Adelaide, Jan 22: Veteran Australian batsman Michael Hussey has called Sachin Tendulkar a ‘cricket god’ who has performed at a consistently high level throughout his career unfazed by all the adulation he has received.
“[Tendulkar] is a cricket god and yet how he handles himself in India, in a cricket-mad country, where just to walk on the street means being mobbed by thousands and thousands of people ... to handle all this and put it aside and perform for India for over 20 years in international cricket is just amazing,” he said.
"He has played brilliantly. Watching him closely, his footwork, the time he has and the straight bat, both off the front and backfoot, he's playing really well. If he continues it's inevitable [the hundred],” Hussey said about the legend’s much-anticipated hundredth ton.
"That's the way batting goes. Sometimes you are playing well but one ball, one mistake and you are back to the pavilion. I am sure to his own mind he is batting well, his bat is as broad as ever at the moment," added Hussey before the start of the final Test at Adelaide.
Hussey also had some words of praise for Indian pacer Ishant Sharma before the end of the one-sided Test series.
"Ishant, if anything, has picked up little bit in pace from some spell I've faced from him in the past. He regularly touched 150 [kmph] in a few of the spells in Melbourne. He bowled with real pace, at least early in the series but he bowled without luck.
"In the first two Tests, he beat the bat on numerous occasions. But the rub of the green didn't go his way. He has bowled well, maybe 50-50 things haven't gone his way. Sometimes such things shape a series.
“I hope that continues for one more Test. He's an outstanding bowler and I truly mean it, both with the new and old ball. I'm sure he's going to come back pretty hard in this Test," Hussey added.
Speaking on his own form and his future in the Australian side, Hussey said, “Throughout the whole summer I have just tried to set myself for this series but my body feels good, I still feel I'm playing well, and mentally I'm still keen to turn up to training and mentally keen for the battle out in the middle. From that point of view I am definitely thinking of continuing on. I'd love to go to the West Indies.”
