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MELBOURNE: India’s morning-and-a-half at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) on Friday (27 December) felt like an endless drag. Not that we haven’t seen many under Rohit Sharma‘s captaincy already, but this one was a step ahead as the visitors just let the game slip away and had a terrible period with the ball. The tactics were all over the place as Australia’s lower-order was given the license to pile on the runs, and misery, on this hapless looking bunch.
Mohammed Siraj continued with his consistency of being inconsistent, Jasprit Bumrah continued to carry the burden of a billion hopes and Rohit continued to look short on confidence, and ideas.
Scorecard: India vs Australia, 4th Test
From 311/6, the hosts were allowed to finish their innings at 474 and another story of what could have been if… unfolded. The ifs have been aplenty this series and it has only gotten messier since Rohit took over the reins from Bumrah in the pink-ball Test in Adelaide. The chopping and changing have continued and the unsettled feeling in the change room is no secret. Add to that the abrupt retirement announcement of R Ashwin.
Amid all this, the captain’s lack of tactical acumen and terrible run with the bat has made matters worse for the side which enjoyed a lot of success during their last two tours Down Under. In four innings, three in the middle-order and one as an opener, Rohit has scored just 22 runs and not once has he inspired any sort of confidence. The move of returning as an opener for the Boxing Day Test was another blunder as not only did it bring in-form KL Rahul down to No. 3, it got India’s weakest batter on this tour straight in the line of fire against the new ball.
There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that it would not work. And it didn’t. Everyone except Rohit and the team management saw it coming. Something, KL Rahul as an opener, which was working was changed in another desperate attempt to fix something which has been long broken. Since the Bangladesh home series, Rohit has looked a batter woefully out of form and has managed just one fifty-plus score in his last 14 Test innings.
Struggle at home, struggle away. Struggle against the quicks, struggle versus spin. Struggle vs the red ball, struggle against the pink-ball. The struggles have continued and it has been affecting his decision making during crucial junctures of a match too. India have looked very flat in the middle and except some rare highs, mostly provided by Bumrah, the theme has been maintained right from the fixture in Adelaide.
Captaincy can become a lonely road when results aren’t going your way and it gets lonelier when the returns with the bat continue to diminish too. While most captains have maintained that batting and captaincy are two different things but both continue to have a major say on each other and are difficult to deal with in isolation. Rohit finds himself in this precarious position where both aren’t going his way.
It feels a drag when he is leading the troops in the middle and painful when he is dismissed without a substantial contribution. He has been dismissed off some good deliveries in the series but the one which got him at the MCG on the day was nowhere close to that.
The lack of clarity was evident in the shot selection as he attempted to pull one from outside off and ended up playing a nothing shot. He would have been livid with himself after seeing replays on the giant screen while making his way back to the change room but that shot wasn’t the only occasion where he should have been livid with himself.
There is a battle in the head which Rohit needs to fight, and win, before he takes on the different challenges in the middle. If he is unable to win that mental bout, India’s sessions will continue to feel like a drag and Rohit’s laborious walks to the dressing room with not a big score against his name are unlikely to stop.
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