Yuvraj brought to the fore an 18-year-old anecdote, raised questions on Dravid's captaincy, when Tendulkar was close to a double century

Mumbai: Former India all-rounder Yuvraj Singh feels the innings could have been declared after batting great Sachin Tendulkar scored a double century in the Multan Test against Pakistan. Virender Sehwag became the first Indian to score a triple century in Test cricket on the second day of the Test on 29 March 2004, but the then captain and current head coach of India, Rahul Dravid, scored 675/5 in 161.5 overs. Decided to declare innings.

It is also mentioned in Sachin’s autobiography.
The announcement saw Tendulkar return 194 not out, six runs short of his double century. Tendulkar also wrote about this in his autobiography ‘Playing It My Way’. He said, ‘We got a message in the middle that we have to play fast and we were going to declare. We could have scored six runs in another over and after that we bowled 8-10 overs. I don’t think playing two more overs would have made a difference in a Test match.

Yuvi scored 59 runs in that match
Yuvraj said in the ‘Home of Heroes’ program on Sports18 channel, ‘If it was the third or fourth day, you would have had to put the team first and even when you were on 150, they could have declared, but it would be different. The decision was taken. I think the innings could have been declared after Sachin’s 200. Yuvraj feels that it became difficult to score consistently in a Test team full of veterans as he did not get a definite place in the playing XI.

Yuvi wanted to play 100 Tests
Yuvraj, who retired from international cricket in 2019, felt that he was not destined to play 100 Tests for India. He said, ‘Finally, when I got a chance to play Test cricket after Dada’s (Sourav Ganguly) retirement, I contracted cancer, which was unfortunate for me. I wanted to play 100 Test matches, face those fast bowlers and bat for two days. I gave everything to the Test, but it was not meant to be.