You would be forgiven for thinking that captaining Mumbai Indians straightaway in the IPL 2013 was the first captaincy exposure of Rohit Sharma. It wasn’t Mumbai Indians, but it was Adam Gilchrist who first saw the leadership spark in Rohit Sharma when Gilchrist was leading the Deccan Chargers in IPL 2009.
Gilchrist asked the management to name a young Rohit his vice-captain that season, and Deccan went on to win the title, with Rohit making crucial contributions with the bat and ball.
5 IPL titles as the Mumbai Indians captain later, Rohit was appointed as India’s full-time white-ball captain in 2021, and Test skipper in 2022, taking the reins over from Virat Kohli. One of the things fans often said about Rohit’s captaincy is how calm and composed he has remained, likening this trait to the great skipper MS Dhoni.
India head into the World Cup 2023 as strong favorites, having claimed the number 1 ICC ranking in all three formats, becoming only the second men’s team ever to do so.
3 best traits of captain Rohit Sharma:
Gives backing and freedom to talented and potential players
Since he took over the ODI captaincy, Rohit has often been criticized for picking the likes of Ishan Kishan and Suryakumar Yadav in the ODI side based on their T20I and IPL form. However, Sharma had identified these two as crucial batters for India in the ODI side and gave them opportunities.
Kishan cracked a double century – the fastest by an Indian in ODIs – and followed it up with four consecutive half-centuries, including one against Pakistan. Suryakumar took a few games to get his mojo in the ODI format, but is now coming off two consecutive half-centuries – both in winning cause – against Australia.
This backing characteristic of Rohit is straight out of MS Dhoni’s playbook. Rohit would remember how Dhoni saw his talent and potential and backed him for years. And now Rohit backed someone like Suryakumar having seen what he can do. Rohit’s move of backing Suryakumar will further be hailed as a master-stroke if SKY can deliver in the World Cup.
Tactical genius
Rohit is a tactical genius. Remember the 2019 IPL final. It was his decision to tell Malinga to bowl a slower ball yorker to Shardul Thakur. Malinga obliged and Thakur missed the ball, Mumbai won the title.
The wave of change in Mumbai’s fortunes was brought by Rohit in 2013, when he demanded the management to pick two overseas fast bowlers in the XI in Johnson and Malinga. Since then, Mumbai have always had at least two overseas pacers in the XI, on the back of which they won 5 IPL titles.
These are just a few examples of Rohit Sharma’s tactical acumen being shown to the world. Another example is going against the norm of picking the experienced pacer over a youngster, Rohit recently put Siraj as the frontline seamer at the cost of benching Shami. While this moved was criticised and questioned in some quarters, Siraj shut them all with his sensational show in the Asia Cup final.
Rohit Sharma has already captained India to two Asia Cup trophies. Now the fans patiently await the biggest trophy of all. In ODIs, under Rohit’s captaincy, India have 24 ODIs out of the 34 he’s led the side in.
Gels very well with all players
The one of the biggest characteristics of Rohit Sharma which fans regularly bring up is his equation with his teammates. An Indian captain having good camaraderie with his teammates is not common in Indian cricket. Whether it was Ganguly, Dhoni, or Kohli, leaks of the captain having issues with his teammates were frequent. But with Rohit, it’s all about good bonding with each other. There doesn’t seem to be any culture of senior or junior in the team – which can be alluded to from the instances when players talk freely with the captain.
