I was never scared of Sachin Tendulkar:Shane Warne

More than 10 years after saying that Sachin Tendulkar gave him nightmares, Australian spin legend Shane Warne now claims that he was never scared of the Indian batting maestro and his 1998 remarks were "no gospel".

Warne was at the receiving end of Tendulkar's batting fury when Australia toured India in early 1998 and the retired Australian had made the widely-reported comments that he saw the Mumbaikar in his nightmares after the beating he got on the field.

In his recently published book 'Shane Warne's Century', Warne had named Tendulkar the number one batsman he has played against ahead of West Indian Brian Lara.

"He never frightened me. I think I might have said 'I'm going to have a few nightmares tonight' once and some journalists took it as gospel, but I was never frightened of anyone. And that's not me being big-headed, I was just confident in my ability.

"Players like (Brian) Lara and Tendulkar were always a challenge, because they were the best in the business and if you want to compete at that level you've got to step up to the mark. Of course some days they're going to smash you out of the park and you congratulate them afterwards, but you're going to get them next time," he told 'Sunday Observer'.

Warne, who was named by Observer Sports Monthly as the Sportsman of 2008 Lifetime Achievement Award, however, suggested that Tendulkar was better than Lara in terms of entertainment value, number of matches he won for his team.

Ask what criteria did he use for including or excluding players in his book, Warne said, "I went on the principle that when I'm watching a sport I want to be entertained. So my number one criteria was entertainment, two was what impact did they have on me as a player, three was the impact they had on the team -- could they win a match off their own bat -- and then there was their skill and their spirit.