On the heels of some really great performance from the Indian team on the whole during the tournament, but with the flak directed at its captain Rohit Sharma as the one who has not converted a start into determination. 104 runs came off four innings for Rohit with a strike-rate of 107.21 and since he is aggressive, he often finds himself giving away a wicket.
Coach of the Indian team Gautam Gambhir came out in full support for his captain, stating that the team management wasn’t so concerned about statistics and preferred to assess performance judging a player by his impact. However, the batting icon Sunil Gavaskar begged to differ and said Rohit’s prolonged stay at the crease could actually take his team to score more than 300.
“If he( Rohit Sharma) stays for even 25 overs, India will be close to 180-200. Just think if they have lost only a couple of wickets; what they could do, they could easily go past 350 or more,” said Gavaskar to IBNLive.
“Also, he has to think about it. You can go out and play aggressively, but he has to use a little bit of discretion there and allow himself time to bat 25 to 30 overs. If he does that, he takes the game away from the opposition. That kind of impact is match-winning,” he went on to say.
Rohit’s top score in the competition so far at this level was 41 against Bangladesh in the opener for India at Dubai. For the following three matches, the scores were 20 against Pakistan, 15 versus the Kiwis, and 28 against the Aussies. Gavaskar says Rohit should not be happy with his 25 or 30.
“And I think, as a batter, are you happy with scoring 25-30 runs? You shouldn’t be! So that is what I would say to him: your impact on the team will be even greater if you bat for 25 overs instead of just seven, eight, or nine overs,” Gavaskar said.
