Sachin Tendulkar’s farmer protest tweet triggers “Sorry, Sharapova” posts

PTI, Feb 5, 2021, 3:25 PM IST

Thiruvananthapuram: Upset with Sachin Tendulkar’s tweet on farmers’ protest, scores of Keralites flooded tennis star Maria Sharpova’s social media pages with messages, apologising for trolling her in 2015 after she had in an interview pleaded ignorance about the cricket icon.

While most messages were apologetic of their previous comments critical of the former World No.1 and lashed out at Sachin Tendulkar for his tweet, a few even invited her to come to “God’s Own Country” to enjoy its scenic splendour and attend the iconic Thrissur Pooram once the coronavirus pandemic ended.

“Sharapova, you were right about Sachin, that he is not a person of quality that you should know,” a social media user commented in Malayalam, as was hundreds of other messages in the south Indian language.

The 33-year old multiple grand slam winner on Wednesday posted a tweet, saying “Anyone else got their years confused?” after her twitter and Facebook page got flooded with comments in Malayalam once again like in 2015.

The netizens were upset with Sachin Tendulkar, who along with several Bollywood and other cricket stars rallied around the government in its pushback against support from several global celebrities to the farmers’ agitation against new farm laws.

“India’s sovereignty cannot be compromised. External forces can be spectators but not participants. Indians know India and should decide for India. Let’s remain united as a nation,” Sachin Tendulkar had tweeted.

Known as the “God of Cricket”, the master blaster had posted the message as part of similar tweets on India’s unity posted by celebrities in response to international pop star Rihanna expressing solidarity with the farmers’ agitation.

Though the tweet of Sachin Tendulkar attracted over 2.7 lakh likes, it did not go down well with a large number of people. Scores of Keralites, including his fans, hit out at their ‘God’ and endorsed Maria Sharpova’s earlier remark about him.

The Russian tennis star had faced the ire of Malayalees in 2015 following her comment in an interview that she did not know Sachin Tendulkar.

But many were back on her wall since Wednesday, apologising for their “crude behaviour” six years ago.

Over the thousands of comments in Malayalam, all had a similar pattern of expressing regret to Maria Sharapova.

“I am sorry, Maria, the legend. We knew Sachin as a player. But we didn’t know him as a person. You were right, and sorry for commenting bad on your FB post,” another user said.

One person offered her shawarma and mouth watering Kuzhimanthi (a type of biryani) as part of peace offering and apologised saying, “I am the sorry”, borrowing words from a Malayalam movie.

Another said: “One truck load of apologies, sister. We didn’t have your foresightedness. Time proved that you were right.”

Yet another user, said “we are sorry for cyber bullying”.