Former Pakistan cricket team fast bowler Shoaib Akhtar has commented that his former rival from the Indian cricket team Sachin Tendulkar would have scored 1 lakh runs in his career had there been DRS system available before. In case you didn’t know, DRS has been a regular part of the modern era in cricket.
It is Decision Review System which allows the players to challenge the decisions made by the on-field umpires. Whenever a player feels that an umpire has made a wrong decision, he can ask for a review. The third umpire then rechecks the ball and announces the final decision. This system became popular during the 2011 Cricket World Cup.
Nowadays, it is a part of almost every top-tier cricketing competition. However, it did not exist during a majority of the time of Sachin Tendulkar’s career. Many fans would know that Sachin scored thousands of runs during his international career even though there were multiple instances of umpire wrongly ruling him out.
According to former Pakistan cricket team fast bowler Shoaib Akhtar, Sachin would have ended his career with a lakh runs had there been a DRS system during his era.
“Sachin Tendulkar would’ve made 1 Lakh runs in his career had there been 3 DRS during his time,” Akhtar said on his YouTube channel.
Sachin Tendulkar scored 34,357 runs in international cricket
As mentioned ahead, Sachin Tendulkar was quite successful during his international career for the Indian cricket team. The right-handed batter scored 15,921 runs in Test cricket, 18,426 runs in ODI cricket and 10 runs in the only T20I match during his legendary career.
Overall, the tally comes up to 34,357 runs. As per the comment made by Shoaib Akhtar, Tendulkar would have ended up with triple number of runs that he scored if there was DRS option available during his time. This comment clearly highlights the high frequency of wrong decisions by the umpires, that ultimately led to the invention of the DRS system.
Still, Sachin is number one on the list of the batters with the highest number of international runs. It will be interesting to see if any player can break his record.
