Rohit Sharma – Started his T20 journey as a champion, and leaves as one

Rohit Sharma announced his retirement from T20Is after lifting the T20 World Cup 2024 for India.

Three different images that tell a great story. In the first, Rohit Sharma is lying face down on the Kensington Oval turf, punching the ground moments after India have sealed a nerve-shredding 7-run win over South Africa in the T20 World Cup final. In the second frame, perhaps a quarter of an hour later, he’s flat on his back, staring at the sky. You can see the beard flecked with grey and the exhaustion on his face. Then, an hour later, behind the microphone at the press conference, he can’t stop grinning, even as he announces that he has played his last T20 match for India.

Indian cricket-watchers with streaks of white in the hair will remember a fourth picture. It’s the inaugural T20 World Cup in 2007, and India must beat South Africa, the hosts, in Durban to progress to the last four. Rohit Sharma has been playing international cricket for less than three months when he arrives at the crease to face his first ball in T20Is. India are reeling at 33-3. He makes a solid 40-ball 50 to lead the side to a respectable total. But that’s not the snapshot we’re talking of.

That comes in South Africa’s reply, with the score 30-3. At the non-striker’s end is Justin Kemp, a hitter of monstrous power who had smashed an 89-ball century against India in an ODI less than a year earlier. When Mark Boucher taps the ball towards cover and sets off, Kemp responds. That’s when you see a lithe figure in light blue sprint in, pick up the ball and throw the stumps down at the striker’s end while in mid-air. For millions of cricket fans, that is their first Rohit memory.

All these years later, he leaves the T20 stage on the back of an unbeaten tournament – eight wins in nine matches, with the game against Canada washed out by the Florida weather. Only twice, in the opening-round game against Pakistan and in the final, were India genuinely pushed into a corner.

For all the conspiracy theories and barbs from the likes of Michael Vaughan, the facts are inescapable. India beat England and Australia, the last two winners of the trophy, with something to spare. They beat the other unbeaten side in the final. Afghanistan, the tournament’s dark horses who knocked out Australia and thrashed New Zealand, didn’t even land a glove on India.

Across the 50-over World Cup last year and its T20 counterpart now, India have won 18 matches and lost just one – the 2023 World Cup final to Australia. The verve with which Rohit blasted runs from the top of the order played a huge part in that sequence of results, as did his composure under pressure.

"I've enjoyed since the time I started playing this format,” he said afterwards. “Better a time to say goodbye to this format. I've loved every moment of this.

"This is what I wanted - I wanted to win the cup."

After the crushing disappointment of Ahmedabad – the sporting equivalent of being ejected from your own party – the core of the team could have been ripped out in order to start afresh. But Rahul Dravid, the departing coach, and the selectors believed that Rohit was the right man to make amends in the Caribbean. Both with the bat – his 41-ball 92 was the innings of the tournament, by a country mile – and as a leader, he proved them right.

At first glance, the 20-year-old from Durban and the 37-year-old in Barbados couldn’t be more different. But they have one thing in common – both lifted the World Cup. What a way to bookend a stellar career.

In exclusive arrangement with RevSportz