Veteran India opener Rohit Sharma etched his name in the history books on Wednesday (October 29) by becoming the oldest cricketer in the world to attain the No. 1 position in ICC Men’s ODI Rankings for batters.
Rohit achieved the feat at the age of 38 years and 182 days, moving up two places to reach the summit for the first time in his career. Rohit replaced India’s captain, Shuman Gill, from the top spot.
Rohit, who had 745 rating points to his credit last week, scored 73 runs from 97 balls in the second ODI against Australia at Adelaide Oval on October 23 and backed it up with 121* from 125 balls in the third match played at SCG on October 25. The two knocks helped him gain 36 rating points.
Sharma is the fifth Indian after Sachin Tendulkar, MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli and Gill to become the No.1 ranked ODI batter in ICC rankings.
Speaking to ICC, former England captain Nasser Hussain expressed his shock that Rohit Sharma reached the pole position so late in his career.
"I can't believe it, to be honest. I heard he [Rohit Sharma] went to number one, and my first question was-when has he been at number one before? And someone said it's the first time. I mean, he's been around forever; he's got three double hundreds in ODI cricket. There must have been some good white-ball players, one-day players in the last 15 years. Fabulous white-ball cricketer, fabulous player, and well done to him. He deserves to be number one in the world," Hussain said.
Even former India wicketkeeper-batter Dinesh Karthik was left baffled as he suggested that Rohit's performance in the 2019 World Cup should have earned him the No. 1 ranking.
Notably, Rohit had finished the 2019 World Cup in England as the leading run-getter, amassing 648 runs from nine matches with five hundreds and one half-century.
"I am surprised that in the 2019 World Cup he wasn't No. 1 somewhere during the tournament. Just the way he batted-it was poetry in motion. It was fascinating to watch how much effort he put in during the lead-up to the series. Prior to this series, over the last three to four years, when the ball was seaming, his only modus operandi was hit out or get out. Here, he actually went back to being a good old-fashioned opener, where he left the ball and played defensively. He almost showed what it takes to do well in such tough conditions as an opener," Karthik said while speaking on Cricbuzz.
"Now, that side of Rohit Sharma we haven't seen because the belligerent side is what we've become so accustomed to. That's an even harder skill, but this is a hard skill in a different way. It takes a lot of mental courage to leave a ball, get no success out of it because it's a dot ball, yet know that if I bat through this and back my technique, I'll get runs."
