Sachin Tendulkar had plenty of bouts with injuries during his illustrious career with the Indian cricket team. The Little Master, however, continued to find a way and worked with some of the finest professionals in the fitness industry.
From 1999-2004, Tendulkar worked very closely with Andrew Leipus, who served as the head physio back then. In an exclusive conversation with CricketNext, Leipus talks about his time with the team, working with Sachin, the midnight Ferrari drives and a lot more.
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Edited excerpts:
Taking you back to 1999. What was your first impression when you met Sachin Tendulkar?
This is over 20 years ago now so my memory is a little bit sketchy. One of the moments I do remember particularly was when I first met him. Our first match was against New Zealand in Mohali and I met the guys for the first time. Sachin is not the biggest physically but he had this aura about him. When he walks in, he appears bigger than he actually is. That’s one of those first memories like wow! Finally meeting this guy. He is small but there is a certain presence about him. That’s my first ever memory of meeting him.
Being a physio, you had to be around him all the time. How was it like to spend so much time with him. How was your relationship with him?
I was welcomed with open arms into the team. I think they were happy to have a new era of professionalism coming into the environment. So everyone was very receptive and you know what, trust is earned but they kind of trusted me from the start which was fantastic. I was also stepping up from First Class cricket to international cricket, so I was like ‘am I going to be ready for this?’. But they were very embracing of my ideas whether it was injury management, whether it was training, whether it was nutrition.
Sachin was one of those guys who was extremely professional and everything he does, in terms of preparations on and off the field, was a tribute to that. Whether it would be getting his hands taped. Lot of these guys get bruises on their hands so they get it taped. Back in the day, one of the things I remember was that sports medicine consumables were hard to find in India. I decided to bring everything with me. I kept saying to the guys that be careful with this stuff because I don’t have a lot of it. It’s not expensive but I just can’t get it. So Sachin used to keep his tape and stick it on the inside of his coffin and then reuse it. He listened to me and I fully respect that.
What was an ideal Sachin Tendulkar routine both before and after a game?
It gets back to that concept of professionalism. Off the field, if there was anything which needed to be done in the room, if he was carrying a niggle or injury, he would be there seeing me either before or after the game. Even before a Test match, where he didn’t have much time in the morning, he would be there in my room before the game. He wouldn’t wait last minute.
In the gym, he would have some of his own ideas but like I said, he was receptive to add the extra ones as well into the mix. He was the first one in the dressing room in terms of picking his spot. He had his spot in every dressing room. That’s all part of the superstition and preparation.
In terms of injury management, we experienced a lot over the years and ironically, at my last team dinner everyone stood up and said a few things. One of things Sachin said was that ‘Andrew you know my body better than my wife’ (laughs).
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In a recent interview with CricketNext, Sachin spoke at length about his injuries and the back injury in particular. He carried the back issue for a long time. How was it when you were around?
Sachin started his career as a medium-pace bowler. I think his back problem started back then. He didn’t have the physique as a medium pacer. If you look at the typical build of one of these guys. So I am not sure whether it started of that. It was already there when I got there. Back pain is you know… normal people get back pain and then athletes get back pain. So you got to treat him as a human being as well as a cricketer. So that requires balancing out the workloads with the S&C coaches, the rehab.
People were saying his bat is too heavy, there was lot of information. He used to get hammered by people offering their best wishes and bits of advice. We consulted quite a few people around the world. I picked out the best sports physicians to help me, give us some guidance. There wasn’t a lot wrong there so we managed with lot of manual therapy and specific exercises. Cricket is a very repetitive sport so a lot of movement patters are repeated. So we basically built up the tolerance to those loads. Sports people are also regular people, we all get back pain. But he has to go and play with that back pain which makes it challenging.
Off the field, away from cricket, how was Sachin Tendulkar? You did spend a lot of time with him off the field too.
I was very privileged to be part of Indian cricket during that period. It was a fantastic time. We spent a lot of time on the road – 10 months in the year. Whenever I wasn’t on tour, I would be basically resting myself in Mumbai because there wasn’t enough time to go back home before the next tour. So I would hang out in Mumbai and there were times when he came and picked me up once in his Ferrari at about 3 in the morning, went for a drive around Mumbai.
He is also hell of a joker. I remember one day during a Test match I was working on his knee, he had a bit of sore knee, and he just looked at me and smiled and said ‘you know those knees are worth a few million dollars, don’t you’. That just made me realise the reality of what I am dealing with. The context of that knee is massive. So if we don’t get him playing, people don’t come to the ground or if he gets out, they leave. The commercial side of it, the financial side of it. There are implications there. So when he said that little joke that his knees are worth few million dollars, he probably underestimated that to be honest.
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