Former Indian opener Kris Srikkanth believes Rohit Sharma will himself retire from Test cricket if he doesn’t do well in the upcoming matches. Rohit’s performance has come under scrutiny after India was whitewashed by 3-0 for the first time while playing in home conditions.
Rohit scored 91 runs in three Test matches against the Kiwis at an average of 15.17. Furthermore, Rohit could only manage 42 runs in two Test matches against Bangladesh at an average of 10.50. Rohit has managed a solitary fifty in the last 10 innings and his performances haven’t been consistent enough.
After the 3-0 series loss against the Blackcaps, Rohit admitted that he was not up to the mark as a batter as well as a leader.
“You have to start thinking ahead (if India doesn’t do well in Australia). If Rohit Sharma doesn’t do well, I think he himself will retire from Test cricket, for all you know. He will play ODIs only. He has already left T20I cricket. We have to keep in mind that he is also ageing. He is no longer getting younger,” Kris Srikkanth said on his YouTube channel.
“At least, Rohit Sharma had the guts. Hats off to Rohit Sharma for accepting the fact that he played badly throughout the series and captained badly. That’s a great thing. That’s the first move of a player to get back to the rhythm. Accepting your fault is very important. That’s a very important quality of a human being. He accepted it openly and that means he is on the road to recovery, that’s my opinion,” he stated.
On the other hand, Virat Kohli could only score 93 runs in three Test matches against the Kiwis at an average of 15.50. Srikkanth backed India’s number four to return to form on the upcoming Australia tour.
“In my opinion, Virat Kohli will start doing in Australia (comeback). His area is Australia. I think that’s his strength. I think it’s too early to talk like this about Virat Kohli (moving on from him). I won’t accept it. Virat Kohli has got a lot of time. One or two bad years of Test cricket,” Srikkanth said.
Kohli has great numbers against Australia as he has scored 2042 runs in 25 Test matches at an average of 47.48, including eight centuries. Kohli has even better numbers while playing in Australia as he has scored 1352 runs in 13 Test matches at an impressive average of 54.08, including six centuries.
