India captain Rohit Sharma on Tuesday crossed the milestone of 10,000 runs in ODI cricket. The 36-year-old achieved the feat during an Asia Cup Super 4 match against Sri Lanka in Colombo. From playing as a middle-order batter in his early days to becoming the fastest opener to reach the landmark of 8,000 ODI runs, Rohit has come a long way since making his debut in 2007. During his initial years with the Indian team, Rohit found it difficult to crack the code, until legendary India captain MS Dhoni converted him to an opener.
Former India batter Gautam Gambhir pointed out the importance of Dhoni in Rohit’s career as he looked back at the important decision the former India skipper made by promoting the Hitman up the order.
“Scoring 10,000 runs was not easy for him. Saw many ups and downs. Having seen that phase, Rohit, as a captain, will back youngsters who go through a difficult period. Rohit Sharma is Rohit Sharma today because of MS Dhoni,” Gambhir said on Star Sports.
Gambhir feels Rohit will have to do a similar job as Dhoni, in terms of how he’ll back the upcoming players, in order to leave behind a strong legacy.
“MS backed him continuously in his initial struggling phase. If he wants to leave a legacy behind, not in terms of runs but as a captain, a lot will depend on how he backs the young players. It will be interesting to see how he grooms the upcoming players,” he added.
Gambhir also recalled his first impression on Rohit, and how confident he was that the star batter would do wonders in the years to come.
“Rohit was playing against my team in a domestic match and my team score was 350 and Rohit came at no.5 and scored 130 runs and made his team win the match from difficult conditions. I asked Wasim Jaffer who is this guy, from that day I knew that this guy is special,” he recalled.
Notably, Rohit is the sixth Indian batter after Sachin Tendulkar, Virat Kohli, Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid, and Dhoni to score 10,000 or more runs in ODI cricket.
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