Rohit Sharma became the captain of the Indian cricket team in November last year. He took over the leadership from Virat Kohli. Virat had an excellent record as captain, but he could never win an ICC trophy as skipper. The Men in Blue lost to Pakistan in the 2017 Champions Trophy Final, suffered a defeat against New Zealand in ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 semifinals and lost to both teams in the group stage of ICC T20 World Cup 2021.
One common theme noticed in India’s defeats was that the top-order batters failed to score big. Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma were a part of the Top 3 in most of the matches, and they scored heaps of runs for the team before the important matches.
The middle-order of the team tried its best to win it for the nation in 2017 and 2019 but fell short on both occasions. Even in the ICC T20 World Cup 2021, the middle-order could not help the team win the match. So in one of his first interviews after becoming the Indian cricket team captain, Rohit Sharma said:
“We have to prepare when the team is 10 for 3. That’s how I want to move forward and get the message across to the boys that guys who are batting at No. 3, 4, 5, 6, there’s nowhere written that if you are 10 for 2 or 3 [in a T20I], you can’t get 180 or you can’t get 190, or maybe more.”
A Twitter user shared a screenshot of Rohit Sharma’s old interview after the Indian collapse in England
In the 2nd and 3rd ODIs of the ongoing series against the England cricket team, the Indian cricket team lost early wickets on both occasions. The trio of Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan and Virat Kohli failed to make their mark. A Twitter user shared a screenshot of an article from Sharma’s old interview and wrote:
“Going in the right direction for World Cup.”
Going in the right direction for World Cup. pic.twitter.com/Qk7RQnd8cs
— Johns. (@CricCrazyJohns) July 17, 2022
