"You Shut Up, Let Me Do The Talking": Ravi Shastri Shares Funny Incident Involving Sachin Tendulkar

Former India captain Ravi Shastri went down memory lane and recalled one of his matches against Australia at the Sydney Cricket Ground, in which he and Sachin Tendulkar had to face a lot of sledging from the opponents. He revealed that the sledging from the Australian players irked Sachin, and the latter even tried to prepare himself for a response. Shastri added that Sachin came to him and shared his plan to give it back to the Australian players in the same manner. He further said that he advised Sachin to "shut up" and reply it all with his batting.

"I remember one at the SCG. It was Sachin's first tour. I had just reached a hundred, and Sachin had just come to bat. And he was being sledged by the Waugh brothers (Steve and Mark). 'You little this, you little that'. And Mike Whitney had come on to the field as a 12th man. I was having a pow-pow with Allan Border until I reached my 100. He took the ball in his hand and said, 'Get back into your crease; I'll break your head'. I turned around there. There were mics, and you could be fined. So I went on the centre of the pitch and I shouted across the SCG, 'Hey Mike! If you can claim to throw as well as you can bowl, you wouldn't be the 12th man of Australia. And that was it," Shastri said at the Summer of Cricket Lunch hosted by Cricket ACT.

"Sachin came to me and said, 'Wait till I get to my hundred. I will also give them some of this'. I told Sachin 'You shut up. You've got enough class; your bat will do the talking. Let me do the talking. And from 100 to 200, there wasn't a word but at the end of the game, they were the first guys in the dressing room with a beer. Play it hard. You've got to be competitive. That's what the crowd respects. That's what the opposition respects," added Shastri.

Ravi Shastri, a batting all-rounder, represented India from 1981 to 1992. During the final years of his career, a young Sachin Tendulkar emerged on the international stage. The Master Blaster made his debut in 1989 and went on to play for India until 2013, becoming one of the most iconic figures in world cricket.

Click here to read article