While I played Ranji Trophy for five years, I used to be asked, 'When are you playing for the nation?' - a question which I didn't have any answer to. I kept playing before I got my first break in 1996; those five years were indeed frustrating.

There are so many fans and so many people who care deeply about this game, and it is because of these fans that we are who we are as cricketers.

The bowlers I respected or feared or rated were not the ones who gave me lip or stared at me or abused me. More the ones who, at any stage of the game, when had they had the ball in hand, they were going to be at me, and they were going to have the skill and the fitness and the ability to be aggressive.

I was in the hockey team in school, played football. One of the challenges for me was to make the team feel better. It helped me evolve, so batting at different positions was never a problem.

You get an image in the first couple of years of your career, and then whether you like it or not, you are stuck with it for the rest of your life.

Reading allows me to recharge my batteries.

I have failed at times, but I have never stopped trying.