Tendulkar set to become Mumbai's school cricket brand ambassador

Retiring batsman Sachin Tendulkar was on Tuesday approached to become the brand ambassador of Harris and Giles Shield by the organisers of the school-level cricket tournament.

Tendulkar, who has announced his retirement from Test cricket after his landmark 200th and final Test at the Wankhede stadium next month, was involved in a record-breaking 664-run partnership with Vinod Kambli in 1988 in the semi-finals of The Harris Shield Tournament, an inter-school competition.

According to Mumbai School Sports Association president Father Jude Rodrigues, Tendulkar has almost given his nod to the proposal.

"Sachin and Kambli had scored almost 700 runs and broke the Harris and Shield record and that has remained history for us," Rodrigues said.

"The basic discussion was that we have invited him to be the brand ambassador of Harris and Shield and he has almost 99 per cent accepted the invitation.

"He was also enthused that okay, now that I have put down my bat, if something can be done at the grassroot level. We are really grateful to be associated with such a personality," he added.

At the age of 11, Tendulkar had played his first Giles Shield match against Khoja Khan School at Azad Maidan, scoring 24 runs. A year later, he scored a century for his school in the Under-17 Harris Shield.

Tendulkar had a dream run in the Giles Shield, scoring seven centuries, including a double ton, when he was just 13 years old and the landmark partnership with Kambli came in the following year in February, 1988.

In that partnership, Tendulkar had scored 326, while Kambi contributed 349 runs before their coach Ramakant Achrekar forced the pair to declare.

Image: Sachin Tendulkar

Photographs: Ben Radford/Allsport