Can Rohit Sharma-led Team India break their ICC jinx in WTC final?
Team India head coach Rahul Dravid had stated that the pressure of not winning an ICC trophy for a decade will not play on India’s mind when they take the field in the World Test Championship (WTC) final against Australia.
On the other hand, skipper Rohit Sharma has made it clear that he wants to win as many championships as possible because that is what sportspersons play for.
And so, India will resume their hunt for the elusive ICC crown when they take on the Aussies in the WTC final 2023 at the Kennington Oval in London, starting today.
Team India last won an ICC trophy in 2013 when they lifted the Champions Trophy. MS Dhoni was the captain at that time and Rohit and only just begun opening the innings for India in limited-overs cricket!
“Whether it’s me or someone else, even the guys before, their role was to take Indian cricket forward and win as many games, as many championships as possible. For me also, it will be the same. I want to win games, I want to win championships. That is what you play for," Rohit admitted ahead of the WTC final.
“And yeah, it will be nice to win some titles, win some extraordinary series. But yeah, like having said that, I genuinely feel that we don’t want to put too much pressure on ourselves by overthinking about these kinds of stuff," he added.
Rohit continued:
“As a captain, like I said, every captain wants to win championships, So I’ll be no different. I also want to win championships. And that’s what the sport is all about, winning championships. So for me, it will be nice if I can win one or two championships, as in when I decide to move on from this job.”
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Rohit stated that players are aware of what they have won and what they have lost. He asserted that the team knows what to do, but the important part is to do it well.
In the previous ICC competition, India were hammered by England by 10 wickets in the 2022 T20 World Cup semi-final.
“Last time we played, we did make a few mistakes” - Rohit Sharma on WTC final loss in 2021
India finished on top of the table in the 2019-2021 WTC cycle. However, when it came to the final, they stumbled, going down to New Zealand by eight wickets in Southampton.
Reflecting on the disappointing performance, Rohit admitted:
“Last time we played, we did make a few mistakes, which we have already spoken about in this group. And yeah, we know exactly what went wrong for us in the last championship final. So, hopefully we’ll not repeat those kind of things.
“Look, since the time we’ve come here, the talk has been around how we can play well, what are the things we need to do as a team. A lot of the guys in our squad are quite experienced right now... and they have been in the situation where there was too much pressure and they’ve come out on top.
“It’s just about handling that pressure, thinking about what are the right things to do under pressure at that point in time.”
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Meanwhile, Rohit suffered an injury scare ahead of the WTC final as he was hit on the left thumb during a training session.