The ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 is slated to be held in India from October 5 to November 19.
While Virat Kohli took the team to great heights in Test cricket, he failed to clinch an ICC trophy. The same has been the case with current skipper Rohit Sharma, under whom the team lost the T20 World Cup semi-final to England last year and also suffered a crushing 209-run defeat at the hands of Australia in the WTC 2023 final at The Oval.
With less than two months remaining for the ODI World Cup 2023, Rohit on Thursday (August 10) said India are “desperate” to break their ICC trophy drought in the upcoming quadrennial event at home.
The Indian captain also added that the team is armed with “inner “confidence” and “self-belief” to win the title.
“Honestly, I have never won a (50 overs) World Cup, it’s a dream to win a World Cup and to be here fighting for it nothing makes me happier than that,” Rohit told reporters on the sidelines of a La Liga event.
“You don’t get World Cups on a platter, you have to really work hard and that is what we have been doing all these years from 2011 till now we all are fighting for it,” he said.
“Everyone is desperate to go and win, because we know we have a good team. We are all good players, that inner confidence and self-belief is there that they can do it. It’s not happened doesn’t mean that we take it lightly. When we lost the 2022 World Cup, I said we will keep fighting for the next World Cup,” he added.
“The World Test Championship was coming and I said we will keep fighting for it, no matter what. Kabhi na kabhi to milega (we will win it at some point),” he further expressed.
Rohit said while he is the designated leader of the pack, his primary job is to do well as a batter.
“I need to do first as a batter. Captaincy is secondary… my role in the team is more as a batter. Obviously to captain well as well, (but) first of all, I have to score big runs and win games for the team.”
With India sweating over the fitness of their key players like KL Rahul and Shreyas Iyer in the lead-up to the World Cup, Rohit said he is scared of injuries now and also highlighted the importance of resting players.
“Last year also we did the same thing — the T20 World Cup was there, so we didn’t play one-day cricket. Now also we are doing the same, the ODI World Cup is there, so we are not playing T20s,” he said.
“You can’t play everything and be ready for the World Cup. We decided this two years ago. (Ravindra) Jadeja is also not playing T20, you did not ask about him? I understand about the focus (on himself and Virat). But Jadeja is also not playing,” Rohit said in reply to a query about him and Kohli missing India’s recent T20 assignments.
“It is a World Cup year; we want to keep everyone fresh; already we had so many injuries in the team that I am scared of injuries now,” he continued.
The captain revealed that the team management had a discussion with the BCCI regarding the workload management of players.
“We had a discussion with the BCCI also that we need to look after the players well. Whenever we have an opportunity to rest players, we will rest players and rotate them. We don’t want anyone to miss the key events.
“A couple of our key players missed some big events in the last two years and we don’t want that,” he said.
(With PTI Inputs)