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Indian captain Rohit Sharma always looks to protect players from his state team – Mumbai. Like most of the Indian captains from the past, he has strong likes and dislikes. So, Rohit likes Surya Kumar Yadav and protects him all the time. So much so that when he got out to Shaheen Shah Afridi while attempting a six against Pakistan in the T20 World Cup match in New York, Axar Patel walked in to join Rishabh Pant.
Easily, Surya could have walked in to join Pant. At least, former Indian cricket Surinder Khanna, who was watching the game from his mansion in Delhi’s Vasant Vihar, agreed that Surya could have come out rather than Axar. “Surya was the best man to bat with Pant,” Khanna told CricBlogger while adding that left-right combo is the best ammunition to unsettle the opposition.
When Rohit doesn’t like a player like Hardik Pandya, he puts Shivam Dube ahead of the Indian vice-captain. Sunday was no different. Of course, both Surya and Dube are from Mumbai, and they are in the good books of the Indian captain. In other words, Rohit is so fond of Dube that he decided to ignore Rinku Singh to be a part of the 15-member World Cup team.
By the time Hardik came to bat, he ran out of partners. Is this captaincy? Fortunately, the Indian bowlers were spot on, took wickets and defended their low total with some immaculate bowling. It was again Jasprit Bumrah, who came to India’s rescue, along with Hardik.
Rohit’s favorite is also Yashashvi Jaiswal. But Rohit couldn’t put him into the playing XI because of his improved relations with Virat Kohli, who is not supposed to be a great T20 player because of his mediocre strike rate.
Even selecting two similar kinds of spinners, who aren’t wicket-takers – Ravindra Jadeja and Axar Patel at the cost of Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzi Chahal – to boost the batting line-up shows the weak mentality of Rohit, who is defensive in his approach.
Just whacking plenty of sixes won’t make him an ultra-aggressive captain. Or a win over Pakistan, who previously lost to the US, makes him the best captain. Pakistan making a mess of it while chasing a low total doesn’t make Rohit the best captain. If he is that good, he would have been captain of Mumbai Indians even today!
