Rohit Sharma did not beat around the bush and addressed the dismissals of Rishabh Pant as it is, saying the India wicketkeeper needs to ‘figure it out himself’. Pant’s wicket in both innings of the MCG Test – which India lost to Australia by 184 runs – raised eyebrows. In the first inning, Pant played a wild ramp shot that took the outside edge and landed in Nathan Lyon’s hands at third man. With India playing for a draw in the second dig, Pant tried to go after Travis Head after tea and holed out at long-on. The dismissal allowed Australia to break the door down, as, from 121/3, India lost seven wickets for 34 runs to be bowled out for 155 in their chase of 340.
Pant, with over 42 Tests is no more a youngster. In fact, this is his third Test series in Australia, but the 30 he scored today is his highest score of the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy thus far. Of course, the world loves Rishabh Pant the maverick – his audacious and fearless approach while batting is what he’s made his career out of. However, game awareness is an art Pant has yet to master, something which his captain Rohit admitted.
“It’s [Pant’s dismissal] just happened, there hasn’t been any discussion about today. Obviously we’ve lost the game, everybody is disappointed about how things panned out … But again look, Rishabh Pant obviously he needs to understand what is required from himself. More than anyone of us telling him, it’s about him understanding and figuring out what’s the right way to go about it. In the past, he has given us lot of success doing what he does. As a captain, there’s a kind of mixed reaction to that,” Rohit said after the match.
“Sometimes you want to back that thought of him playing the way he plays, sometimes when things don’t look good, it frustrates everyone. That is what it is, that’s the reality. It’s the success and failure – need to be balanced about it. As captain, it’s hard to have conversation when it has given him a lot of success as well. But it’s about him figuring out what is the right way to do things, it’s about situations as well. Certain situations of the game, if there’s a risk percentage, do you want to take that risk? Do you want to let the opposition come back into the game? Those are the things he need to figure out himself.”
Rohit Sharma not entirely against Rishabh Pant curbing natural instincts but…
Pant is the same guy who was responsible for India drawing the Sydney Test and getting his team over the line to conquer the Gabbatoir. But the one batting in Australia in this series appears to be a pale shadow of his former self. What is more ‘frustrating’, as Rohit puts it, is the fact that despite getting starts in five of the seven innings across Perth, Adelaide, Brisbane, and now Melbourne, Pant hasn’t registered a single fifty. It’s not as if Pant and Rohit haven’t discussed this long, lingering issues, but for someone who’s tasted so much success with something he is good at, perhaps toning it down doesn’t come naturally.
“I’ve known Rishabh for a long time, understand his cricket as well … In terms of conversations, no way I can say I’ve not had a chat with him or he doesn’t understand what the term expects. He understands that. But things that he does, gives him results as well, just the fine line between telling him not to do those things or telling him to do those things,” added Rohit.
