Grooming Rohit Sharma – If Sachin is God’s gift to cricket, then Rohit Sharma is M.S. Dhoni’s gift to Indian cricket.
One of the best things that Mahendra Singh Dhoni did to Indian cricket as a captain was grooming Rohit Sharma. The Mumbai lad has been with the Indian team since 2007 but still he had never been a regular member of the team till the start of 2013, when he was surprisingly made to open in the fourth ODI against England at Mohali. After being dropped early, Rohit went on to play an innings of 83. He again opened in the final game but this time could not do anything special.
After the axing of Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir from the ODI squad, Rohit Sharma was selected in the Indian team as an opener with a new partner, Shikhar Dhawan, for the Champions Trophy 2013. The left-right opening pair perfectly emulated Sehwag and Gambhir as both scored plenty of runs in the tournament together. Their opening partnership contributions were crucial for India and at the end, it helped the Men in Blue win the Champions Trophy title.
Rohit Sharma went on to tumble records as an opening batsman in future and now he has
two double centuries to his name. An experiment from the Indian captain gave the team a new opener and the credit fully goes to the skipper for bringing about a change in Rohit Sharma’s batting position.