Know Your Cricketer – Rohit Sharma; well known as Hitman

 

Rohit Sharma was born on 30th April 1987 in Bansod, Nagpur, Maharashtra. He was raised by his grandparents and his uncle in Borivali due to his father’s low income. His parents Gurunath Sharma & Purnima Sharma were living in Dombivli and his father worked as a caretaker for a transport firm storehouse. Rohit used to visit his parents only during weekends, he has one younger brother, Vishal Sharma.



Rohit Sharma’s early life
Rohit Sharma joined a Cricket Camp in 1999, his uncle managed to get his admission into the camp. Dinesh Lad was his coach there at the camp. His coach suggested him to change his school to Swami Vivekanand International School, where Dinesh himself was the coach and the cricket facilities were better that Rohit’s old school. As his financial condition was not in the shape that he could join the suggested school, his coach managed him the scholarship that for 4 years he had nothing to pay as fee. 
Rohit Sharma started as off-spinner. He was also doing well as a batsman; Dinesh noticed his batting ability and promoted him from number eight to open the innings. 

Domestic Career
In March 2005, Rohit made his debut for West Zone against Central Zone in Deodhar Trophy at Gwalior. In this trophy he was batting at number eight and he scored not out 31 runs, West zone won by 3 wickets with 24 balls remaining. He came into the limelight when he scored 142 runs in 123 balls against North Zone in the same tournament played in Udaipur. He visited Abu Dhabi and Australia with India A squad. Later he made his name in the list of India’s probable 30 members list for the upcoming ICC Champions Trophy tournament, but he did not make it to the final squad.

In July 2006, he made his first-class debut for India A against New Zealand at Darwin where he scored 57 runs as India won by 3 wickets. He made his debut in Ranji Trophy for Mumbai in 2006-07 season and he scored 205 runs in 267 balls in the match played against Gujarat.

In December 2009, Rohit made his highest career score of 309 runs not out in Ranji Trophy against Gujarat. In October 2013, he was appointed as the Captain.



International Career - Test Matches
In November 2013, Rohit made his Test debut against West Indies and scored 177 runs in the match held at Eden Gardens, Kolkata. In the second test match held at Wankhade Stadium, Mumbai, he scored 111 runs not out. Rohit remains out from the Test matches played in 2017-18. Rohit Sharma was recall for the Australia tour in 2018-19, Chief Selector M.S.K Prasad mentioned the reason for his recall that he has the natural game within him that suits to the bouncy pitches of Australia. Rohit played the first Test match in Adelaide where he scored 37 runs. During this match he sustained a minor injury due to which he couldn’t make it for the second Test match held in Perth. He managed to participate in the third Test match held in Melbourne and contribute 63 runs not out which made the Indian Team score to 443/7 and the test match and Series was won by India on the land of Australia. After this match Rohit had to return to India for the birth of his daughter.

Rohit Sharma completed his 2000th run and his first double century in Tests in the third Test match played against South Africa in October 2019. He scored 212 runs in the first innings. In 2020, during one of the tour to Australia, Rohit Sharma was made vice-captain of the Indian Test Team replacing Cheteshwar Pujara.



In 2021, it was a successful home series for him. Sharma finished the series aggregating 345 runs, the most for India, at an average of 58. He went on to score his first overseas Test century on 4th September 2021 with an innings of 127 against England at The Oval, also reaching the milestone of 3,000 runs in Test cricket.

World Cup 2015 & 2019; must known facts
In March 2015, Rohit made his first appearance in the Cricket World Cup. Rohit played 8 matches for India in Australia. India made it to reach semi-final where they were defeated by Australia. Rohit scored 330 runs in the World Cup Tournament with one Century.

On 15th April 2019, Rohit was appointed as the Vice-Captain of Indian Team for the 2019 World Cup in England. First match in world that India played was against South Africa, in which Rohit scored 122 runs. At this point of time Rohit made his 12000th run in International Cricket. In the forthcoming matches played in the World Cup Tournament of 2019, he marked the centuries against Pakistan, New Zealand and Bangladesh. In the match against Sri Lanka, by hitting another century, he became the first batsman to score the 5 centuries in the single World Cup Tournament. Sachin Tendulkar was the one who hit 6 centuries in all the World Cups, the legacy was broke by Rohit in 2019. Rohit made 648 runs in the total in this tournament and won the ICC’s Golden Bat Award. He was the third Indian to achieve this award.



One-Day International Matches
On 23rd June 2007, Rohit made his debut in the international one-day match against Ireland in Belfast. He was at number 7 in the batting order for this match but couldn’t made it to bat as India won the game by 9 wickets.

On 18th November 2007, he scored his maiden ODI half century against Pakistan at Jaipur. With his performance he was selected for the Common Wealth Bank Series 2007-08 in Australia. Rohit scored 235 runs with 2 half centuries in this series including 66 in the first final at Sydney when he was playing in partnership with Sachin Tendulkar for most of India’s successful run chase.



After this his ODI performance had taken a downturn and he lost his middle-order position to Suresh Raina. Later to this, Virat Kohli took his position as the reserved batsman. Later on in December 2009, he performed well in Ranji Trophy and secured 3 centuries, following to this he was recalled to the ODI Team for the tri-nations tournament in Bangladesh, Tendulkar opted to take rest in this series.

On 28th May 2010, he scored ODI century and scored 114 runs against Zimbabwe and on 30th May 2010, he mark another century by scoring 101 runs not out against Sri Lanka. In South Africa he has gone through with the poor performance which results in his out from the 2011 World Cup Tournament, but he was recalled for the limited-overs squad for the tour of the West Indies in June and July 2011.



In 2012, Rohit performance was slow down and he could only score 168 runs in the whole year including one half century. Although Captain M.S. Dhoni was having faith in him and his career was again revived in 2013. In ICC Champions Trophy, 2013, Dhoni took the decision and move Rohit’s batting order to the opener of the innings with Shikhar Dhawan. The pairing was a success and Indian won the tournament by defeating England in the final. On 13th November 2014 playing against Sri Lanka, Rohit broke the world record for the highest score in a one-day international innings with 264 runs.

In 2018, Rohit was appointed as the Captain of Indian Team for the series against Sri Lanka. India won the series 2-1 under his leadership. He also hit his third ODI double-century and scored 208 runs not out. In the same year, India won the 2018 Asia Cup by defeating Bangladesh under his captaincy.



Indian Premier League
Rohit Sharma joined IPL in the year 2008. He was signed by the Deccan Chargers Franchise based in Hyderabad for the sum of USD 750000 per year. In 2011 auction held, Mumbai Indians bought Rohit Sharma for USD 2 million. Under his captaincy, Mumbai won the IPL in 2013, 2015, 2017, 2019 and 2020. Rohit scored his century in IPL by scoring 109 runs not out against Kolkata Knight Riders; this was his only century made in IPL.



National Awards
Rohit Received Arjuna Award in the year 2015 and Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna in 2020.