Although Rohit Sharma had started his international career in 2007, he was not able to cement his place in the Indian team in any format of the game when this decade began. He was highly inconsistent and was in and out of the side.
Rohit’s fortunes changed when the former Indian captain MS Dhoni decided to put him at the top of the order in the Champions Trophy 2013. Rohit never looked back after that and went on to become one of the most dominant white-ball cricketers in the decade.
Here are 3 reasons why Rohit Sharma owned white-ball cricket in this decade –
#1 Champions Trophy 2013 triumph:
Rohit was not supposed to open the batting in the tournament. He was supposed to bat at no. 4, but since Dinesh Karthik scored a couple of hundreds in the warm-up games, he had to be accommodated somewhere in the middle order.
That’s where MS Dhoni took the most important decision of Rohit’s career. He sent Rohit to open the batting with Shikhar Dhawan and Rohit repaid his captain with a half-century in the very first game against South Africa.
Rohit finished the tournament as the second-highest run-scorer for India with 177 runs in 5 innings with two half-centuries and played a key role in India winning the tournament.
#2 Five Hundreds in ODI World Cup 2019 :
Rohit became the first batsman in the history of the game to reach the three-figure mark 5 times in one edition of the World Cup. He was in sublime form in the World Cup 2019. Hardly anyone could trouble him even in English conditions.
The 32-year old won the Golden bat as well for his tally of 648 runs. He left the Australian opener, David Warner, behind by a whisker as he scored 1 more run than him in the tournament.
#3 Asia Cup 2018 title:
In the absence of Virat Kohli, who was rested for the tournament, Rohit got the opportunity to captain India in the prestigious Asia Cup. India did not go into the tournament as the favorites. It was the Pakistan team which the pundits were backing to win the tournament.
But, Rohit, with his inspiring captaincy, made it a one-sided show for India. Not only he guided India to two thumping wins against the arch-rivals Pakistan, he eventually guided India to the Asia Cup title as well.
Rohit was also one of the best performers for India with the bat, as he scored 317 runs in just 5 games at an average of more than a 100. He scored a fifty and a hundred in the two big games against Pakistan.
Rohit ended the decade as the no. 2 ODI batsman and no. 9 T20I batsmen in the world. He is one of the only two Indian batsmen who are in the top 10 in the ICC rankings in both formats of white-ball cricket at the moment. The other one is the Indian captain Virat Kohli.
