19 January 2020- The last time Rohit Sharma scored a century in ODI cricket. 6 November 2018-the last time Rohit Sharma scored a T20I century.
Once known to bludgeon centuries regularly ever since becoming an opener in 2013 – 27 of his 29 ODI hundreds have come as an opener and all 4 of his T20I hundreds – Rohit Sharma hasn’t been able to up his century tally in over two years. In the same period, he’s taken over the India captaincy.
Also, and importantly, it is no coincidence that Sharma’s century drought and the increase in his strike rates in white-ball formats have come in this period. For Sharma, since taking over the captaincy mantle, has made conscious efforts to bat more aggressively than he used to before, in a bid to keep up with the modern, evolving game.
We will talk about the strike rates, but first we must understand that this increase in strike rate has come because Sharma has batted with a higher intent than he’d done in the previous few years. Hence, with an increase in intent and attacking shots percentage, there comes a higher risk of getting out than it does with the conservative methods.
Since his last ODI century, Sharma has played 14 ODIs and has struck at a strike rate of 104 in these games, a much higher strike rate than the 88 until his last ODI ton. He’s even gone past 50 in 4 of these knocks – 4 fifties in 14 knocks which have come with inconsistent frequency in over two years isn’t bad – but failed to convert it into three-figure scores.
Rohit Sharma is taking more risks than before, leading to higher rate of failure than before
That Sharma is the skipper and the established opener gives him the security of his place in the side, and he would want to lead this new brand of cricket from the front. INTENT. Sharma can afford to take risks, and can afford a few series without a century, which is the current case. But not others.
The clear contrast has been the likes of Dhawan and Gill, both of whom have, comparatively to Rohit, batted conservatively in Sharma’s absence (or Gill, now, in Sharma’s presence too with Dhawan pushed outside).
It is a similar case in T20Is as well for Rohit: his strike rate in 2020 and 2021 was 150, only lowering a bit to 134 in 2022, where he played 29 T20Is (the most he has in a single year) and also an entire T20 WC in the difficult batting conditions for openers in Australia.
Indian fans had been asking for the increased intent from their top order. Sharma is exhibit A.
