Rohit Sharma’s 92: A World T20 epic that was an ode to street cricket

In his long and glittering career, Rohit has authored several unforgettable hundreds, double hundreds. But the St Lucia knock would have a standalone value, like a limited edition Rolex or Rolls Royce. It was a knock that would have left the audience wondering – Was it just a dream? Madness, magic and method combined to produce a knock of devastating beauty. It was one of the rare T20I innings that would have recall value for a long time.

The reactions he generated from bowlers were not anger or frustration, but one of pure disbelief. Aussie pacer Mitchell Starc’s lips curled in a “wow” when he walked back to pick his cap from the umpire after the most demoralising over of his life. Pat Cummins looked dazed as he seldom would when Rohit smoked him onto the corrugated roof with the ease of plucking a flower from his back garden. Or the marvel in the eyes of Adam Zampa, or the dread in the eyes of Marcus Stoinis, when Rohit rollicked 16 runs off three balls.

Stunning sixes

Two of the sixes were of the most extreme nature. The first when he crouched, opened his stance a bit, and then hit the ball over deep midwicket. The second was a classic. He glazed down the track, stopped and with the most eloquent bat-swing lofted him over extra over. He made the bowlers look skittish too.

He played every stroke you associate with him — the pull, drive, sweep—and more, like the crouched pick-up. How Australia would wish it happened some other day.

The match would weigh heavily in the mind of Australia’s bowlers, like an immovable millstone. Starc is unlikely to forget his second over of the day. It conceded 29 runs – his most-expensive ever. The indomitable left-armer, a feared giant of the game, looked spooked when Rohit flayed his first ball through cover, the second through cover point. Starc staggered to the crease mumbling something and cursing himself, wishing perhaps the captain had not picked him.

The rest of the over he merely ran through the crease, without energy and intensity. A fuller ball into Rohit’s pad was shovelled away over mid-on. The next ball seared into the stands above the deep midwicket fence. Starc took a deep breath, Rohit chuckled. His bat-swing was crisp, intuition precise and shot selection on the penny.

For Rohit, it was one of those days when everything fell into place like a daydream on a hammock beside the turquoise waves of the Jalousie, the most famous beach in St Lucia. For Starc, the scenes were straight from a cold-sweat dripping nightmare. The Australian sighed, a dot ball at last, but then clenched his fists in anger when Rohit top-edged a full-toss for the third six of the over.

The onslaught came soon after Virat Kohli held out to a backpedaling Tim David at mid-on, the momentum of Kohli’s pull impeded by the direction of the wind blowing against the shot. But the storm was about to kick in.

In his next over, which came 45 minutes later, Starc exacted revenge, denying what could have been the most thrilling hundred ever in T20 World Cups. But that would be akin to taking a painkiller after a fractured hand. The pain would torment him.

Rohit raced along—and until he perished it did not register who his partner was, what his own score was, where the fielders were, or what the bowlers did. He stormed to 50 off 19 balls, the next 42 arrived in 22.

There was a bit of a soothsayer in Rohit on Monday. He could read the mind of the bowlers, knew what the next ball would be. It was fun while it lasted; and it would last in the memory of the audience, teammates, and adversaries, longer than the 60 minutes the Rohit Sharma show lasted.