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For some time now, India have covertly flirted with the idea of a white-ball team without Rohit Sharma. And for valid reasons too. A 10-wicket semi-final defeat in the 2022 T20 World Cup was a traumatic reminder that India’s approach—particularly surrounding the top-order batting—needed a desperate shakeup. The 2023 ODI World Cup final defeat only went on to strengthen that belief. But more than anything else, these doubts summed up the insecurity of a team seeking validation, and hence always tentatively looking towards the future while not fully convinced that the older generation is no longer needed.
How about now?
For the record, Sharma the opening batter was never inflexible to India’s needs. India’s quick starts in the ODI World Cup almost always hinged on his aggression till they came unstuck together in the final against Australia despite Sharma playing a handy innings. But the narrative became complicated when Mumbai Indians broke the bank to get Hardik Pandya—India’s T20 captain-in-waiting—and promptly made him captain. This is Mumbai Indians, five-time IPL champions, moving on from the man who won them those five titles.
Probably they had their share of reasons as well. Sharma isn’t getting younger, And captaincy is largely instinctive so maybe there arose a need to embrace a fresh perspective. Because if it was only about his batting, it’s not as if Sharma was a struggling, out-of-sorts opener. The runs weren’t coming in as heavily as he would have wanted, but Sharma’s intent wasn’t lost on anyone. Like in Indore, where instead of choosing to bat himself in a comfort zone, Sharma skipped down the pitch to hack a fast bowler and lost his stumps.
So, when the time came in Bangalore to hit the reset button, Sharma did it the way that suits him best—picking the right balls to get the maximum out of it while preserving the last specialist batting partnership with Rinku Singh.
“Obviously, you had to protect the game a little bit (at 22/4),” said head coach Rahul Dravid at the end of Wednesday’s riveting double Super Over finish against Afghanistan. “You always have the mindset of going out and set the pace of the game, but in games like this, sometimes you have to hold back a little bit. You can’t hold back too much at this ground because you know you need a big score, towards the end, and I thought that level of hitting was incredible.”
More admirable was the way Sharma was able to switch gears so effortlessly in what was only his third T20I in 14 months. This, mind you, after India chose to set a target even though chasing is their stronger suit. But Sharma, clearly, wants to push the team. And probably also proclaim his batting position as a long-term solution and not a short-term relief. The situation also played into his hands. India may have a slew of younger, more dynamic openers in the pool now but once again Sharma displayed—going from 50 off 41 balls to 121 off 69—that no one can turn it on like him.
“The thing with Rohit is the kind of range that he has, it’s hard to bowl at him when he’s set at the back end,” Dravid said. “You can’t bowl short because he’s really good with the pull, (can’t) bowl up and he’s got a great range as well. It’s really good to have him back, just his presence in the dressing room has been very helpful. Both Virat (Kohli) and him add a lot to this group.”
And it’s not as if Sharma is relying only on his conventional range to maintain that edge over bowlers. Sleek shots like the reverse-sweep, something he used quite liberally in Bangalore, add another layer of intrigue to Sharma’s batting.
“We’ve been talking to a lot of our players about opening up square parts of the wicket, looking to use the sweeps and reverse sweeps, and practicing them,” said Dravid. “I have been practising it a lot in the nets,” Sharma said in an interview to JioCinema on Wednesday. “You have to play some shots in order to put the bowlers under pressure. When the ball is spinning and you can’t hit straight, you have to try something new. The ball was spinning and gripping today, so I thought I’d play with the spin rather than step out and hit hard in front of the wicket.”
All this only reiterates the change Sharma is willing to subject himself to in order to stay T20 relevant even though this is the format his game is ideally built for. But that’s just one side of the coin. Retiring himself to let a better runner come at the crease, or tossing the ball to Ravi Bishnoi for the second Super Over are vignettes of Rohit Sharma the captain that may have been taken for granted for too long. So, it was probably necessary to remind everyone why Sharma remains integral to India’s World Cup dream. And it couldn’t have come at a better time.
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