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When I was told that Sachin Tendulkar would be the guest of honour at a breakfast press briefing last week I thought here would be the chance to see the real Sachin.

Everybody thinks he is this lovely, friendly, articulate, genius cricketer and doesn’t have a bad bone in his body, but I was sure there would be another side to him.

And if anything would bring it out it would be facing a room full of journos at 8.30am in the morning to talk about all things cricket.

I turned up at the appointed time to see if Sachin the grouch would be in the same mood as most people are in the mornings and the pr people said that we would be running late.

Typical, I thought. Sachin thinks he doesn’t have to turn up on time and can just swan in when he likes being the big star.

But, wait no, he was there on time, it was the BBC’s Jonathan Agnew who was keeping everyone waiting, until the call came that a touch of man flu had laid him low and he wouldn’t be able to make it.

This will test Sachin, he’s going to have a stand-in interviewer off the cuff and he’s bound to be unimpressed with that.

Adam Mountford, the Test Match Special producer, stepped in manfully and did a bang up job sounding enthusiastic without being to reverential and we were up and running.

Questions were fired in about his early career such as India’s tour to England in 1990 and his first ton - which he admits was something of an embarrassment to him because he modestly didn’t think he could be so bold as to raise his bat as such a youngster.

He was asked about his time at Yorkshire as their first ever overseas player and he had nothing but praise and kind words to say about the county.

Then it got a bit tougher. Why didn’t you keep to your agreement to play for Middlesex in the T20 this summer? Because he wanted to spend more time with his family and he expanded - “I felt that I had been travelling a lot recently and as a father I hadn’t spent enough time with my children. I needed to commit more time and energy to them and that is the only reason I am not playing. I think I made the right decision.’

At that stage I was completely under his spell. This guy has shown nothing but charm and model behaviour since he entered the international arena over 20 years ago and despite being a demi-god to millions he has not changed at all.

He has not been wowed by the bright lights or the money or the fame, he is still just a lovely bloke who is exceptional at what he does.

Sachin was there as part of his sponsorship committment to RBS and he was helping to celebrate 30 years of NatWest involvement in English cricket and you can see why companies want to be associated with him.

On the subject of NatWest’s involvement in cricket - nothing but a thumbs up from this blogger. Their voluntary cricket force project alone with the ECB has been a revelation at local clubs up and down the country - worth an estimate £40 million per year.

It was just a great morning, listening to a player that really doesn’t have a bad bone in him and is still hugely enthusiastic about the game.

Plus there were bagels.

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