Indian cricket team captain Rohit Sharma allegedly complained to the Board of Control for Cricket in India about legendary batter and commentator Sunil Gavaskar, CricBlogger reported. It was claimed that Rohit voiced the cricket board concerns that Gavaskar was “too negative” given Rohit’s recent poor form against Australia. He scored a paltry 31 runs in three Test matches against Australia and even took the audacious step of self-dropping for the Sydney Test. In his column for the Sydney Morning Herald, Gavaskar wrote that Rohit would step down from Team India’s captaincy “if he doesn’t score runs in Melbourne and Sydney” without waiting for the selectors to make that call.
The report further added that Rohit has expressed discomfort with the external pressures and performative situations regarding his performances. “Rohit said Gavaskar’s attack was quite unnecessary and that is why he complained to BCCI against Gavaskar,” said a source.
Along with Yashasvi Jaiswal and Shreyas Iyer, Rohit Sharma will miss Mumbai’s must-win clash against Meghalaya in the Ranji Trophy starting Thursday.
Currently placed third in Group A, Ajinkya Rahane-led Mumbai has amassed 22 points from six matches, placing them behind Jammu and Kashmir and Baroda. During Rohit’s return to domestic cricket, they suffered a five-wicket defeat against J&K.
The trio of Rohit, Jaiswal, and Iyer will now set their sights on the upcoming ODI series against England, beginning on February 6 in Nagpur, and they will embark on this four days after the Ranji Trophy final.
Rohit Sharma and Jaiswal opened together in Tests and performed similarly for Mumbai in their last Ranji Trophy encounter. Returning to domestic cricket came after the Indian cricket board passed the directive, which made it mandatory for players to play domestic competition post India losing two consecutive Test series against New Zealand and Australia, which punched a hole in their aspiration of making the third successive World Test Championship final mainly due to the batting unit’s troubles.
Rohit is in terrible form, having managed only 164 runs in 15 Test innings with a 10.93 average this season. At this juncture, the unsettling phase continued for Mumbai as he could score only 3 and 28 against J&K. Jaiswal has just posted scores of 4 and 26, unfortunately for him, but he also has a fairer Test season with a century and two half-centuries in Australia, comprising four fifties at home.
Iyer, on the other hand, has been the most in-form player for Mumbai this Ranji season, scoring 480 runs in 7 innings at an average of 68.57 including two centuries. Besides, he impressed with the bat in white-ball cricket making two unbeaten tons in the Vijay Hazare and 345 runs at a strike rate of 188.52 during Mumbai’s victorious Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy campaign.
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