 "Rohit Sharma: 'India youngsters responded pretty well, credit for series win goes to entire team'")
India captain Rohit Sharma credited the “entire team” after registering a 4-1 Test series over England following an innings and 64 runs win on Saturday in the Dharamsala match. The highlight of India’s series victory against the Bazball-inspired England has been the way youngsters responded with aplomb after a number of seniors had to miss matches due to various reasons.
Virat Kohli sat out of the entire series to spend time with his family as he welcomed his second child. Mohammed Shami also missed all five matches due to an ankle injury, while KL Rahul have been out since the first game due to right quadriceps injury. Shreyas Iyer was dropped midway due to poor form and even Jasprit Bumrah had to be rested in the fourth Test to manage his workload. But young players, who replaced these stars, including Sarfaraz Khan, Dhruv Jurel and Akash Deep seized whatever opportunity was given to him.
Read: India equal win-loss record in Test matches in massive turnaround
Rohit acknowledged the performance of youngsters in the post-match presentation ceremony.
“When you win a Test like this, everything has to fall in place. At some stage people are gonna and people are gonna come and we know that. These guys are maybe short of experience, they have played a lot of cricket and I can stand here and see that these guys responded pretty well under pressure. The credit goes to the entire team and it was pleasing to see,” he said.
“When you win a series like this, we talk about scoring runs and 100s but it is important to take 20 wickets to win a Test. The way bowlers took responsibility was pleasing to see.”
In the final Test, Kuldeep Yadav put Indian team in the driver’s seat after the first innings with his five-wicket haul as he continues to impress ever since his knee surgery in 2021. Rohit praised the spinner for his efforts and also mentioned his batting which has improved in recent time.
“It was over a period of time that we had a conversation (with Kuldeep), he’s got a lot of potential and when the chips were down in the 1st innings, he bowled really well and after his injury he came back and worked at NCA and he is putting a lot of effort and the most pleasing thing was his batting.”
Impact Shorts
More ShortsRead: Ashwin 'most pleased’ with nine-wicket haul in Dharamsala
With 712 runs at an average for 89 in five Tests, Yashasvi Jaiswal was the leading run-getter in the series and Rohit was impressed with the talent the opener possess.
“He’s (talking about Jaiswal) got a long way to go, amazing to be in this position. When a guy’s got talent like that who can put pressure on the bowlers from the word go, there will be lots of challenges going forward. He is a tough guy and loves the challenges, clearly superb series for him and likes to score big,” the skipper said.
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