Recalling the contribution made by his coach Ramakant Achrekar to his career, legendary Indian cricketer Sachin Tendulkar on Thursday said coaches no less than parents. During a book release function, he said, “Coaches, gurus are like our parents, because we end up spending so much time with them, we learn so many things from them.”

The master blaster released a book on child health-care for parents, “Even When There Is A Doctor”, which is written by Dr. Yashwant Amdekar, Dr. Rajesh Chouhan, and Krishnan Sivaramakrishnan. Talking about his coach, Sachin said, “(Achrekar) Sir was strict at times, extremely strict and also caring and loving. Sir did not say well-played to me ever, (but) I knew (when) Sir has taken me to have bhel-puri or paani-puri, Sir is happy, I have done something nice on the field.”

He further added, “I was a naughty child, difficult to manage….I was extremely lucky to have a balanced family, my father who was always extremely calm, who never got angry, agitated, and so did my mother…they gave me freedom, pampered me, but never spoiled me. When the situation demanded to be firm they were firm.”

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While recollecting an instance from childhood which, he said, taught him to use freedom with responsibility, Sachin elaborated, “I must have been 13 or so when I had to go to Indore to attend a national camp for a month and those were the days when mobiles were not available. I was going for a month and my mother was worried, and my father was telling her that he is the sharpest and cleverest among all of us, he knows, he is mature guy, I felt brilliant…with that freedom somewhere (in) my subconscious mind it registered that with freedom comes responsibility and I should not misuse my freedom.”

Tendulkar also credited his wife Anjali for bringing up his children Sara and Arjun. He said, “I wouldn’t want to take any credit, the person behind me (Anjali) — I would like to give her all the credit and more so because we both were doing well in our careers and when you know that you have a promising future and that is when an individual decides to take a back seat (in career).”