India head coach Rahul Dravid on Sunday said the team is “very lucky” to have someone like Rohit Sharma taking over the captaincy from a player of Virat Kohli’s calibre.
Rohit took over after Kohli stepped down as India’s Test captain in January 2021 following the series defeat in South Africa.
After this, praise for Rohit’s captaincy… India Retaining the Bodar-Gavaskar trophy with a six-wicket win over Australia in the second Test here on Sunday, Dravid said the Mumbaikars respect the dressing room.
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“He is one of those people who have been there for a long time. The kind of person who doesn’t speak much, but when he does, everyone listens.
He takes great care of the dressing room and the players. We are very fortunate that Rohit has taken over the captaincy from someone like Virat,” Dravid said after the match.
Captain Rohit lauded the spin duo of Ravindra Jadeja and Ravichandran Ashwin for finishing the job for India.
Jadeja returned with a career-best 7/42 and, along with Ravichandran Ashwin (3/59), took all the wickets to bundle out Australia for 113 in their second innings.
“Looking at how things were yesterday, the way we came back and got the job done was fantastic,” Rohit said at the post-match presentation.
“Even though we were just one run behind, I felt we were behind because we had to bat at the end.
He said, ‘The bowlers were brilliant, taking nine wickets this morning is commendable. And then we got the job done with the bat.” Having been 61/1 overnight, Australia were bowled out in the first session of the third day.
“Any game you play in this type of weather, there has to be some moisture in it. I noticed that the first session has a lot to offer, but as it progresses it slows down and doesn’t get enough bytes.
So our focus was to keep it tight in the morning and these guys are masters of bowling in these conditions.
On a pitch like this, people need to do something different. We were ready for him to come and play the shot.
“Our idea was not to panic and just hit the right areas, wait for the mistake to happen and that’s what happened.” Rohit said that the partnership between Jadeja-Virat Kohli and Akshar Patel-Ashwin got them the victory.
“There are a lot of moments in the four innings but I thought the partnership between Jadeja and Virat and then Akshar-Ash was brilliant. It’s a big help because of the balance we’ve created for ourselves.” Dravid said: “We wanted to chase closer to 200-225 and that partnership enabled us to make a comeback, or we were lagging behind.” Dravid further said that his bowlers squandered a lot of runs in the final session of the second day and credited them for coming back in the first session on Sunday.
“A bit down on the evening for giving away too many runs, I think we probably bowled wrong and were all over the place, and they were going hard on us, but we did it right this morning. It was fantastic how the game then Go ahead
Jadeja believes sweep is not a good option on Kotla track
Australia’s ploy to tackle spin with a premeditated sweep shot failed and player of the match Jadeja said it was not a good option on the slow and low pitch at Kolta.
“These wickets suit me as the oddball spins and some stay low. I knew they would play sweep and reverse sweep, so my idea was to keep it simple and straight forward.
“I knew they were looking for runs, so the plan was just to bowl at the stumps. If they make a mistake, I have a chance. I don’t think sweep is a good option against me on this kind of wicket. The defeat dashed Australia’s hopes of breaking a 19-year drought to win a series in India.
After his batsmen were dismissed on a sweep shot, Australian captain Pat Cummins said, ‘Everyone is in control of their game, some balls are just in your name.
But we need a review on shot selection, did we do the right thing? Both games were disappointing, especially this one. We were ahead of the game and that doesn’t happen very often in India. This loss hurts,” he signed off.
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(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed)