Joe Root is still doing great things in Test cricket. On Friday, he became the batter with the second-most runs in Test cricket history.
Root’s excellent and consistent batting made Day 3 of the fourth Test hard for the Indian bowlers. He scored his 38th Test century that day. Before the day’s play, Michael Atherton, a former England batter, talked about Root’s batting. He also spoke about Sachin Tendulkar’s first tour in England. Atherton talked about how crucial it is for players to maximize their talent, and he brought up Vinod Kambli, a former Indian middle-order batter.
Sachin and Kambli played cricket together in school, and everyone thought they would both do amazing things for India in the future. But, they had very different international careers. Tendulkar became one of cricket’s greatest players, but Kambli didn’t meet expectations, though he started well.
Atherton told Sky Sports Cricket that it was a hot summer with flat pitches, which were great for scoring runs. He said that Tendulkar was 17 and he was 21, and it was clear that Tendulkar was very talented.
He added that Tendulkar had time, was composed, had all the shots, and had a great attitude. But, there was no sure way to know he would score over 15,000 runs. He mentioned Vinod Kambli, Tendulkar’s schoolmate, who scored a double-hundred in 1993 and seemed like a fantastic player, but ended up not succeeding.
He said that every player needs to try to get the most out of their talent. It’s up to each person how they do that, but no one can say that Sachin didn’t use his talent to its full potential.
On Friday, Root passed Ricky Ponting to become second on the list of batters with the most runs in Test cricket history. Sachin Tendulkar is first with 15,921 runs.