In the final of the World Test Championship, the Indian team had to face defeat by a margin of 209 runs. Team India has lost the final of the World Test Championship for the second time in a row. New Zealand in 2021 and Australia in 2023 have defeated India. Rohit Sharma's poor captaincy contributed a lot to India's defeat against Australia. From starting the preparations for this match, the Indian team failed to fight till the last ball for the win. Because of this, India has to face a big defeat. Here we are telling what mistakes Rohit made in this match.
Lack of preparation
Most of Australia's players rested for almost two months before the final match. After that, everyone started preparing and was fully prepared for this match. Only David Warner and Cameron Green played in IPL. At the same time, all the players except Cheteshwar Pujara of India were busy in IPL. Rohit had said that the players will go to England and prepare as soon as they get time from IPL. Many players did this too, but Rohit Sharma himself joined the team after the IPL was over. Rohit said after the defeat that one has to prepare for such a final. In such a situation, the question arises why he himself did not decide to withdraw from this IPL like Australian captain Pat Cummins.
Elect to bowl first
It is considered better to bat after winning the toss in a Test match. The Indian team was doing this continuously and was also winning the matches. For this reason, India reached the final of the Test Championship for the second time in a row. However, this time India won the toss and decided to bowl. It was from here that the Indian team lagged behind in the match. Australia made a big score in the first innings and did not give India a chance to come back.
Mistake in team selection
In this match, Rohit Sharma did not keep Ravichandran Ashwin in the team and his decision overshadowed the Indian team. Ashwin's record against David Warner and Steve Smith is excellent. Ashwin is also the world's number-one bowler in Test cricket and Australia has five left-handed batsmen in their team. Ashwin's record against left-handed batsmen is even better. Despite this, Rohit did not include Ashwin in the team and the Australian team managed to score 469 runs in the first innings. In this, the left-handed batsmen contributed 259 runs. Steve Smith also scored 121 runs, he is Ashwin's favorite victim. In the second innings too, Alex Carey scored an unbeaten 66 and Mitchell Starc scored 41 runs. Both are left-handed batsmen and Ashwin has a good record against both. Due to the runs of these two, the Australian team was successful in giving a target of more than 400 runs.
Field setting reduction
Indian bowlers had started well in this match. Australia's three wickets had fallen for 76 runs. After this, Steve Smith and Travis Head shared a 285-run partnership to put Australia in a better position. During this, Sourav Ganguly raised questions about Rohit's field setting. He said that Rohit had not set the field. For this reason, Travis Head kept getting runs easily and shared a 285-run partnership with Smith. The situation was similar in the second innings when the Indian bowlers were bowling short balls to Starc and Carey, but there were no fielders on the leg side.
Bowling change
Rohit Sharma made long spells from his bowlers in this match. This tired the bowlers, as all the players were already very tired after playing for two months in the IPL. The effect of this was that the edge was not seen in the Indian bowlers and the Australian players kept playing them easily. If Rohit wanted, he could have bowled with Jadeja in one end and could attack from the other end keeping the fast bowlers fresh, but Rohit did not do so and allowed Australia to score big. At the same time, Australian captain Pat Cummins used his bowlers in short spells. This kept the energy of the Australian bowlers going and they kept taking wickets at regular intervals.
How is Rohit's performance?
Since the year 2018, the Indian team has played 40 matches outside India under the captaincy of Rohit. Which includes ODIs and T20s. India has won 26 out of 40 matches and lost 14. Before this match, Rohit had captained India in Test matches and proved to be successful as well. Under Rohit's leadership, the team has played six Test matches in India, out of which they have won four matches and faced defeat and draw in one match each. At the same time, Team India has faced defeat in the only Test outside India. Rohit Sharma has captained the Indian team in a total of 84 matches so far. Out of these, India has won 62 matches, while 21 have faced defeat. One match ended in a draw.
