ROHIT SHARMA MAKES DREAM DEBUT AS TEST OPENER, HITS TON VS SA
Rohit resurrects start-stop Test career with a fluent hundred in his first outing as opener; India 202/0 on Day One
VISA K HA PAT NAM: Two days ahead of the first Test against South Africa, Rohit Sharma had cut a lonely figure in the dying minutes of India’s practice session. He took a stroll near the square boundary, possibly thinking about how a couple of days earlier he had been dismissed for a duck in the warm-up match, in his first real test at transforming into India’s Test opener.
Yet, when it was show-time— the first morning of the Test series—Sharma was ready for the biggest challenge in the toughest format of the game.
Thirty minutes after Virat Kohli won the toss and chose to bat, Sharma strode out at 9:30 am and faced the new ball with the same panache as he does in the afternoon starts of the shorter formats. By the end of the raincurtailed day, he had resurrected his start-stop Test career with a fluent and unbeaten 115. Not just that—along with Mayank Agarwal (85 not out), the opening pair put together an unbeaten stand of 202 runs, in turn healing the team’s recent troubles in this crucial position.
More than how he middled the ball, it was the way he left them that stood out in Sharma’s first foray as opener. Well aware of Vernon Philander and Kagiso Rabada’s abilities with the new ball, Sharma decided to give the first hour to South Africa’s new ball bowlers, who had in the past dismissed him on three occasions each. “During the first few overs, the ball will do something. I was just focusing on the basics, playing close to the body and leaving the ball,” he said at the presser after play.
Sharma also immediately understood that the Visakhapatnam pitch was bound to get easier as the day progressed. “I know what happens after 7-8 overs once the shine is gone. It does not swing much thereafter. And from there on it is about taking the game forward,” he would later explain. Such insights are expected of an experienced campaigner like Sharma, but its application is not always easy. Had that been the case, he would not have been in this position, re-branding himself as a Test opener in the first place.
So Sharma took his time and showed respect to the opposition until the South African spinners came in. And once that happened, Sharma was all but unstoppable, smacking as many as five sixes in his 183-ball effort, all the big hits coming against the Proteas’ spinners.“Itisaslowandlowpitch.Soit iscrucialforyouthatyoudon’tget stuck at any time,” Sharma said.
Initially, there was that odd ball bowled by Rabada and Philander that made Sharma look uncertain about how he was going to negate the swing. But from South Africa’s point of view, such balls were far and far between. This was Test cricket and Sharma was in no hurry, happy to let the ball go by and in turn let the fast tiring pacers to drain out of energy.
Philander was the first to be taken out of the attack—the humid climate reducing his swing and Sharma further nipping chances of movement by batting out of his crease—and SA captain Faf du Plessis brought on the first of his spinners, Keshav Maharaj. This was the ninth over of the day and the openers were well set.
The off-spinner Dane Piedt made his entry into the game in the 19th over and soon after, so did the left-arm orthodox debutant in Senuran Muthusamy. Now, it
was Sharma’s game. The Proteas spinners tried to lure the Indian openers to play the sweep but apart from the uppish stroke that brought Sharma his fifty, neither of the openers fell for the bait.
With the sun shining bright and the spinners getting little turn, Sharma started dancing down the track and lofting the bowler over the long on and long off fences. At lunch, the South Africans would have hoped for the break in momentum to help them and early in the second session, it very nearly did. Sharma played the wrong line off a Rabada length ball, the ball crashed into his pads and the fielders went up in appeal. But once it was turned down, Sharma must have known it was going to be this day.
“Opening the batting is a different ball game in red ball cricket,” Sharma said later. “You have to challenge yourself mentally to play the new ball and then take the game forward .” He most certainly did and du Plessis helped by removing the close-infielders. The 100-run partnership was brought up int he36t hover, and then Agar waltoog otto his half-century with a glorious six off Maharaj that sailed over extra cover.
At the other end, Sharma had his eyes on a three-figure score. Two consecutive sixes off Piedt took him into the nineties, and a single off Muthusamy took him to his first Test century in two years, but more importantly his first Test hundred in his very first innings as an opener. He would’ve made more hay had there been sunshine, but the rains ensured that the South Africans got much needed respite from India’s openers by tea, with no further play possible thereafter.