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Former Indian national cricket team all-rounder Irfan Pathan has opined that India skipper Rohit Sharma would not have been able to find a place in the playing eleven of the Test team if I hadn’t been the captain.
Irfan Pathan’s comments came in the wake of India’s national cricket team’s humiliating defeat under Rohit Sharma at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in the fourth Test of the 2024-25 Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
Read also: Ajit Agarkar straight up told him to back Virat Kohli and drop Rohit Sharma from the Test team
Rohit Sharma is going through a thin patch
Indian captain Rohit Sharma has gone through the worst time of his career, both as a Test skipper and as a batsman. Under him, India faced an embarrassing Test series against the New Zealand national cricket team.
Something was expected to change in the 2024-25 Border-Gavaskar Trophy, but things have taken a turn for the worse. In his absence, India won the Perth Test in dominant fashion, but since his return, the team has struggled and is yet to register a win, losing 2 Tests and managing to draw one Down Under.
Rohit’s personal form is also affecting the team as he has failed to contribute anything. In the Adelaide and Brisbane Tests, he batted in the middle order and failed miserably.
There was a change in the playing eleven combination in the Melbourne Test, and he returned to his usual starting position, pushing the in-form KL Rahul to No. 3. However, this too did not work, and the pattern of India showed a terrible batting performance.
In five innings of the Border-Gavaskar series, Rohit has scored just 31 runs at an average of 6.20.
If he wasn’t the captain, he might not be playing right now: Irfan Pathan
Speaking to Star Sports, former Indian national cricket team player Pathan stated that Team India would have had a seven playing XI in Test cricket if Rohit was not the captain, already which would not have been included alongside it in its current form.
“A player who has scored around 20,000 runs, but as Rohit is struggling now, his form doesn’t seem to support him at all. What is happening now is that he is the captain, so he is playing. If he wasn’t the captain ., it might not be playing right now.
“You would have had a set team. KL Rahul would have been playing up top. Jaiswal would have been there. Shubman Gill would have been there. If we talk about reality, given how he is struggling with the bat, they might not have been a place for him in the playing eleven,” said Irfan Pathan.
Even in India, even before he came here, he was not scoring runs – Irfan Pathan
Irfan Pathan further expressed his disappointment and said that Rohit’s form is extremely poor and he was also not scoring runs in the home series.
“But because he is the captain, and you want to win the next match to tie the series, he stays in the team. But his form is very poor. Even in India, even before coming here, he didn’t score runs and he still hasn’t scored runs.
“This is a very disappointing scene when I see Rohit Sharma batting. Because whenever I see Rohit Sharma batting, I always want to see him bat. Whether it’s Test cricket or one-day cricket, but now, the his form, the way he goes forward, whether it’s his mentality or the coordination with his body, I don’t see it at all,” he added.
