Kolkata: Rohit Sharma, the white ball giant of Indian cricket, is excited at the prospect of another T20 World Cup being held in India later this year but does not want to be distracted by that yet.
Lauding the idea of mega events like a World T20 being spaced up, the ‘Hit-man’ said: “It’s nice for the fans also to look forward to something because it’s not every second year you are playing the World Cup, otherwise the charm of the World Cup goes away. The freshness of the World Cup remains and it’s gonna be an exciting World Cup as it is being played in India. We are all looking forward to that but before that, we still have a lot of work to do,” Rohit said at a virtual press conference ahead of five-match T20 series against England which begins on Friday.
All five T20 matches will be held at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, starting on Friday.
The last T20 World Cup was played in 2016 in India and the next showpiece event was scheduled in Australia in 2020, but had to be eventually postponed due to the coronavirus and will now take place in October-November in India.
“Look obviously if you don’t play the World Cup, you definitely miss it. But in between, we played 50-over World Cup in 2019. It’s for ICC to decide there can’t be too much of the World Cup also. So they have spaced it out nicely between 2016 and 2021, there was a 50-over world cup in between.
Asked about his approach for the upcoming T20 series against England, Rohit said his approach would remain the same for the game but added that he would, however, play according to the demands of the situation.
“I have played more than 100 T20Is now. You should know my approach as of now, how I approach the game. I don’t need to talk about the approach. I have done it for many years. But yes the situation changes every now and then and based on the situation, I have to change my game,” said Rohit.
“It is very important for me to understand that situation and play according to whether we bat first or bowl first. Keeping that in mind, I will take my game forward,” he added.
On a different note, Rohit felt he doesn’t see any reason as to why neutral umpires cannot travel for the matches in the post-coronavirus era along with teams for a bilateral series.
Ever since cricket resumed after the coronavirus-induced lockdown, home umpires have been officiating in all international matches. The ICC had brought in some changes for safe resumption of cricket, and one change was to have home umpires for all games in order to reduce travel.
“Yes (on ICC allowing neutral umpire), that can be an option, if players can travel, the umpires can travel as well. I don’t see any reason why umpires cannot travel. You know make them quarantine as well, make their life difficult as well (laughs),” said Rohit.
The opening batsman also praised the quality of umpiring during the recently concluded Test series against England played on challenging wickets. “Having said that the umpiring in this Test series was brilliant. All three or four umpires who were part of the series did a terrific job, wasn’t easy because of the nature of the pitch,” said Rohit.
