India captain Rohit Sharma became the maiden Test wicket of Shoaib Bashir, the 20-year-old Somerset off-spinner, in the second Test, which started on Friday in Visakhapatnam.
On a surface that the captains and pitch reporters suggested was much better for batting than the one in the first Test in Hyderabad, Rohit Sharma won the toss and elected to bat first.
Rohit had three centuries in his last four international innings in Visakhapatnam – two in a single Test in 2019 vs South Africa and one in an ODI vs West Indies – hence the fans had been hoping for a big knock from the captain, especially in the absence of KL Rahul, Virat Kohli, and Ravindra Jadeja.
However, Rohit Sharma disappointed once again as he managed only 14 runs after facing 41 balls and got out, caught at leg-slip to a superbly designed and executed plan from England, to debutant off-spinner Shoaib Bashir.
While on one end, young Yashasvi Jaiswal looked comfortable, Rohit didn’t hit a single boundary in his knock and was troubled first by James Anderson and then by the England spinners, before eventually succumbing to Bashir.
A regular off-break from Bashir pitched in just outside off and spun in a little meeting Rohit Sharma in line with the stumps. The right-hander tried to glance it on the leg-side, but inside-edged it straight to Ollie Pope at leg-slip. Bashir roared on the occasion of his maiden Test wicket, and it is the big scalp of the Indian skipper.
Netizens trolled Rohit Sharma brutally for yet another failure:
Rohit Karma. https://t.co/i7030DoDpK
— Isabelle Westbury (@izzywestbury) February 2, 2024
Also Read: IND vs ENG: Fans Unhappy With Rohit Sharma For Omitting Sarfaraz Khan In 2nd Test
Teams:
India (Playing XI): Yashasvi Jaiswal, Rohit Sharma(c), Shubman Gill, Rajat Patidar, Shreyas Iyer, Srikar Bharat(w), Ravichandran Ashwin, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Mukesh Kumar
England (Playing XI): Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Ollie Pope, Joe Root, Jonny Bairstow, Ben Stokes(c), Ben Foakes(w), Rehan Ahmed, Tom Hartley, Shoaib Bashir, James Anderson
