35 ton dulkar

In the Saturday night gloom at the Feroz Shah Kotla, Vaas bowled to Tendulkar, who hit a single. Before another ball could be bowled, the umpires offered the light to the batsmen for the day and off they went. There's more to that ball and that run, however. It brought up the 100 for Sachin Tendulkar, his 35th in Test cricket. And that took him past Sunil Gavaskar's eighteen year-old world record of 34.

Plenty of adulation for Sachin today, of course, and fully deserved. The Indiatimes website has assembled a slideshow of 35 photos, one from each of his Test centuries, beginning with his 119 at Old Trafford as a seventeen year-old in 1990.

The HT.com website (above, right) seemed to have a problem with their news priorities for the day, created by the fact that Miss Iceland is more photogenic than Mister SRT. The Sunday edition of their newspaper (left) had the priorities in order.

Reportage in Sri Lanka seems to be a little more subdued - here's the sole report of the day's play that I can find on today's Sunday Observer.

BBC Online has its own Flash-infested tribute to Tendulkar, but it's probably a little too early for any audio coveage yet.

Looking at the numbers, Tendulkar has, as at stumps on Saturday, 10256 career Test runs. Lying ahead of him are Steve Waugh (10927), Allan Border (11174), and Brian Lara (11204, 11163 without ICC contrivances).

Will Tendulkar catch Lara's run total? Somehow, I don't think he will catch up. Despite being four years younger, his fitness in the long term is more doubtful than Lara's. If the Trinidadian can keep out of trouble with the WICB I think he'll be the first to 12000, Tendulkar might be struggling to even get that far.

He'll prove me wrong now, of course...