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Rohit Gurunath Sharma!


A long due ode to en erstwhile enigma of sports, who for the first five years of his career might have given more income to the stand-up comedians and trollers than he did for himself.

As a sports fanatic, I have a hierarchy spread in terms of allegiance I have for Sports personalities & teams.

Top of the list & a thing of beauty that would never return to full-fledged action would be Stefan Edberg. I don't think in my limited view of sports, I have seen a more graceful poetic movement in a sports arena.

Followed by that for a neck to neck tie is the Indian Cricket team and Liverpool football club, who don the Silver medal by the narrowest of margins. Will torment about these two in a later post.

Before I get to the bronze, I would like to make some honorable mentions of Yuvraj Singh, VVS Laxman, Mohd Azharuddin, Rahul Dravid, MS Dhoni and Sachin Tendulkar in that very order, who I really adored to watch during their peak and had an emotional connection.

The bronze, however, should go to the one and only Rohit Gurnath Sharma, the Hit-man. Strangely enough, the nickname he has is a big irony given the grace he gets to batting and the time he has to play his languid and exquisite stroke play.

He is probably the only reason for me to still follow Indian cricket even on non-ICC events and sometimes those meaningless bilateral events which India plays so very frequently these days.

My first tryst with Rohit was when he was a teenager in the T20 world cup where I think he scored a crucial 50 in a must-win encounter against South Africa on his debut and won the MOTM and also scored a crucial 30 in the finals against Pak to propel the score to 154 or thereabout to give his team a fighting chance.

Though people were in awe of Robin Uttapah during those times, Rohit's backlift, his lazy allegiance & I guess subconsciously, his connection to the Telugu/Hyderabad/Vizag roots did have a strong reason for me to follow this guy. Not to mention a calm, unruffled demeanor.
I remember doing a lot of fire fighting for this guy with a lot of friends who felt he is a burden to the team and a talent which was never backed by attitude etc and thanks to the masterstroke of MSD (probably to get one up in his cold war with Viru) Rohit opened the innings in ICC Champions trophy 2013 and he never looked back.

For a country which booed its favorite sons Sachin and Dravid in Mumbai and Bangalore respectively, we cant expect patience with an unproved talent and for this I won't blame the naysayers for the impatience shown, :-)
He may not be as effective as his captain Virat Kohli yet in terms of winning games single-handedly or his mentor MSD to pull a rabbit out of hat from unfavorable situations but he definitely has the wherewithal to perform under pressure.

To know the true worth this guy has, one needs to watch all his 100s he scored against Australia in Australia (Channel 9 commentary being must instead of the nasal Laxman Sivaram Krishnan commentary).

I can't single out one fabulous knock he played from the many but for me, the most hilarious anecdote is his first double hundred in Bangalore when my significant other, took a leave on what was a Friday to watch her favorite Virat Kohli bat and when India was one down & I received a message from her which read "Ben Stokes" Rohit Sharma, I quickly checked cricbuzz to realize that Rohit ran Virat out.

Of course two hours later when I was in Chutneys In-orbit, I enjoyed what would be his first double hundred.
Today is a tip of Iceberg of what Rohit could possibly do and this is precisely what we expected from Sachin Tendulkar when he was at the prime of his prowess. Treat India with the Rabbit out of hat victories when the backs were against the wall. But then expecting that would be like expecting rain from Sun God and hence came the finishers in Yuvraj Virat MSD and to a lesser degree Rohit and Raina.

India never had its Miandad, Inzamamul Haq, Alan Lamb, Neil Fairbrother or even Basit Ali, but thanks to the current generation superstars we have all of them to the power infinity and more.
Rohit Sharma might have had a fabulous world cup but if he would have added another to his tally in the semi-finals or finals in a winning cause for India, he would have been on par with the Kapil Devs, Yuvrajs, MSDs and Virat's in the great Indian folklore of limited over champion match winners!

Just hope he plays long enough to up the proverbial ante and rubs his shoulders alongside the true greats of Whiteball limited over cricketers!!

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