World Cup 2019: Virat Kohli hails Rohit Sharma’s caliber of catapulting good starts

With their win against the Bangla Tigers, India officially qualified for the semi-finals of 2019 World Cup. It is the 6th consecutive occasion for the Men in Blue to have booked their place in the knock-out stages of an ICC event. Even though the team has some batting issues in the middle-order, the top-order has been excellent with their contributions. Especially Rohit Sharma who has raised his game at the right time and skipper Virat Kohli was all praises for him in the post-match presentation.

In 2019 World Cup the Indian team was banking on their top three to score heavily. It started in a predicted manner but an untimely injury to Shikhar Dhawan put the thinktank in a bit of dazed situation. The back-up opener KL Rahul has also repaid some of the faith shown in him as he has scored runs at crucial times. Other batters have also chipped in but it has been Rohit Sharma who has really led the batting unit with his hunger.

Rohit Sharma’s  white-ball reputation

Since the time Rohit has started opening the innings in white-ball cricket, he has completely looked at home. Now he is slowly churning out mindboggling numbers. He has already hit 26 tons in ODI cricket and 4 of them have come in this tournament. In this World Cup, he is the leading run-scorer with 544 runs to his account and that’s why Kohli has repeatedly praised him for his heroics.

After the game against Bangladesh, Rohit bagged his 3rd Man of the Match award of this World Cup and is keen to replicate his valiant efforts in the rest of the series. The No. 1 ODI batsman, Kohli went on to state that the Indian vice-captain is the best batsman in this format. Kohli also added that Rohit is the building block of their batting line-up. His average of 57 in ODIs since opening the innings is the further validation of his skipper’s point.

Virat Kohli’s post-match talk: “I have been watching it for years now, I have been saying it publicly, in my opinion, Rohit is the best one-day player. When he plays, we are heading towards a big score and really happy with the way he’s playing.”

On the other side skipper, Kohli himself might look to convert his starts. With the continued flaws in middle-order, India will again bank on Hitman for the rest of their tourney.