Sachin Tendulkar glad to have played when India became nerve centre of cricket'

Mumbai: Legendary Indian cricketer Sachin Tendulkar feels that he was luck to have played the game at a time when its presence and popularity in India grew manifold, and culminated in the country becoming a cricketing superpower.

Tendulkar, whose documentary ‘Sachin: A billion dreams’ releases on Friday, credited the film’s director James Erskine for not only capturing his growth as a cricketer, but also the overall growth of the sport within the nation.

“James Erskine, my director, was clear this is something we had to document,” Tendulkar said to Economic Times. “He wanted to portray this change that our country has undergone in the last 30 years because that's also the story of why and how cricket has become what it is.”

The 44-year-old, who has scored over 15,000 runs in Test, and more than 18,000 runs in ODI cricket, went on to say that he did not have much idea about the sport when he had just started playing the sport.

“When I played I had very little knowledge of it all. It was all a cocoon,” he said. “But others, my family, friends and people associated were seeing this change like you all did.

"I am glad I have lived and played cricket at a time when the game was transformed like the way it has and how India turned into the nerve centre of the game something that needs showcasing."