Rohit Sharma is a much irreplaceable figure of Indian cricket, his presence almost coaching like himself, such is a rating of his captaincy, which is often par with the successful MS Dhoni’s or any other.
Rohit is just as calm and shrewd and calculating as any general who has to make quick decisions under ambiguous situations. He possesses a few field placements and makes a few changes which denote his substantial – if not comprehensive – knowledge of the game.
Rohit is very good at keeping his head cool even when its pouring in the outside to help the team through these situations. This aspect has been very crucial in the success of Mumbai Indians especially in the tight games.
He is also known to be able to control his wards, instilling confidence into them and reassuring them in the absence of form because of which many youngsters have flourished under his guidance.
And now a video is doing the rounds on the internet in which Indian offie Ravichandran Ashwin explains how the captaincy approaches of MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli and current Indian team captain Rohit Sharma differ.
Speaking to a journalist, Ashwin says, “Rohit has some good traits about his captaincy and I would say about 2-3 things are nice. Talking about how Rohit handles the team, he always keeps the environment of the team light. He makes an effort to keep it light. And he stays very balanced and tactically he is strong. Although both Dhoni and Virat were also tactically good, Rohit manages to utilize tactics much more. In case of any big match or series coming up, Rohit goes for a meeting with the analytics team and the coach, what’s the weakness of a certain batsman, what’s the plan of a certain bowler, things like those, and this is his strength that he is able to do that and still maintain the team atmosphere but at the same time support the players. If a player is chosen in the XI, that player is backed 100%. With those three captains I have spent most of my career with them.”
While speaking about Team India s new head coach Gautam Gambhir, Ashwin acknowledges that I have played one or two series with Gauti bhai. There must have been a series or two where Gauti bhai was there. But both, Gauti bhai as well as Rohit will be very intense with similar attributes. There are similarities between Gauti bhai and Rohit’s approach to leadership but the latter keeps it light while the former is leans on the serious side. There is only a way.
Gauti bhai is a man with hot blood running in his veins, he is ever full of zeal, he is quite enthusiastic with respect to Indian cricket, in the similar way, Rahul Dravid is also. Indian cricket is something that occupies Rahul bhai’s thoughts as it does to Gauti. Indian cricket is also something that Gauti is deeply passionate about. However we tend to think differently about both these players because we see their personalities being different, because its how every individual being is different to the other.”
Rohit has also displayed leadership skills as the captain of the Indian national team, albeit in limited respects and particularly in limited overs cricket. He has captained India to the T20 World Cup last month and several series in the bilateral format and naturally within the team, has been considered to be the leader.
Rohit is not a stereotypical leader and has the ability to switch his leadership style from aggressive to defensive and vice versa as the circumstances dictate and this tends to conveniently place the team in winning situations.
The Mumbai Indians have won the IPL title, which is in itself the most coveted trophy in all Twenty-Twenty, for five times under Rohit’s captaincy (2013, 2015, 2017, 2019 and 2020) making MI one of the most successful teams in the history of the tournament.
