The US president, Donald Trump, gave a special mention to cricket greats Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kohli during a visit to India on Monday – but it was probably the first time he had spoken their names.
In a speech during a rally with the prime minister, Narendra Modi, at the Sardar Patel Stadium in Ahmedabad – the world’s largest cricket stadium – Trump incorrectly pronounced the name of India’s greatest ever player as “Soo-chin Tendul-kerr”.
His unique rendering of the name was noted on social media.
Andy Silke
(@andysilke)Something about Donald Trump’s pronunciation of Sachin Tendulkar tells me he isn’t a huge cricket fan pic.twitter.com/stFhq46MLx
The US president almost scored with Kohli, whose first name came out as “V-rot”, slightly off “V-rut”.
Cricket’s governing body, the International Cricket Council, jokingly asked on its Twitter account whether anyone knew if “Sooch-”, “Sutch-”, or other variations of Tendulkar’s first name were correct.
Trump said the stadium was “where your people cheer on some of the world’s greatest cricket players from Sachin Tendulkar to Virat Kohli,” prompting a smile from Modi and applause from the crowd.
Trump also tripped over other words, including Ahmedabad (“Ahba-bard”) and the word for tea-seller – chaiwalla –, which he pronounced as “cheewalla”, and he himself chuckled at his attempt to pronounce the name of Hindu monk Swami Vivekananda (“Swami Vivekamandan”).