Cricket's greatest ever player, Sir Donald Bradman, was watching a 1996 World Cup match on television when he first saw Sachin Tendulkar bat. The Indian player's technique seemed strangely familiar. Though his stance and his movements were compact and efficient, he hit the ball hard and his shots were ruthlessly effective. The Australian called his wife into the living room of their suburban Adelaide home. "Who does this remind you of?" asked Bradman, then 87. The answer was obvious. "I never saw myself play," Bradman said later. "But I feel that this player is playing much the same [way] I used to play.
Being labeled the next Bradman has never been an easy honor. But perhaps no batsman has worn the tag with so much grace—and so deserved it—as Tendulkar. West Indian captain Brian Lara, the only contemporary of Tendulkar's to consistently threaten his position as the batsman of the age, told the Times of India that the Indian was the greatest he had ever seen. "You know genius when you see it," said Lara. "And let me tell you, Sachin is pure genius."