Tendulkar: A special ton because it helped India win

It is sometimes said that Sachin Tendulkar is not at his best when in good nick. But surely there's no such thing as someone's form being too special for his own good? In the first two one-dayers of the five match series, Tendulkar played flashy cameos, going hard at every ball bowled at him and eventually fell short of the big score. In the third one-dayer at Indore however, Tendulkar began tentatively, not middling the ball as well as he would have liked. Weathering the lack of a sublime touch, Tendulkar went on to make 139, an innings that set up an Indian victory by 118 runs. But it was not just any century. When Tendulkar pushed a Shane Warne leg break to mid off, sauntered a single and took his personal score on to 34, the little maestro from Mumbai became the first man to cross 10,000 runs in limited overs cricket.

"I knew it was coming but I wasn't really thinking about it," Tendulkar told scribes after the match. Perhaps that explains the rather muted celebration from Tendulkar. The crowds at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium were, in contrast, well alive to the magnitude of the moment. The roar that went up was tremendous, the standing ovation heartfelt. "I basically just wanted to hang in there and that's what I did. It paid off at the end of the day." It certainly did. Tendulkar spent a total of 197 minutes at the crease.

"Initially the ball came onto the bat very well. At that time I went for my shots. As time went on, the wicket played lower and slower. I had to adapt my game. I changed my plans as the game went on and that made the difference," said Tendulkar, speaking about the pitch, which looked a beauty of a batting track from a distance. The look in Tendulkar's eyes betrayed a sense of relief. Yet, Tendulkar was keen not to sound too emotional or jubilant.

As the press conference drew to a close, Tendulkar had to concede that this knock was special. "A hundred is a hundred, every one of them makes you happy. But this one is extra special simply because it helped India win," said Tendulkar. That summed up Tendulkar's mood aptly.