Sachin Tendulkar
On November 15, 1989, a 16-year-old Indian made his Test debut against arch-rivals Pakistan at Karachi. He was marked out for greatness and a nation’s expectations were soon on him, despite his tender age. When he retired from international cricket 24 years later, on November 16, 2013, he had not only fulfilled all these expectations, but had exceeded them in every possible way.
Having started really young, Sachin Tendulkar went on to become one of cricket’s greatest icons. The first of his 51 Test hundreds came while he was still a 17-year-old, a match-saving innings at Old Trafford against England. And even though he hit his first ODI hundred only in his 79th match, he managed 49 hundreds in that format as well.
With over 30,000 international runs and 100 international hundreds, Sachin Tendulkar is arguably one of the best batsmen to have ever played the game. The fact that his playing career spanned over 24 years, greater than the age at which he arrived at the biggest stage, is testament to the skill, ability and longevity of one of the greatest sports persons that India has ever produced.
Pele and Mbappe
Winning the FIFA World Cup is the biggest dream for any footballer. Winning it while still in your teens doesn’t happen to many. And that can be bettered only by scoring in a winning cause in the final of the World Cup, while still being a teenager. Only two teenagers have ever scored in the final of a football World Cup. The first one was Brazilian Pele and the second one was Frenchman Kylian Mbappe. The third in the list of youngest goal scorers in the final of World Cups is over 20 years.
Pele was just 17 years and 249 days old when he scored twice for Brazil in the final against Sweden in 1958, giving them a 5-2 victory. Pele went on to become one of the greatest footballers of all time and remains the only player to have won the World Cup thrice, having achieved the feat in 1962 and 1970 as well.
For 60 years, Pele remained the only teenager to have scored in a World Cup final. He finally got company when Mbappe scored in France’s 4-2 victory over Croatia in the 2018 FIFA World Cup final. Mbappe was 19 years and 207 days old on the day when the final took place.
PV Sindhu
PV Sindhu is just 26 years old at the moment, but she is someone who needs no introduction, especially in India. With a silver medal at the Rio 2016 Olympics and a bronze in Tokyo 2020, Sindhu is only the second individual athlete from India to win multiple Olympic medals and the first Indian woman ever to win two Olympic medals.
Her greatest achievements, however, have come not only in the Olympics, but also in the World Championships. Having broken into the top 20 of the BWF World Rankings as 17-year-old in September 2012, Sindhu shot into prominence with her performance at the 2013 World Championships in Copenhagen.
With impressive victories against players seeded higher than her, Sindhu made it till the semis, before losing to the eventual champion. That, however, was good enough to fetch her a bronze at the event, making her just the second Indian after Prakash Padukone in 1983 to win at the worlds.
Sindhu has had a way with the World Championships since then, following up her bronze in 2013 with another bronze in 2014, silvers in 2017 and 2018, before clinching the coveted gold in 2019. This makes her just the second woman after China’s Zhang Ning to win five or more medals at the World Championships and knowing Sindhu, she would surely be looking to add more to her tally.
LeBron James
LeBron James is now known by his nickname King James and he really does rule the basketball court. The only player to have won the NBA title with three franchises as NBA Finals Most Valuable Player (MVP), James has four NBA championships, four NBA MVP awards, four NBA Finals MVP awards and two Olympics gold medals.
It all started for James as an 18-year-old in 2003. The Cleveland Cavaliers, his hometown team, selected James as the first overall pick of the 2003 NBA draft. He scored 25 points in his first regular season game, a record in the NBA for most points scored by a prep-to-pro player in his debut performance.
That was just a sign of things to come as he moved from strength to strength in his very first season. By the time the season ended, he had per game averages of 20.9 points, 5.5 rebounds and 5.9 assists, becoming just the third player in league history to average over 20 points, 5 rebounds and 5 assists as a rookie. It was no surprise when James was awarded the NBA Rookie of the Year award in 2004, one of many accolades that followed.
Max Verstappen
Max Verstappen, driving now for Red Bull, is fighting with Mercedes’ driver Lewis Hamilton for a shot at the overall championship this year. Having turned 24 on September 30, Verstappen can’t hope to be the youngest F1 world champion as both Sebastian Vettel and Hamilton won their first titles while still aged 23. Winning the title, however, would still be a great success for someone who has already been in the sport for years.
When Verstappen stepped into his Scuderia Toro Roso for the Australian Grand Prix in 2015, he was 17 years and 166 days old. Still not legally old enough to drive a car in his native Netherlands, Verstappen created history by becoming the youngest race driver in Formula 1.
While his first race ended in retirement in the pits, he had something to cheer about in his second race itself as he finished seventh at the Malaysian Grand Prix in 2015. That meant that Verstappen got his first F1 points in just his second race, aged just 17 years and 180 days.
The list of being the youngest wasn’t going to end there. At the 2016 Spanish Grand Prix Verstappen, aged 18 years and 228 days old, became the all-time youngest race winner. Verstappen had shaved off more than two years from the previous youngest race winner, as Vettel was 21 years and 73 days old when he had won the 2008 Italian Grand Prix.
Simone Biles
Simone Biles was six years old when she first tried gymnastics during a day-care field trip. What the instructors saw during that first attempt made them suggest that she continue with it. She did just that, going on to become one of the finest gymnasts ever.
Biles began her elite career at the age of 14, competing at the junior level in 2011 and 2012. She made her senior debut in 2013 and is now among the most decorated gymnasts of all time.
Apart from four golds, one silver and two bronze medals won across the two Olympics she has participated in so far, Biles has also won 19 golds, three silvers and three bronze medals at the World Championships.
At Tokyo 2020, she openly spoke about her difficulties and even partially withdrew from some events. Her stand was praised throughout the world as she brought the focus back on the mental health, safety and preservation of elite athletes. For someone who is just 24, Biles has already had a roller-coaster career, with stellar success and some pitfalls as well.
Viswanathan Anand
With more chess grandmasters than there are squares on a chess board. India is now a powerhouse in chess. And yet, even 35 years ago. India was still waiting for its first grandmaster.
All that changed with Viswanathan Anand, who became India’s first grandmaster in 1988. What’s more, he achieved the feat while still in his teens as he turned the country’s first grandmaster at the age of 18. That was enough to earn him the Padma Shri, India’s fourth-highest civilian award, as an 18-year-old.
As a child, Anand was known for his rapid playing style, earning him the nickname Lightning Kid. While he developed a more rounded game as the years wore by, he remained a great exponent of rapid chess throughout.
In the years that followed, Anand went on to become a five-time world chess champion. He also inspired a generation of Indian youngsters, who took to chess and excelled at it. With many taking to chess from a very young age, India has produced many more grandmasters. A couple of them (Gukesh Dommaraju and Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu), in fact, have achieved it even before entering their teens, achieving the norm as 12-year-olds.
Katie Ledecky
Imagine being at the Olympics as a 15-year-old. Not as a spectator, but as a competitor. The sights and sounds on offer and the overall experience provides for great learning for anyone at that age. If you go on to win a gold medal as well, it is hard to describe the feeling.
American swimmer Katie Ledecky could perhaps get closest to describing how it would feel, for she achieved the feat at London 2012. With a time of 8:23.84, 15-year-old Ledecky qualified for the final of the 800 m freestyle event by placing third overall in the heats. Just getting to the final, however, wasn’t enough for Ledecky.
She blitzed through the course, stunning the entire field, taking gold in a time of 8:14.63, the second fastest time ever then, behind just the world record. She went out hard during the race, establishing almost a body-length lead by the 200 m mark. She kept pushing herself till the end, winning her first international medal in style.
Ledecky has won a total of 7 Olympics golds and 15 World Championship gold medals, the most in history for a female swimmer. And it all started when a 15-year-old dared to dream to be the best in the world in her chosen field.
Neeraj Chopra
Neeraj Chopra is now everywhere. Returning to India as a hero after winning a javelin gold at Tokyo 2020- the first ever gold that India has won in athletics and only the second individual gold medal in Olympic history – Chopra can now be seen in advertisements, reality shows and what not. At just 23, Chopra has probably eamed all the adulation and recognition that he is receiving after achieving at the highest level after years of hard work.
While it is hard to trump an Olympic gold, Chopra had laid a marker of things to come while still in his teens. In 2016, Chopra not only won gold at the IAAF World U20 Championships held in Bydgoszcz, Poland, but also did it in style. With a best throw of 86.48m to snatch gold, Chopra set a world junior record. In the process, he became the first Indian athlete to achieve a world record.
Chopra, however, missed out on qualifying for the 2016 Rio Olympics as this event had taken place just after the cut-off date for qualifications. He didn’t let that deter him and used the five years between Rio and Tokyo to arrive at top shape for the marquee event. Expectations were high on the youngster and he exceeded all of them by winning gold at Tokyo 2020.
Emma Raducanu
The 2021 US Open, the year’s final Grand Slam event, took place late in August and September. While the build-up to the tournament was all about whether Novak Djokovic would complete a calendar Grand Slam by winning the US Open as well, it didn’t happen, as he fell in the final hurdle against Daniil Medvedev.
Even though all the news initially had been on the men’s event, the women’s event threw up a surprise and garnered much attention as the tournament progressed. This was because two teenagers took the women’s event by storm and the final was played between Britain’s 18-year-old Emma Raducanu and Canada’s 19-year-old Leylah Fernandez.
With a 6-4, 6-3 victory in the final, it was the younger of the two teenagers who won the US Open title. In the process, Raducanu became the first qualifier to win a women’s Grand Slam toumament in the Open Era (1968 onwards). As this was only her second major toumament after the 2021 Wimbledon, Raducanu also became the first female in the Open Era to win the second major she had entered.
With almost her entire tennis career in front of her, Raducanu would be looking to make the best of this phenomenal start that she has got. Predicting is never easy, but exciting times are surely ahead.
Picture Credit : Google
