CHENNAI: It’s only before big days that flaws tend to assume a glaring magnitude. Even as India’s top-order cut through Hong Kong like a hot knife through a brick of butter on Tuesday, the one stutter they suffered set the Twitterati tongues wagging.
“Rameez Raja is a massive fan of Rohit Sharma”. “Rohit says, ‘weak teams ke against score karke kya faayda?’.” (What’s the point of scoring against weak teams?). That, and a truckload of other digs at the stand-in India skipper’s 22-ball 23.
Their ire, albeit exaggerated, did have reason behind it. The Men in Blue’s top-three — basically Shikhar Dhawan, Rohit and Virat Kohli — have notched up 58.31 per cent of the team’s runs over the past two years. The four below them? 31.82 per cent. No Kohli, a misfiring batting lynch-pin who’s also doubling up as the captain, and a crunch Pakistan match just a few hours away; perfect ingredients to set the social-media platform on fire.
“The problem with Rohit is that he tends to slack off in the early part of his innings. That’s been costing him his wicket,” observed former India coach and batsman Anshuman Gaekwad.Not only does that remark encapsulate Rohit’s dismissal against Hong Kong — he tried to biff a good-length off-break from Ehsan Khan from Dubai to Abu Dhabi, only to sky a leading edge to mid-off — they succinctly summarise all his fall-of-wickets in this year.
Including Tuesday, two of Rohit’s 10 ODI innings this year across India’s tours of South Africa and England have culminated in match-winning hundreds, one each in both nations. It’s the other eight, though, that Gaekwad is referring to.
Barring India’s third ODI against South Africa — where indecision to withdraw his bat cost his wicket — all of those other wickets have come courtesy a release shot. With the exception of one, all said strokes stemmed from bottled-up pressure while on strike. For those who need numbers to substantiate that, here’s two: the cumulative average and strike rate for said instances are 13.57 and 68.34.
With Kohli currently not a part of the team, one might be tempted to offer a total rejig as a solution: place Rohit Sharma at No 4 (considering that he began his career as a middle-order batsman) to shield him from his new-ball woes, and use KL Rahul to fill up the resultant opening void.
Gaekwad, though, feels that there’s another combination band-aid that India can make use of against Pakistan, keeping in mind both Rohit’s and India’s middle-order woes.“Rohit would make for a good fit at No 4, but India’s history has always seen batsmen being pushed up the order and then being ejected, but never down. I myself stand as an example. What Rohit needs to do, especially against Pakistan, is to apply himself for those first 40-odd balls. That’s when he’s weak, not later.
“Considering how iffy those slots from No 4 to 6 have been, is perhaps push MS Dhoni to No 4. He himself suggested that last year. He may have lost his ability to accelerate from the first ball, but with the cushion of extra overs, he can still provide a solid foundation during the middle overs. The likes of (Hardik) Pandya and (Kedar) Jadhav can then make use of that. That’ll be a good contingency plan if in case Rohit falls early.”
rahulravi@newindianexpress.com