Virender Sehwag revealed how Sourav Ganguly told him that if he wanted to play Test cricket for India, he will have to open the innings. (Photo: Reuters)

Virender Sehwag narrated his story of becoming India's opener in Test cricket that saw him achieve unprecedented success. Sehwag revealed how Sourav Ganguly pushed him into opening as "rest is history."

Sehwag, during the launch of Bengali version of Boria Majumdar's book 'Eleven Gods and A Billion Indians' in Kolkata, described the little yet interesting story that made him the opener.

During India's England tour in 2002, Ganguly asked Sehwag to open the innings. Sehwag shared that his first question to Ganguly and coach John Wright was "why me?"

"They said that 'you have batted as an opener in ODIs and you have enough experience there'." So my next question was Tendulkar has opened for a decade and you (Ganguly) started as an opener in 1998. So why can't you guys open and I can bat in the middle order.

"They said if you want to play Test cricket, this is the only place. Don't ask questions, if you want to do it (open) then do it, otherwise sit on the bench," Sehwag revealed what Ganguly told him.

"So then I said, Dada please just promise me if I fail as an opener in 3-4 games, you will give me a game in the middle order and he said 'done'."

"Then I told John Wright to see that he fulfils his promise."

"After that, rest is history. In my first game I scored 84 as an opener at Lord's. Tendulkar, Ganguly and Dravid told me that 'you're the stupidest' and I asked why. They said nobody has scored a hundred in their first game at Lord's and you missed it. I said I at least scored 84 and I was happy with that," Sehwag added.

Sehwag further shared the story of him and Ganguly opening during the Natwest series final.

"I was very confident that if English people can score 325, then we can easily chase that because they are not good in one-day cricket. We played like 30-35 one-day matches in a year, so we are a better side than them. So I told Dada 'don't worry, gore kar sakte hain to hum bhi kar sakte hain. Inhone ne hum pe raj kia hai, ab hamara mauqa hai inpe raj karne ka." (If English can do it, so can we. They have ruled us, now it's our chance to rule them)

At the launch, Sehwag also spoke about Chris Gayle's form in this year's Indian Premier League and how he was not suprised with the way Gayle was going tongs and hammers on the bowlers.

"Isn't it right? I saved the IPL - nobody is bigger than Gayle. I was expecting Gayle to do this," Sehwag said.

Gayle has been in sensational form this season and has slammed 63 and an unbeaten 104 in his two innings for KXIP. Speaking about his knock against Sunrisers Hyderabad on Thursday, Gayle had said that Sehwag had saved IPL 2018 by snapping him up in the auction.

Gayle was let off the roster by Royal Challengers Bangalore earlier this year which came as a big surprise to many. His inconsistency in the last season was to blame for this as he managed just 200 runs in 9 games at an average of 22.22 with one score of fifty-plus.

But, Sehwag and Co. decided to take a punt on the Jamaican by picking him up for his base price late on Day 2 of the auction and it certainly paid off.

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"He was suffering from a bad back and he missed a lot of games. Virat Kohli dropped him because he was not scoring runs and not many people were going to buy him," Sehwag said.

"If I don't play him in the XI, he is a good guy for marketing deals - it's my job," he added.