
“If you know how to score runs, you can perform in any format.”
“Sledging is an important part of the game, but you should never cross the line.”
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