Rohit earned the Player-of-the-Series award for his 202 runs in three ODIs against Australia.
Rohit Sharma put on a show with the bat to script India’s nine-wicket victory in the third and final ODI against Australia at the Sydney Cricket Ground on Saturday (October 25).
Chasing 237 to win, India lost skipper Shubman Gill for 24, but Rohit shared an unbeaten 168-run stand with Virat Kohli to take the tourists home with 69 deliveries to spare.
Rohit remained unbeaten on 121 off 125 balls, and eventually earned the Player-of-the-Series award for his 202 runs in three matches.
After the game, Rohit reflected on his match-winning hundred at SCG. “I enjoy playing in Australia in general. Today was the perfect day, again to get a big one and get the team through. We had the opportunity as the bowlers did a fantastic job of restricting them first up with that score. I thought they were a little under par and the credit has to go to the bowlers for the way they bowled," he said in a video released by BCCI.
“Once we started to bat, up front with the two new balls it was a bit challenging as the pitch was slightly misbehaving at the start and we knew once the shine of the ball is off it gets a little easier. So that was the plan, I wanted to bat as deep as possible and see how we can take the game till the end," he added.
The former India captain attributed his success in the series to the quality of preparation he puts himself through during the extended break.
“Sometimes you can think so many things, but it doesn’t come off, but today was the day where I thought okay this is what I have to do and it just perfectly fit into my plan," Rohit stated.
“Obviously, when you play in Australia, you got to plan and play, so all the planning and all the understanding that I had from the previous experience, I used it today," he remarked.
Notably, Rohit Sharma has become one-format player after retiring from T20Is and Tests. The Australia tour marked his return to international cricket for the first time since Champions Trophy 2025 triumph in March.
“Since the time I started playing, I’ve never had four to five months to prepare for a series so I wanted to utilise it, I wanted to do things in my own, on my own terms and that actually worked out pretty well for me in terms of understanding what I need to do for the rest of my career, it was important to utilise that time, and I prepared pretty well at home. The conditions here aren’t ideal and there’s a massive difference between the two countries but I’ve come here so many times so it was just about getting into that rhythm and understanding what I need to do here," Rohit explained.
“I give a lot of credit to how I prepped before coming here giving myself a lot of time in the first place, which was very important because sometimes you need to understand that there’s so much to do in life besides what you do professionally, but I got a lot of time in my hand so I utilised that like I said I could do things on my terms, at my own time, which actually really helped me," he concluded.