Why no one in Team India wears the No.10 jersey anymore
In the spectrum of Indian cricket, the jersey No.10 holds a more significant position than any other number, as it was once donned by the legendary Sachin Tendulkar. Ever since his retirement, in 2013, the same jersey No. was worn by just one Indian player, before being eventually retired by BCCI.
In his 24-year-long international career, Sachin Tendulkar set up an unmatched legacy that is believed to last forever. Despite the myriad of comparisons across several generations of cricketers, in the hearts of Indian fans and on several record lists, the legendary ‘Master Blaster’ remains untouched. Hence, the jersey the number he wore to his retirement has to be exclusively significant.
However, it wasn’t his first jersey number. When Sachin first donned the coloured jersey, he took to the field with number 99 on the back of his jersey and it was also his jersey number during the 1999 World Cup. Following his dreadful tennis elbow injury, the legendary batsman made a come back wearing a new jersey number – No. 33. However, he soon shifted back to wearing the No.10 on his back and didn’t revert from it throughout the rest of his international career.
Incidentally, the jersey number 10 also has a great significance in the game of football as some of the iconic players of all time have played in #10. Starting from Diego Maradona to Lionel Messi, from Pele to Neymar, the jersey number stands special across sports. In cricket itself, apart from Sachin, players like Pakistan’s Shahid Afridi, Australia’s Darren Lehmann and Peter Siddle, New Zealand’s Craig McMillan, and England’s Geraint Jones have also donned the jersey #10.
However, in Indian cricket, there was only one more cricketer who has worn the same jersey number after Sachin. And that incident didn’t go down well with the loyal Indian fans, who have their hearts tied with the legend, and that led to the Board of Cricket Control in India (BCCI) retiring the #10 jersey in Indian cricket.
It was on August 31 of 2017, when Maharashtra pacer Shardul Thakur made his much-awaited ODI debut for India, in the 4th ODI against Sri Lanka in Colombo. Thakur was seen donning the jersey number 10, which wasn’t seen in the Indian cricket circuit since Tendulkar’s retirement, and the Indian cricket fans took to social media to bash the BCCI's decision to let the Thakur wear it. The social media outrage had led to BCCI treasurer Anirudh Chaudhry writing a mail to the senior members of the board requesting them to retire the jersey #10.
Incidentally, there is no stipulation to retire jerseys in ICC guidelines, unlike in football, so the BCCI had to unofficially retire it in honour of Tendulkar. Meanwhile, Thakur had clarified that the number 10 was the sum total of the digits in his date of birth as he was born on October 16, 1991. However, Shardul then changed his jersey number to 54 and the BCCI retired the jersey number 10 on November 29, 2017.
Apart from Tendulkar, other cricketers who have had their jersey numbers retired by their boards are South Africa’s late Hansie Cronje(#5) and Australia’s late Phil Hughes(#64). While Cricket South Africa didn’t officially announce the retirement of Cronje’s jersey, only one player has worn the same number since the former South Africa captain. Top-order batsman Ashwell Prince had once wore jersey number 5+0 to pay homage and respect to the late Cronje, who passed away in a helicopter crash. Meanwhile, in Hughes' case, it was Cricket Australia who retired the jersey number 64 after the young batsman’s unfortunate death in 2014.
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