After a painful defeat against New Zealand, Indian captain Rohit Sharma shared his thoughts on the team’s performance. The 3-0 whitewash in IND vs NZ series was a hard pill to swallow, and Rohit openly acknowledged the challenges faced by the team throughout the series in the post match presentation.
Rohit began by addressing the difficulty of losing a series, saying, “Yeah, absolutely, you know, losing a series, losing a Test is never easy, it’s something that’s not easily digestible.” He recognised that India did not play their best cricket. “We made a lot of mistakes and we’ll have to accept it.” he added.
Struggles with the batting order
The Indian captain pointed out that a lack of runs in the first innings hurt the team. He mentioned, “We didn’t put enough runs on the board in the 1st innings (in Bengaluru and Pune) and we were behind in the game.” Even when India gained a 30-run lead in the final Test, he felt they needed to do better. Rohit stressed the importance of putting runs on the board and admitted, “You want runs on the board as well, that’s something that was there in my mind. There are certain ideas on my mind when I go to bat, but in this series, it didn’t come off and that’s disappointing for me. ” Unfortunately, his personal batting performance did not meet expectations, leading to disappointment.
Learning from young talent
Rohit Sharma praised Rishabh Pant, Yashasvi Jaiswal, and Shubman Gill. Pat was the ‘lone warrior’ in the foirth innings, playing a 64 run knock, while Gill played a crucial innings of 90 runs. Rohitsaid, “Those guys showed how to bat on these surfaces, , you’ve got to be ahead and be proactive, we are playing on such pitches in the last 3-4 years, we know how to play (and play well). But this series, it didn’t come off and that’s going to hurt.”
Reflecting on his role as captain
Rohit also acknowledged his own performance, stating, “I wasn’t at my best with both bat and as a captain, that’s something that’ll rankle me.” He emphasised that the team’s overall performance was lacking, which ultimately led to their losses. “We didn’t perform well collectively and that’s the reason for these losses.” he concluded.