On 21 August at CEAT Cricket Awards ceremony held in Mumbai, Team India’s Shreyas Iyer captured the admiration of fans with a sweet gesture for his captain Rohit Sharma. The moment Rohit walked in Iyer stood up from a front-row chair and offered it to him.
Nonetheless, in an impressive display of humility, Rohit chose to take a seat behind while Iyer remained seated in front.
The duo had been part of India’s recent ODI sequence in Sli Lanka, where they faced an unbelievable 0-2 loss on the side of the visitors. Despite losing, Rohit was in form with an aggressive stance making him stand out as the single bright spot throughout this bleak series for Indian batters who managed only 52.33 runs against a strike rate of 141.44.
In contrast, Iyer found this series hard to remember as he could only manage a dismal average of 12.66 with a top score of just 23 across three matches played. It is after all such performance that has led to him leading Team D during Duleep Trophy starting from September fifth in two thousand and twenty-three.
“My goal was to change this team without focusing too much on the statistics”- Rohit Sharma
Rohit Sharma, Indian captain, voiced his desire to make the team environment conducive to freely playing, during the CEAT awards ceremony. The 37-year-old has switched to an entirely aggressive batting mode for one-day and T20I formats since last year. He said this after being crowned the Men’s International Player of the Year:
“It was my dream to transform this team and not worry too much about the stats, the results, to make sure that we create that environment where people can go out there and play freely without thinking too much. That is what was required.”
Additionally, he expressed his gratitude to the triple fundamental support that led to India’s recent victory at the T20 World Cup played in West Indies and USA.
“I got a lot of help from my three pillars, who are actually Mr Jay Shah, Mr Rahul Dravid (and the) chairman of selectors Ajit Agarkar. That was very critical for me to do what I did and obviously not to forget the players, who came in at different points in time and helped the team to achieve what we achieved,” Rohit stated.
Rohit will return to play for India when they face Bangladesh in two-match Test series commencing on September 19.
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