Rohit Sharma— a great Team India believed he would be, has finally arrived
When the Indian selection committee led by MSK Prasad tried to invest in Rohit Sharma as an opener in the year 2019 in scarcity of tried and tested openers, it was levied that the team management was extending the bridge too far for one batsman at the expense of other promising talents. Moreover, Rohit Sharma’s bleak track record in the longest format did not help stop the narrative. It was never said but was inevitable and known to Sharma himself that BCCI was opening a final chance for him to prove his credentials in Test cricket and unlock all the potentials that have been harped about for years since his emergence on the international stage. The first assignment against South Africa turned out to be a multi-bagger series for the right-hander as he managed Proteas pacers efficiently and plundered their spinners to a double-century and a century in the three-match long series. The first test was passed with flying colours but as has been the case for every Indian batsman, the path of greatness goes through the tough pitches and batting conditions in SENA (South Africa, England, New Zealand and Australia) countries. As soon as his successful stint against the Proteas got over at home, sceptics started talking about his technique and patience outside India. An immediate test of all those metrics was delayed as he injured himself in the white-ball series against New Zealand that preceded the two-match long Test series. His injury brought back Prithvi Shaw in the reckoning at the top of the order in New Zealand where India were handed a harsh reality check of their deficiencies as none of the decorated batsmen could stand in conditions that were suitable for swing and seam bowling. India did not play another Test match from March 2020 to December. However, Sharma, the prolific right-hander was once again on the verge of getting ruled out of another overseas Test series before the BCCI stepped in and he opted tough and mentally gruelling quarantine period to play the last two Tests against Australia. The stakes were higher as Virat Kohli had returned home before Rohit joined the team and the men in blue needed senior batsmen to stand up in the face of the Australian pace trio of Josh Hazlewood, Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc, who folded them for meagre 36 in the first Test. Those last two Tests of the series against Australia was Rohit’s moment of reckoning and a string of failures there could have been a career-defining moment, but in the wrong sense for him. He walked into the side without any match practice and replaced Mayank Agarwal, who was India’s first-choice opener going into the series but was finding it tough against Australian pacers. Once again, his return was not welcomed by all but it was accepted as a fact that it was bound to happen due to his experience and class and more so due to the absence of Kohli. To his credit, he did not look at sea against Australian pacers and played new ball with precise defence and calculated attack. He has never been troubled by pace and bounce and once he could see off the new Kookaburra ball, there was a big score in the offering for him. However, the eternal criticism of him “throwing his wicket away” in a frustrating manner after “looking good” kept on reappearing on the tour. However, instead of getting bogged down by it, Sharma took it as a challenge and instead of correcting those mistakes that were moments of frustration for fans and critics, he doubled down on it. After two relatively successful Tests against Australia where he could establish some reputations of being a “good enough” opener to play new ball in overseas Tests, he ruled the show in the home series against England, but not before facing the ire of fans after India lost the first Test in Chennai by a huge margin. The pressure was on and Rohit responded in a grand manner in the second Test with a match-winning ton on a rank turner in Chennai. But wait, his prowess with the bat was never in question on home pitches. He had already established that as a fact after a stellar run at the top against the Proteas and had fantastic numbers to boast of. That he has got more time to play a ball than an average batsman is the oldest cliche attached to his carer but ironically most of his failures at the top in overseas cricket were a function of him not giving time to his batting at the crease. Once he was out hooking Cummins, at another instance, he was out to Nathan Lyon while trying to “manoeuvre” the field. Rohit needed to realise that the time people say he has while attempting to play a delivery, must be utilised in a grand manner and then it has to be replicated in numbers on the field. He had missed the Tests in New Zealand and pace and bounce in Australia were never his uncomfortable zones. Then, there were only two testing moments that remained for him—England and New Zealand. Rohit, with all the shots he has, could well have opted to play an aggressive brand of cricket so that others who graft runs would have had their life easy in English conditions that can present you with unplayable deliveries every now and then. He would have been forgiven for adopting that approach but it would have yielded failures. In the end, runs matter more than how they come in the eyes of fans and the scoreboards. But, Rohit made a choice, choice of taking time and defeating his opponent in the game of patience and perseverance. There were enough signs in the World Test Championship final against New Zealand where he had shown remarkable patience against the quartet of Tim Southee, Trent Boult, Neil Wagner and Kyle Jamieson. However, he did not have runs to show for his choice of batting patiently. The first Test against England at Trent Bridge was the first of the many challenges he had to encounter on the tour of the UK where either he would have gone from a frustrating good-looking batsman to the path of greatness or there would have been another endless streak of obituaries of his career. After Indian bowlers bundled England out on the first day, Rohit was in the middle with the bat on the first day of the series and the tone had to be set then and there for him to lead the Indian batting lineup. He was so disciplined outside off stump and played with such level of control that a bowling lineup comprising of James Anderson, Stuart Broad and Ollie Robinson, who are considered masters of extracting false shots out of batsmen had to go to plan A, B, and C to finally have him dismissed on a bouncer that is one of the suckers for the right-hander. Playing more than 100 balls and scoring approximately three runs per over while not giving an easy catch to slips or wicketkeeper was a significantly improved performance from an Indian opener in England after harrowing performances in the series of 2011, 14 and 18. However, the runs were not there to be proud of. The second Test at Lord’s was similar but then he had a lot tougher ask—batting against Anderson and Robinson on a pitch that the home team believed will suit their pacers. He played with almost zero flair in the first half an hour and as soon as the bowlers got desperate to get him playing, he stroked his way through immaculate precision. He came close to hitting his first overseas century in the format and to bring that up while batting at the top of the order in England, which has been a graveyard for openers in the recent past would have been such an accomplishment. However, it wasn’t to be as Anderson produced a jaffa to breach his defence and that he did not drive the ball to edge to slip was once again a win. India surged to a triumphant win over the hosts in the Lord’s Test and Rohit’s 83 along with KL Rahul’s hundred in the first innings had laid the foundation for it. Then, India hit a bump in Leeds when England pacers ran riot and dismissed them for 83. Even in that sinking ship, Rohit was the only batsman who had sailed through for more than 100 balls albeit getting dismissed in another “frustrating” manner. Until the first innings at Headingley, he was out hooking a ball on two occasions and the dismissal in the third Test was a clear case of him getting caught in two minds of whether to go for another big shot or to leave it. He was out in a disappointing manner, but the people who believed in him and wanted him to succeed would have seen that as a result of a work in progress. After a string of three Test matches where he looked at his best as an opener in the longest format in a country that has been the most challenging territory for Indian batsmen in the past, his time finally came in the fourth Test at the Oval. India were down and out in the first two sessions only and although first Shardul Thakur with the bat and then bowlers limited England’s lead under 100 runs, India were chasing the game on the third day. Once again, he and KL Rahul batted with supreme discipline and carried the equilibrium to the fourth day. Rohit was on song from the word go on the fourth day that eventually turned out to be the penultimate day of the series. He forced Anderson, Robinson and Chris Waokes to come closer to him and once they did, he hit them down the ground with the flair that matches Sachin Tendulkar and through cover-point with immaculateness that would make Rahul Dravid proud. He was presented with tough circumstances throughout the series as India were batting towards the fag end of the day on more than one occasion, but Rohit was not in a hurry. The cliche of him having a lot of time in the crease was eventually working for him in a bigger context and meaning in the series. It was surreal to see Rohit bat with so much awareness of his stump and leaving Anderson who is a master of flummoxing batsmen with his outswingers and inswingers with ridiculous ease. He emerged as the best Indian batsman from the group that had the likes of Virat Kohli, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane—batsmen with far more proven credentials in the longest format and it was all down to his choice of spending time at the crease. "Most pleasing thing was that I was able to play 250 balls. If you look at all the Test matches I have nearly played 100 balls in every innings. That to me was a goal,” Rohit asserted after hitting his first overseas ton at the Oval. As Jim Collins says in his bestseller Good to Great, “Greatness is not a function of circumstances. Greatness, as it turns out, is largely a matter of conscious choice." Rohit Sharma has paved the way for his greatness with choices of putting discipline over flair, substance over aggression and patience over waiting for an unplayable delivery.
