Facts of Sachin Tendulkar

Facts of Sachin Tendulkar's early years

Sachin's name was kept on Sachin Dev Burman who was very famous music director and Ramesh Tendulkar's (father of Sachin Tendulkar) favourite.

Tendulkar often used to fight with fellow children during the school time. It is not wrong to say that he was prankster. Sachin once put a hose pipe into Sourav Ganguly's room and turned the tap on.

Likes to dunk his glucose biscuits into his tea and have them with a spoon.

In school, he was once mistaken for a girl by good friend Atul Ranade because of his long curls

Sachin was introduced to cricket by his brother Ajit Tendulkar in 1984. When young Sachin fell from a tree on a Sunday evening during his summer vacation, while Guide was shown on national TV, his infuriated brother (and mentor) Ajit sent him to cricket coaching class as punishment.

Sachin Tendulkar used to sleep with his cricket gear during his junior days.

Colony watchman's son Ramesh Pardhe, who was his playmate, said Sachin would ask him to dip a rubber ball in water and hurl it at him. He wanted to see the wet marks left on the bat to find out whether he had middled the ball correctly

Facts of Sachin Tendulkar's love

Sachin loved tennis apart from cricket. Sachin's idolised - John McEnroe. Sachin in his own words - As a kid I loved John McEnroe. They called me Mac because, while everyone else liked Borg, I was crazy about McEnroe. I tried wearing headbands and sweatbands, and whooping at people. It didn't quite work.

Sachin Tendulkar loves collecting perfumes and watches.

Sachin Tendulkar once told a Marathi news channel in an interview that his weakness is 'vada-pao', a popular Maharashtrian snack. He used to compete with Vinod Kambli and Salil Ankola and say - 'I-can-eat-more-vada-pavs-than-you'

Sachin loves Kishore Kumar and rock group Dire Straits.

Sachin is so possessive about his Ferrari that wife Anjali is not allowed to drive it.

Sachin met Anjali Mehta (daughter of Gujarati industrialist Anand Mehta) by some mutual friends and went on to become good friends. Anjali is the paediatrician by profession. In 1995, he married her. They have a daugther, Sara who was born in October 1997 and Arjun who was born in September 2000.

Loves sea food. Owned a restaurant.

Facts of Sachin Tendulkar's Cricket Career

From the cricket world, Sachin was first met to famous cricket coach - Ramakant Achrekar. Ramakant Achrekar used to give coins to Sachin if he could play the entire session of nets without being dismissed. Tendulkar has won 13 coins from Ramakant. He still treasure all those coins.

Sachin Tendulkar batted in his debut Test against Pakistan wearing the pads gifted to him by Sunil Gavaskar. Sachin Tendulkar's debut Test also was legendary allrounder Kapil Dev's 100th.

During an under-15 tour in Indore, he couldn't sleep and woke up in the middle of the night to shadow practice. As the flooring was wood-based, the noise that emanated from the bat hitting the flooring disturbed the other tenants. As the hotel manager went to complain to coach Vasu Paranjpe, he was ticked off by the coach and told to 'Go and bowl to him'.

Sachin Tendulkar fielded for Pakistan as a substitute during a one-day practice match against India at the Brabourne Stadium in 1988.

In his debut Test match English fast bowler Alan Mullally complained that Sachin Tendulkar was batting with a bat broader than the normal willow.

Sachin went 79 matches before scoring his first ODI century – by which time he had scored seven Test hundreds

Sachin Tendulkar uses a very heavy bat at the crease, weighing 3.2lbs. Only South Africa's Lance Klusener used a heavier bat in world cricket.

Sachin Tendulkar started off with centuries in his debut matches in the Ranji, Duleep and Irani Trophy.

Sachin Tendulkar has been granted the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna, Arjuna Award and Padma Shri by the Indian government. He is the only Indian cricketer to get all of them.

Tendulkar has scored most centuries in a calendar year: 9 ODI centuries in 1998. In 1998 he made 1,894 ODI runs, a record for ODI runs by any batsman in a calendar year.

Sachin calls Sourav Ganguly 'Babu Moshai' while Ganguly calls him 'Chhota Babu'. >> Read Accomplishments of Sachin Tendulkar

Remembers every dismissal and even the bowler who dismissed him.

Facts of Sachin Tendulkar's Advertisements, Politics and others

Sachin Tendulkar is India’s first active cricketer to be nominated to the Rajya Sabha.

The first advertisement in which Sachin featured was for a sticking plaster.

The first brand which Sachin Tendulkar endorsed was the health drink ‘Boost.’ He was seen alongside Kapil Dev in many of their ad films, the start of which happened in 1990.

Tendulkar's immense popularity saw him be an early pioneer in India on cricket business dealings, signing a record sports management deal with Worldtel in 1995 worth $5.7million over five years. In 2001 he signed a new deal for $15.2million, switching to Saatchi and Saatchi's ICONIX in 2006 for a deal worth $34.2million over three years

Sachin Tendulkar went to watch the movie Roja in 1995 with a beard and disguise. It all went wrong when his glasses fell off and the crowd in the cinema hall recognized him.

Tendulkar’s first car was a Maruti-800.