Jayasuriya recalls batting alongside Tendulkar, calls Mumbai his 'second home'
Left-handed Jayasuriya played for the Mumbai outfit for three seasons from 2008 to 2010 and scored 768 runs from 30 matches, which featured a ton and four half-centuries.
Former Sri Lanka batter Sanath Jayasuriya recalled his Indian Premier League (IPL) spell with five-time winners Mumbai Indians (MI), where he shared the dressing room with many greats including Sachin Tendulkar — a player with whom he formed a lethal duo at the top. Left-handed Jayasuriya played for the Mumbai outfit for three seasons from 2008 to 2010 and scored 768 runs from 30 matches, which featured a ton and four half-centuries.
Jayasuriya, who is regarded as one of the finest opening batters, called Mumbai as his second home The former Sri Lankan opener also opened up about the team environment at the Mumbai-based franchise. In the very first season of his IPL career, he hit a blazing ton against MS Dhoni's Chennai Super Kings (CSK). At 38, he plundered the opposition bowlers and hit eleven sixes and nine boundaries to remain unbeaten on 114. Mumbai won the contest by nine wickets with 37 deliveries to spare.
"Mumbai is my second home. In and out we were there and playing. The team and the team owners were really good and they looked after all the players. It's like a family," Jayasuriya said in an interview with Sportskeeda.
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The former Sri Lanka skipper also reminisced about the time he spent in the middle with Tendulkar. Jayasuriya talked about how much he enjoyed batting with the batting maestro.
"Batting with Sachin [Tendulkar] was quite relaxing as he would always come and say what to do. He always kept talking about ways to execute plans and win matches," mentioned the 53-year-old.
Jayasuriya and Tendulkar have more than 55,000 runs to their name in international cricket and the duo hold various records as well. The Sri Lankan scored 13,430 runs in ODI cricket and 6973 runs in Test cricket. He even played 31 T20Is matches in his career and gathered 629 runs.
Further talking about his MI teammates, the Sri Lankan lavished praise on Harbhajan Singh for keeping the dressing room lively.
"Harbhajan Singh always used to come up with nice humour, making us laugh all the time and he kept the dressing room alive," the Sri Lankan remembered.
