Sunil Gavaskar strongly believes Rohit Sharma underperformed as Team India captain; draws comparison with Virat Kohli
Legendary cricketer Sunil Gavaskar is not impressed with Rohit Sharma’s captaincy and expressed his disappointment with him for various reasons. There was a lot of hype about Rohit Sharma when he took over as the captain of Team India given his successful performance with Mumbai Indians in the Indian Premier League (IPL). However, he failed to replicate that for the Men in Blue and has only a few bilateral series wins and a border Gavaskar Trophy.
As he succeeded Virat Kohli as captain in all formats, everyone expected him to lead India to glory in major international tournaments. It has been over 18 months since Rohit’s reign began, and two important events – the T20 World Cup last year and the World Test Championship 2023 – have passed, but India’s wait for silverware has continued for the past 10 years. Notably, India also failed to qualify for the final of Asia Cup 2023 after losing to Pakistan and Sri Lanka in the Super 4.
“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 told The Indian Express.
Gavaskar criticised India’s performance in the WTC final
Another reason Gavaskar was disappointed with Rohit was India’s declining performance in the overseas Tests. Under Kohli and Ravi Shastri, the former head coach, India were in great form in red-ball cricket, especially in the bowling department. However, the former India opener feels that the Indian pacers lack their intent now and highlighted that by discussing their performance in the WTC final against Australia.
“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.
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