Rohit Sharma’s ODI centuries have nosedived since the 2019 World Cup he has scored just three hundreds in the last four years but the India captain has been a different beast altogether in Tests. Since being promoted as opener in the home series against South Africa, Rohit has dished out some classic tons. Beyond the double centuries, Rohit’s 161 against England on a rank Chennai turner in 2021, 127 versus the same opponent a few months later at the Oval it was his first Test century overseas and the 120 against Australia in Nagpur on another spin-friendly surface is a testament to how far Rohit has come as a Test player.
Rohit Sharma trains in Alur ahead of the Asia Cup. (PTI)
In fact, Rohit is one of the few Indian batters, who has played more quality knocks at home than abroad. Make no mistake. He really had to grind for that century at The Oval but it’s the centuries he has amassed at home that have been the bigger challenge. The conditions weren’t particularly favourable for batting, and recently, the India skipper has displayed the highest level of consistency among the team’s Test batters. As Rohit explained how he had to change his batting approach focussing more on scoring at a quicker strike-rate than going for daddy hundreds, burying the home vs overseas debate, he asserted that some of his best Tests have come playing on Indian pitches.
“Look at my recent Test innings in India. I can tell you that batting in India is much more difficult now than batting overseas, especially in the last 2-3 years. The pitches that we have played on, it is more challenging than overseas. That’s why we haven’t spoken about runs and averages of batting unit. All of us agreed that we want to play on challenging pitches,” Rohit told PTI in an interaction.
“I don’t want to worry about what kind of averages we finish with. That is how I think but different players will have different thought processes, and I don’t want to change that. I am going to play on pitches that suit our bowlers.”
Rohit was handed Team India’s captaincy a lot later than usual. Ideally a captain in India is selected young with years in front of him look at Virat Kohli and MS Dhoni but Rohit was almost 34 when he became Indias all-format captain. It hasn’t even been two years. But having led Mumbai Indians for 11 years, captaincy wasn’t new to Rohit. He even took charge of the Indian team whenever Kohli wasn’t available during his reign and even led India to wins in Nidahas Trophy and the Asia Cup in 2018.
In a sense, Rohit has already stepped away as India’s T20I captain. Post the 2023 World Cup, the duration for which he continues in ODIs will likely lead to an intriguing discussion. At 36, Rohit doesn’t have a long road as captain ahead, but he emphasises that there are greater priorities than the concept of having a captaincy ‘shelf-life’.
“You get a responsibility; you produce a result and more important is if you are happy with the responsibility that you have been entrusted with. This is more important questions than the shelf life,” he added.
“I am a person who goes with the flow. What I feel right now, I would want to do without thinking about what I want to do five or six months later. I like to take things as they come but prepare according to what is in store in the future.”