India made a poor choice at the toss on Thursday, and captain Rohit Sharma took the entire blame on himself for misreading the Chinnaswamy pitch, where the hosts were folded for just 46 in the opening innings of the first Test match of the series against New Zealand.
In a bizarre move, India opted to bat first and picked three spinners and two fast bowlers in the playing XI despite Day 1 being washed out in Bengaluru, where the pitch remained under the covers for more than 48 hours in the lead-up to the second day of the Test match.
Former India cricketer Sanjay Manjrekar hailed Rohit for his “honesty and big-heartedness” in the press conference and for not pointing fingers are particular players for the collapse. He tweeted: “Love Rohit Sharma’s honesty & big heartedness. Saying he didn’t read the pitch well enough. Not blaming anyone. Top man.”
However, the social media post did not go down well with fans, who asked if he would have said the same had Virat Kohli, back in his captaincy days, done the same.
What did Rohit Sharma say?
Rohit admitted that he was hurting for misjudging the pitch after India were bundled for their lowest-ever score at home and third overall. “You see and you try and make the judgement. Sometimes you make the right call, sometimes you don’t, and I was on the other side of it this time around,” he said. “I’m hurting a little bit because I made that call. But see, for us as a team, I think these are the challenges.”
“So, what if we put ourselves under pressure a little bit? We want to play well. We want to challenge ourselves. This time around, it didn’t come off, the challenges that were thrown at us. We didn’t respond well, and we found ourselves in a situation where we got bowled out for 46 runs. As a captain, it definitely hurts to see that number, but in 365 days you’ll make two or three bad calls. That’s okay.”
