Bangla used conditions well: Sachin

But the sight of a certain Sachin Tendulkar entering the press conference hall changed the whole atmosphere. There was that much-anticipated question on Sehwag’s remark on Saturday, but Tendulkar replied, “Sehwag made that comments and if you want to know about it you should ask Sehwag.”

The question popped up immediately but this time the champion batsman was rather terse. “Move over to the next question please.”

There was no further probing on the issue. Talk about using the reputation to diffuse a potentially explosive situation.

Moving on to the day’s play, Tendulkar explained that Bangladesh bowlers exploited the conditions well. “There was a bit of moisture in the wicket, offering a bit of assistance to the bowlers. They exploited it well, pitched the ball on the right areas and they got the results.”

Tendulkar also did not blame his colleagues for their rather causal shot selection on the day. “I don’t think that was the case as nobody plays a shot thinking of getting out. The fact was that Bangladesh bowlers exploited the conditions well. Laxman was unfortunate in his dismissal, the ball rolling over to wicketkeeper. So such things happen as bad days cannot be avoided in cricket,” Tendulkar said.

“Yes, we did not have a great day. But there is a lot of cricket to be played, and we have to wait and see how things will pick up in the coming days. We want to score as many runs as possible and the wicket will also behave differently later,” he said.

There was an element of happiness for Tendulkar as he surpassed 13,000-run mark in Test cricket en route to his unbeaten 76. “It’s nice feeling though I was not counting. It was displayed on the board, so it was hard to miss,” he added.