Rohit Sharma was appointed India’s all-format captain last year after Virat Kohli relinquished the T20I and Test captaincy and was sacked as ODI skipper.
When Rohit was handed over the job, fans and experts had high hopes from him since he had already led Mumbai Indians (MI) to five IPL titles.
However, Sharma has failed to live up to the expectations so far. Under his captaincy, India lost the T20 World Cup semi-final to England last year while the team suffered a crushing 209-run defeat at the hands of Australia in the WTC final at The Oval last month.
Batting legend Sunil Gavaskar had also expected much from Rohit. No wonder, he has been left disappointed by the outcome.
“I expected more from him (Rohit). In India it is different, but when you do well overseas that is really the test. That is where he has been a little disappointing. Even in the T20 format, with all the experience of the IPL, hundreds of matches as captain, with a mix of best IPL players not being able to get to the finals has been disappointing,” Gavaskar said while speaking at The Indian Express Idea Exchange.
He also wondered whether a proper review of India’s WTC final loss was done by the selectors and BCCI.
“They should be asking questions, ‘Why did you field first?’ Okay, it was explained at the toss that it was overcast and all. The question after that should be, ‘You didn’t know about Travis Head’s weakness against the short ball?’ Why was the bouncer employed only when he had scored 80 runs. You know, the moment Head came in to bat, in the commentary box, we had Ricky Ponting saying, ‘Bounce him, bounce him.’ Everyone knew about it but we didn’t try,” he added.
After the WTC final defeat, Rohit Sharma emphasized on the need for a longer preparation period but Gavaskar did not buy that argument.
“What kind of preparation are we talking about? Now they have gone to the West Indies. You have the example of the World Test Championship before you. Are you playing any matches? So what is this talk about 20-25 days? … When you talk about preparation, be genuine about it. Go 15 days before, play two warm-up matches. The main guys can rest, but the fringe players might be actually challenging those who are not doing well. He does not get an opportunity to show that he is good enough,” he stated
“The truth is the main guys do not want to go early. Because they know that come what may, they will get selected. And when you go early they will talk about the workload. You call yourself the fittest team in the world or fitter than the early generations then how do you break down so soon? How do you have a workload issue when you play a 20-over game?” he further remarked.
Gavaskar also demanded more accountability for the coaching staff of Rahul Dravid, Vikram Rathour and Paras Mhambrey.
“If the batters are making the same mistakes over and over again, you need to ask what has happened with your technique. How have you tried to improve the batter? Have you tried to tell him, maybe take a different guard. Don’t take a leg-stump guard, take a middle and off stump guard.
“I remember once calling Virender Sehwag out of the blue. He had not been scoring too many runs. I told him, ‘Viru, just try the off-stump guard’. So he asked, ‘Why, Sunny bhai?’ So I told him, ‘Look, you aren’t known for great footwork. What is happening is, sometimes when you are getting out, you are reaching out for the delivery and it makes things difficult for you. So, maybe if you take the off-stump guard, you straight away know that the ball is outside the off-stump’. That is where the coach can come in with his inputs.”
(The Indian Express Inputs)
