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Sydney: “We’re going to have a look at the wicket and finalise it tomorrow.” “As I just said, we’re going to have a look at the wicket and announce playing 11 tomorrow.”
India head coach Gautam Gambhir responded when he was quizzed about the playing XI on eve of the fifth and final Test in Sydney.
It was a typical response but what spiced up proceedings was the fact that he was categorically asked about Rohit Sharma‘s participation at Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG). Not once, but twice.
The response remained the same, even the words to a degree, and certainly raised quite a few eyebrows in the media room. It was Gambhir’s first interaction with the media in Australia as the coach mysteriously stayed away after the pre-departure address back in November.
He was back in the hot seat at a time when a lot of questions were being raised about the environment in the dressing room, knee-jerk reactions while selecting the XI and the defeat in Melbourne which came after a debatable call to bench Shubman Gill.
The No. 3 was benched to accommodate Rohit back at top of the order but it didn’t work out as the Indian captain’s lean patch continued and India were outplayed in the Boxing Day Test.
Gambhir was constantly asked about the transition, discussions with senior players and he maintained that “Indian cricket is in safe hands” while emphasising the importance of “honesty”.
There was a lot of straight talk during the interaction which lasted a little over ten minutes but it was the sequence of events which followed that added to intrigue of India’s last practice session of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
Moments after finishing the presser, Gambhir engaged in a long conversation with Jasprit Bumrah near the change room as the rest of the lot played foot-volley. Once the warm-up was complete, the head coach made his way to the ground and had a chat with Shubman Gill, who was doing fielding drills at that time with coach T Dilip and Washington Sundar. A short chat was followed by a fist pump, pat on the back and soon Bumrah joined and gave Gill a handshake.
The youngster, who was dropped for the Boxing Day Test, continued with more close-in catching drills as the likes of Virat Kohli, Rishabh Pant, KL Rahul, Nitish K Reddy and Yashasvi Jaiswal did some slip-catching. All this while Rohit stood away from the group and didn’t participate in the catching drills, which he was very active in before the Melbourne fixture, and was one of the last players to leave the ground as rest of the batters made their way to the nets.
Kohli, KL Rahul, Yashasvi Jaiswal and Ravindra Jadeja got the session underway and Rohit, still in his training shorts and sweatshirt, had a long chat with Washington Sundar outside the dressing room.
Sundar left and then it was Gill’s turn to speak to the skipper and this time they had Bumrah for company too. When the mini-conference was over, all players were sweating it out but Rohit was nowhere to be seen.
Kohli, Jaiswal, KL, Jadeja and now Gill too were swapping nets as they continued to face the likes of Sundar, Reddy, Prasidh Krishna, Harshit Rana and a lot of side-arm.
The action continued before Rohit finally made an appearance and stood in a corner chatting with throwdown specialist Hari before starting a long, light-hearted chat with Bumrah. The seamer had a ball in his hand and the two cracked plenty of jokes but Rohit didn’t look in the mood to have a hit.
Players started to leave the area and Rohit exited too, adding to the curiosity of the travelling media contingent. He, however, returned in a few minutes with the batting gear on and had a small hit before India wrapped up their final session of the tour.
It wasn’t a usual net session as Rohit remains very chatty in the middle and has never stood in a corner, away from all the action. Thursday, however, was different and felt different. Even as the public announcer practiced the names of skippers of the two teams in the main ground, Rohit gave enough hints that he wasn’t going to be one for the New Year Test. He has been for quite some time now and it wasn’t a surprise that he has been dropped for the final game of the series.
All signs in the nets pointed in only one direction and that was Rohit making way for Gill. The coach maintained that the call will be taken on the morning of the match but Rohit’s last Test in whites has certainly happened at the Melbourne Cricket Ground and like most stalwarts, he signed off without a farewell match.
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