Rohit Sharma is facing an acid test as a skipper. After a T20 World Cup campaign that saw India lose in the semi-finals, he has two important ICC events coming up. First, he would aim to help India qualify for the World Test Championship final. Then there is the ODI World Cup at home later this year, where Indian cricket fans would be hoping for the Indian team to finally win the marquee event. In the midst of this, there was speculation on his captaincy future after Hardik Pandya was named the T20I captain for the series against Sri Lanka.
Rohit Sharma missed the series and will be making a comeback as a skipper in the ODI contest against Sri Lanka, starting on Tuesday. On the eve of the first ODI, Rohit was asked who can be the India captaincy prospect in ODIs and Tests after him.
“Abhi toh kehna mushkil hai. Sabka focus abhi ODI World Cup pe hai. (It is difficult to say right now as everyone is focussed on ODI World Cup). And also we have World Test Championship matches coming up. You have to wait and watch,” he replied.
Rohit Sharma added he has no plans to “give up on T20 Internationals” amid strong indications that the transition has already started under Hardik Pandya.
“We have only six T20Is, three are over. So we’ll manage, you know to look after those boys till IPL. Then we’ll see what happens after the IPL. But certainly, I’ve not decided to give up the format,” Rohit said, trying to dispel doubts on whether he will continue playing the shortest format or not.
“At the moment I think it was made clear in the past that it’s a 50-over World Cup year for us. And for some of the guys it’s not possible to play all formats,” Rohit replied to a query from PTI on the eve of the first ODI against Sri Lanka on Tuesday.
Rohit said that a new look team has played the T20Is against Sri Lanka due to workload management of some of the senior players.
“If you look at the schedule, there were back-to-back matches, so we decided on just looking at some players’ workload that we wanted to make sure that they get enough break time and manage them. I definitely fall in that (category) as well,” Rohit said.
With PTI inputs
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