36 years ago on this day - December 18, 1989, India faced arch-rivals Pakistan at Gujranwala in the second ODI of the four-match series. A 16-year-old boy padded up to play his first limited-over match in India colours.
That teenage boy was none other than legendary
Sachin Tendulkar, who made his international debut a month ago in Karachi in the first Test of India’s tour to Pakistan.
It was an anti-climatic start to arguably the most successful ODI career in cricket history. The teenager came to bat when India were struggling at 34/3 after Raman Lamba was run-out in their 88-run chase.
Coming to bat at No.5, Sachin failed to make an impact as he was dismissed by
Waqar Younis, who also made his Test debut in the Karachi Test along with the teenage batter. Sachin faced just two balls and was out for a duck as India lost the low-scoring game by 7 runs.
Little did the young boy and the world knew at that time that the teenage prodigy would end up playing 463 ODIs in a career that spanned more than two decades, scoring still the world record 18,426 runs in the format, including 49 centuries and 96 half-centuries.
How Sachin Tendulkar's debut ODI panned out in 1989India's tour of Pakistan that year comprised four Tests and four ODIs. The two teams entered the second ODI on December 18, after drawing the Test series 0-0, that's four drawn matches, and the first ODI abandoned without a ball being bowled in Peshawar.
At Municipal Stadium, India captain Kris Srikkanth won the toss and decided to bowl first against the hosts. The visitors gave ODI debuts to not just Sachin, but to two more players - Salil Ankola and Vivek Razdan.
File Pic: Sachin Tendulkar (Getty Images)
Spinner Maninder Singh gave India a terrific start, removing Ramiz Raza and Saleem Malik in quick succession as the hosts were reduced to 22/2. Two run-outs followed - Wasim Akram and Mansoor Akhtar, and Pakistan kept losing wickets in quick succession and their innings ended at 87/9 in 16 overs - the match was a curtailed one due to rain. Saeed Anwar, coming to bat at No.5, was the sole resistance for the hosts and remained unbeaten on 42 off 32 balls, hitting two sixes and four fours.
For India, apart from Maninder (2/17), debutant Salil Ankola took two wickets for 26 in four overs, with Raman Lamba finishing with figures of 1 for 9. There were as many as four run outs in Pakistan's innings.
Needing 88 to win in 16 overs, India started cautiously with the openers adding 26 runs before captain Srikkanth was bowled by Waqar Younis for 17. It opened the floodgate, with Navjot Sidhu and Lamba (10) following soon.
It was then, the young Sachin came to bat for India for the first time in the ODIs. But he was undone by the bowling of Younis and was gone for a two-ball duck caught by Akram, and India were left reeling at 36/4. Like Pakistan, India too kept losing wickets at regular intervals with Mohammad Azharuddin top-scoring for the visitors at 21.
Only four India batters managed to reach the double figures mark, and were restricted to 80 for 9 in their 16 overs, losing the match by 7 runs. With the win, Pakistan took a 1-0 lead in the series, which they eventually won 2-0 after the third ODI too ended without a result and the hosts winning the final match by 38 runs.
Sachin Tendulkar with Lionel Messi at Wankhede stadium.
Sachin Tendulkar's stats in his first international seriesSachin started his international career in Tests, featuring in all four matches in Pakistan. He had a decent start to his Test career, scoring 215 runs in six innings at 35.83 average and hitting two fifties with a best score of 59, which came in his second career inning in Faisalabad after starting with a 15 in Karachi. He signed off the Pakistan Test series with his second half-century - a 57 in Sialkot.
But ODI career which started with a duck, was incidentally the only limited-over match he featured in the series, in which one match was abandoned without a ball being bowled and other was deemed no result without India getting a chance to bat.
Duck to most runs in ODI cricketDespite failing to open his account on debut, Sachin went on to finish his career with a plethora of records, especially in ODIs. The Little Master signed off his career as the highest run-getters in ODIs (18,426), had the longest career in the format (22 years and 91 days), scored most hundreds (49) at the time his retirement - before
Virat Kohli surpassed him recently, most runs in a calendar year (1894), most hundreds in a calendar year (9), most fifty-plus scored (145) and fastest to 15000, 16000, 17000, 18000 runs in the format among others.
Fun fact: The ODIs in that series were scheduled as 40-overs-a-side, even though Sachin Tendulkar’s debut match itself was reduced to 16 overs per side due to rain. In those days, the maximum number of overs in ODIs was not standardised — matches were played over 40, 50, 55 or even 60 overs. The 50-overs-a-side format became the norm only in the mid-1990s, with the 1987 World Cup in India and Pakistan being the first major tournament to formally adopt it.