RAJKOT: Rajat Patidar is taking a long walk back. He had just tried to play Tom Hartley off the backfoot but was caught in an awkward position, with the ball taking a leading edge onto the hands of the short cover fielder. Much like everyone else watching, captain and non-striker Rohit Sharma, too, was bewildered. Everyone, including him, was waiting for the replay to find out if the ball had bounced extra or done a bit too much.
It hadn't. From the replays, it seemed like Patidar was caught in two minds whether or not to play on the front foot and went for a half-hearted cut but stopped midway. It seemed like one of those times when the batter had a brain fade. Except, it came with a cost and disappointment. More so for Rohit than many. He had watched Yashasvi Jaiswal hang his bat outside to nick Mark Wood. Shubman Gill getting found out against the same pacer before the Patidar moment happened. As the Madhya Pradesh batter took the long walk back, the scorecard read 33/3 within the first hour after opting to bat first on a surface that had little to no demons.
Understandably, instead of the two debutants — Sarfaraz Khan and Dhruv Jurel — Ravindra Jadeja, the home lad who has played all his domestic cricket at this venue, walked in at No. 5. Now, at this point, the pressure was on the two most experienced batters in the top seven to do the job. Rohit, in particular, was under the pump because he hadn't crossed the 40-run mark in eight innings. However, he was nowhere near looking settled. In the very next over, Wood, who had been running in with intent, rushing the Indian top-order with his pace and line, delivered a mean bouncer that hit Rohit on the helmet grill. Immediately, the support staff was out there checking in on him. A few balls later, Rohit tried to take on Hartely, but the ball took an outside edge on its way to Joe Root at the slips. As luck would have it, Root dropped him. Then he survived a DRS decision against James Anderson.
That perhaps was the wake-up call Rohit needed. It seemed like an indication of luck going his way and he realised it too. He defended and defended with conviction against Hartley and took on the spinner only when there was a bad delivery. Against Anderson, too, Rohit was happy to get on the front foot and defend, while leaving a few outside the off-stump. That didn't mean he went into a shell. He knew Jadeja was at the other end, who was comfortable at rotating strike, and all he had to do was pick the right balls to play his shots. Like when Anderson pitched one in his zone, Rohit punched him through covers. Against Hartley, a short-pitched delivery was pulled, and the loosener from Joe Root was swept to the ropes.
To put things into context, there was a phase where between overs 24.4 and 30.2, Rohit did not add a run to his name. Jadeja was ticking the scoreboard along with a nudge here and a cut there. Out of nowhere, Rohit would launch Hartley into the sightscreen to the joy of a sizeable crowd watching from the stands of the Niranjan Shah Stadium and then go back to defending on the front foot. He would wait for Anderson to stray on the pads and flick it, and then tonk Root into the stands. Once he went into the 90s, Rohit was happy to defend and nudge until the tea break.
When the moment came, Rehan Ahmed gave room and width, he cut the spinner and trudged for a two, getting to his eleventh Test century and becoming the oldest Indian captain to do so. It was not an inning of dominance as it is often the case with Rohit at home, but the one of commitment and necessity. His modest bat rise celebration summed it up.
What helped Rohit through the day was having someone who felt at home, who was in no hurry, and who knew how to bat on this surface. Jadeja, on the eve of the match, had said that it is a hard pitch and one can expect a lot of runs on the first two days. He knew what was expected of him and did just that. Unless it was a full toss or overpitched or a short delivery there to hit, Jadeja had no intention of taking any undue risk.
He was tested by both Wood and Anderson but survived and kept the scoreboard moving as much as he could. It was the kind of innings that one would just watch him stay put at the crease and before you knew he would have 40 next to his name. Then the fifty came along, after which he opened up a little, and played a few more shots, taking on the bouncers from Wood. Rohit, too, joined in, trying to pull every short ball that came his way. England, understandably, did not mind as they got what they wanted — the wicket of Rohit as the Indian captain pulled one into the hands of midwicket. As Rohit walked back with 131 runs, the scorecard read 237/4.
With Sarfaraz taking to Test cricket like fish to water — he smashed a fifty of just 48 balls — Jadeja had all the time in the world to get his own hundred. It was albeit a little anticlimactic as Sarfaraz got run out in the mix-up (62) when Jadeja was on 99, the senior all-rounder eventually got to his milestone. A hundred that was as important as the one from Rohit. The job is still not over. Jadeja needs to carry on, especially with Sarfaraz back in the pavilion. That said, on a day when the team needed the most, the two senior cricketers — Jadeja and Rohit — stepped up and rescued India from what could have been a disastrous start to the third Test.