India’s Rohit headache: Is it age or technique? Will there be a revival or terminal decline? | Cricket News

Of late, Rohit Sharma the batsman has had the demeanour of a mumbler in a loud bazaar. Tentative, hesitant, unsure. He seems to be prodding at something, something alive and dangerous that could explode on him. At his best, Rohit the cricketer came across as a guy who took what he was doing really seriously, but never took himself seriously. He had that wonderful nonchalance, yet intensity to set and dictate the tempo for his team.
It can perhaps be seen as an overreach, even a cliche, but there does seem a wariness, if not weariness, in his visage these days. Definitely the former as a batsman, and the latter as a captain on field.
It’s not the leadership but the batting that’s his main worry. In the 2011-12 tour of Australia, a parallel of sorts was seen in Rahul Dravid. He had started well in the first Test, but slowly he kept getting bowled.
There were a few murmurs then from a few experts about how it could be something to do with the back-leg movement but one couldn’t discern anything.
In the matches though Dravid would seem that one instant late in getting to where he wanted to be. The weight transfer just wouldn’t happen as quickly as he might have preferred. The stumps kept clattering, particularly from Ben Hilfenhaus. When he returned from that tour, he had decided it was time to hang his batting gloves. Technical issues could be sorted out, not ageing.
India’s captain Rohit Sharma, center, and his batting partner KL Rahul leaves the field as rain stops play during play on day three of the third cricket test between India and Australia at the Gabba in Brisbane, Australia. (AP)
Rohit is in a vulnerable state now, trying to figure out if the issue is technical or of age. In theory, Australia should be kinder to him then India’s next big tour of England in July, where the moving ball could really test out his footwork.
His game isn’t quite where it was; and hence Adelaide Pink ball was a write-off of sorts. He was never going to get going because there were too many challenges for him to overcome: his slow feet, the moving ball, the toughness in picking it off the hand, the conditions.
He had a good chance in Brisbane on Tuesday to get himself going as a batsman, and resultantly as a captain too. There was no real venom in the pitch, the ball wasn’t jagging around. But he couldn’t. The problem, unlike with Dravid of 2012 vintage, is much clearer.
The strengths in best years as Test opener is now slowly turning against him. He had transformed himself into a classical opener almost with two main traits of compactness and stillness. Minimal but precise movement of feet, and the hands that just move in line.
The jarring-ness of the dant past had vanished. Back then, he would ground his bat, pick it up from a wide position/angle, the front feet would be planted across – and he would get squared-up to balls straightening outside off or potentially in trouble with nip-backers as he would have to quickly retreat that advanced feet and the pads out of the way.
Indian skipper Rohit Sharma. (AP )
He figured out everything on his own. “I had to do it on my own,” he told this newspaper once. Slowly, the individual parts of his batting was tweaked: the bat began to be held in the air, it would come down from a straighter angle, the initial front foot angle was curbed, the hands would ease towards the line, and not betray outside off. He had to change his grip, the way he held his bat. A sense of Jacques Kallis-ish compactness had descended on him.
Now that precise minimal movement now seems to have the opposite effect: that his forward stride isn’t big enough; everything seems either a bit shorter or slower. Is that the age or is that the technique?
At the forefront of the issue is that forward stride which is actually just a short step now. He seemed to have realised that as his main achilles heel. Prior to Adelaide, at nets, he had started to stand outside the crease, with his back leg touching the popping crease line. As if to say ‘if I can’t take a big stride to meet the ball earlier, I shall cut down the dance standing more ahead than usual’. It didn’t work.
There was that dismissal against Cummins there when he lost the off stump. A sort of dismissal that happens more often with Rohit than other batsmen. Tim Southee has done it to him, and a few others. Because his stride isn’t that lengthy enough, and more importantly, the way he moves his hands, the way he plays the initial line of the ball results in deviations taking out of the stump or ramming into the pad. That technique was very valuable for him as a opener in his best years as he would ensure he just pushes inside the line and not edge the away-shaper. It was part of a deliberately cultivated technique. Now, it’s turning against him.
India’s captain Rohit Sharma waits for the presentation ceremony after their loss in the second cricket test match against Australia at the Adelaide Oval in Adelaide, Australia, Sunday, Dec. 8, 2024. (AP Photo/James Els)
When standing outside the crease didn’t work in Adelaide, he hit the nets in Brisbane standing more conventionally – back feet inside. Both at Adelaide and Brisbane, he had a support staff to check now and then where his feet stood and how his hands moved.
It hasn’t worked in the first innings here. The front foot froze after a short step and the hands kept moving ahead, and unsurprisingly the away-shaper took a slice of edge along with it.
Rohit Sharma now has potentially 5 batting innings left on the tour to find out if his batting issues are of technical or of age. What’s the discovery that awaits him at the end: revival or terminal decline?

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