Indian opener Rohit Sharma while speaking to ANI on Wednesday morning said that he is excited to step onto the field as the vice-captain of India’s limited overs side. Rohit added that he did not even dream about this 10 years ago and was only focused on representing India. “10 yrs ago was only thinking of playing for India. Excited to step onto field as vice captain of team. Looking forward to it,” Sharma who leads Mumbai Indians in the IPL was quoted as saying. The right-hand batsman has a good record in leading his team Mumbai Indians in the IPL. Rohit’s batting performance in the top order has also been consistent for quite some time.
Earlier, former South African veteran player Jonty Rhodes has compared his teammate Jacques Kallis to Rohit. “Rohit looks like a laid-back kind of guy. Remember Jacques Kallis saying how people were critical of his approach and he didn’t look like a guy who was trying. He was a bit like a duck on water; you only see the duck above the water but underneath the feet are paddling to stay in place,” Rhodes was quoted as saying by Sportskeeda. Rhodes is currently the fielding coach of Mumbai Indians.
Rohit has represented India in 21 Tests, 158 ODIs and 62 T20Is. He has scored 5435 runs in the ODIs at an average of 42.46 while in Tests, he has aggregated 1184 runs so far. Currently, Rohit holds a world record for the highest individual score in ODIs. He smashed 264 against Sri Lanka in 2014. Rohit scored a total of 330 runs in the 2015 World Cup which was the second highest in the team after Shikhar Dhawan.
Interestingly, Yuvraj Singh was dropped from the squad announced for the five-match ODI series and the lone Twenty20 against Sri Lanka. The series will begin on August 20 in Dambulla. Among slow bowlers, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal are selected while Mumbai fast bowler Shardul Thakur made a comeback into the squad along with Manish Pandey. Umesh Yadav and Mohammed Shami have been rested.
India – Virat Kohli (captain), Rohit Sharma (vice-captain), Shikhar Dhawan, K.L. Rahul, Manish Pandey, Ajinkya Rahane, Kedar Jadhav, M.S. Dhoni (wicketkeeper), Hardik Pandya, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Jasprit Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Shardul Thakur.
