Latest news with #2023WorldTestChampionship
Time of India
04-05-2025
- Sport
- Time of India
Winning Test series in India toughest assignment we have as Oz cricketers
Pat Cummins Pat Cummins has caused a lot of heartbreak for Indian fans in recent times. The Aussie paceman, who took over the reins at a difficult time in Nov 2021, has overseen his team's success in the 2023 World Test Championship and the ODI World Cup — both at the cost of India in the final. Earlier this year, his team finished off India's WTC Final hopes. The pacer, who is now leading Sunrisers Hyderabad team in the IPL, talks to Dwaipayan Datta about the dynamics of being a top-level captain and writing a not-so-typical cricket book Your book 'Tested' has stories of 10 leaders including former PM Julia Gillard. What goes into the making of a successful captain, and who are the leaders who inspire you? I think it is about collaborating well, dealing with pressure and having genuine care for the players. I find myself looking to the business world for inspiration. What resonates with me with these leaders is their ability to stay ahead of the competition and get the best out of their workers. In a lot of the new startups, the founders are in their 20s and 30s, much like a professional cricket team. How has the great Dennis Lillee influenced you as a cricketer and a person? by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Click Here - This Might Save You From Losing Money Expertinspector Click Here Undo Dennis has been a great source of wisdom and support since I first met him around 2013. Technically, he got my action to a point where I could deal with the stresses that come with fast bowling while maintaining my strengths. Many feel you're in that rare group of cricketers who make pace bowling look poetic. What makes you such a joy to watch? I think some people are being very kind because when I bowl it doesn't feel very poetic! The fast bowlers I love watching in Test cricket always seem to be at the batter, asking questions even when conditions aren't in their favour. That is the ideal place to be in as a bowler, consistent but not predictable. You took over Australian captaincy when the national team was at a bit of a crossroads. How difficult was it to bring everyone together and become the world-beating unit that you are? The one thing that remained constant during this time was a core of brilliant, experienced players. A lot of the initial days were spent fostering an environment where everyone comes together, but at the same we stay out of each other's way when it makes sense to. What has been your best moment as an Australian captain? Winning the World Test Championship and the ODI World Cup in the same year — it's hard to beat that. In the ODI World Cup final, we knew we were walking into a game where the whole country was behind India, so no point in pretending that wasn't the case. I must admit, it was pretty sweet standing in the middle of the (Narendra Modi) stadium with the boys, looking around the stadium in stunned silence. I'll never forget that. India couldn't be beaten in a bilateral series by Australia since 2016, until your team did it earlier this year. Is it the most difficult team to beat across formats? Do you think a Test series win in India will be your final frontier as captain? India's depth and home dominance make them the ultimate challenge across all formats. It's a few years away but winning an away Test series in India does seem like the toughest assignment we have as Aussie cricketers. You're enduring a tough IPL season with SRH. How difficult is it to deal with failures? Failures are tough but part of the job. We all want to win everything but some of the most successful teams ever may reach just over a 60% win rate. Knowing this, it does help in thinking objectively about the parts you think you need to improve upon, but also the parts that you believe are right, and just didn't pay off on this occasion. How important is it for a captain to be at the top of his game during a big series? I believe it is quite important. Results aside, I think clarity of thought can make a difference across a long series. There aren't too many bowling captains. How easy or tough is it to lead while being the No. 1 bowler of the team? And what did you make of Jasprit Bumrah as captain during the India-Australia series? It's a skill I've got better and better at, and I've just learnt to lean on senior guys when needed on the potential blind spots I may have, for example, how long and when to bowl myself. I find it hard to judge a captain that I haven't played under but I always believe the benefits of a bowling captain can certainly outweigh the cons. Mitchell Starc, Cummins, Josh Hazlewood and Scott Boland — where do you place this pace quartet in Aussie cricket history? And how's the next crop shaping up? I'll leave that up to others, but it has been an amazing time over the past decade playing alongside those guys. The next crop is really promising; we have about another half a dozen guys who have debuted across formats in the last couple of years and have been match winners. So, I feel we have great depth!
News18
30-04-2025
- Sport
- News18
Rohit Sharma Turns 38: Cricketer's Journey, Career Stats And Records
Last Updated: Happy Birthday Rohit Sharma: The cricketer captained MI to five IPL titles before taking over the reins full-time for India back in November 2021. Happy Birthday Rohit Sharma: One of the finest batters of this era, Rohit Sharma celebrates his birthday on April 30. The ever-graceful right-handed batter, whose effortless batting style continues to mesmerise cricket lovers, turns 38. Renowned as 'Hitman' for his remarkable hitting ability, Rohit holds a great place in the hearts of his passionate fans, who must be thrilled to see him back in form in IPL 2025. Over the years, Rohit has proven himself as a successful all-format player while also leading IPL franchise Mumbai Indians and his country to great heights on the field as captain. Rohit captained MI to five IPL titles before taking over the reins full-time for India back in November 2021. He helped India transform their traditional approach to a more aggressive one, with the skipper leading the way in his team's successive ICC T20 World Cup 2024 and ICC Champions Trophy 2025 victories. Under his captaincy, India also reached the finals of the 2023 World Test Championship and ICC World Cup. Rohit Sharma's Journey Coming from a humble background, Rohit's initial journey was full of hardships as he had to live away from home with his grandparents in Borivali, Mumbai due to the family's financial struggles. To pursue his education and cricketing dreams together, Rohit had to stay apart from his parents Gurunath and Purnima Sharma as a growing child. Living in Borivali allowed Rohit to join a cricket club and train for adequate hours under right guidance. Identified early as a special talent by coaches in Mumbai, Rohit soon got a chance to play junior cricket under MCA and BCCI wings and impressed with an encouraging run at the 2006 ICC U-19 World Cup in Sri Lanka with 205 runs in six innings. Rohit also got a chance to make his first-class debut for India A before even turning up for Mumbai in the Ranji Trophy when he played against New Zealand A in Darwin in July 2006. He was awarded his maiden international cap for India in Belfast the very next year against Ireland and soon emerged as one of the heroes of the memorable 2007 T20 World Cup win. Rohit Sharma's Career Stats Rohit Sharma has played 67 Tests for India with 4,301 runs at an average of 40.57 and 12 hundreds. The batting giant has been a mighty fine player in the One-Day Internationals where he has recorded 11,168 runs from 273 games at a strike-rate of 92.80 and an average of 48.76. Before his retirement from T20Is last year, Rohit turned up in the format 159 times and produced 4,231 runs at a strike rate of 140.89. He has also scored 6,856 runs in his IPL career. Rohit Sharma's Records Rohit has achieved several landmarks, including the record for most centuries in a single edition of the ICC Cricket World Cup with his five hundreds at the event's 2019 edition in England. He also produced the joint-most five centuries in T20Is before calling quits and has been a six-hitting machine, sending the ball out of the park for the record most number of times in Test, ODI and T20Is combined. Rohit also became the second-fastest to 10,000 ODI runs last year behind only teammate and legend Virat Kohli. First Published:
Indian Express
29-04-2025
- Sport
- Indian Express
Pujara's wife Puja didn't tell him about his father's heart condition when he was making big runs in Australia
A couple of years ago, after India's 2023 World Test Championship final loss to Australia, their perpetual No.3 Cheteshwar Pujara got the call that most cricketers in their mid-30s dread. It was the chief selector on line informing him that they wanted a younger Test side and he wasn't part of it. Despite his 100-plus Tests, unlike other equally out-of-form seniors, he didn't get the long rope. Pujara, a veteran of many setbacks and comebacks, was hurt. True to his temperament, he went silent. But not his wife, Puja, a close witness and sherpa to Cheteshwar's arduous cricketing journey. She was outraged, her anger exploded into pithy rhetorical questions: Why was Cheteshwar expected to shoulder the blame for India's defeat? Why should you put yourself through so much scrutiny? Why don't you call it quits? Both knew, there were no answers. Then Puja said something that would go on to be the theme of a book she would pursue in the days to come: 'You are not the only one who is going through these highs and lows. We, as your family, are equally affected by it.' Two years later, the one-of-a-kind sports book — 'The diary of a cricketer's wife' (HarperCollins) — is out and the scene at the Pujara household when he got dropped finds space on its pages. The cover calls the book 'A very unusual memoir' but there is a case for adding 'honest' to the tag line. Sporting arenas have been insensitive in dismissing the partners of players as mere props. Often the support system and bouncing board of sporting superstars, the Wives and Girlfriends go by a rather reductive and dismissive collective noun – WAGs. On match days, as they sit bunched in VVIP stadium boxes, they are expected to give the game situation appropriate expressions. In the grand cinema called Indian cricket, they have a bit part but no dialogues. Finally, there is a book that records the all-important female voice of men's cricket. The Pujaras are keen to talk about the book. Puja says the role of wives, and other family members, rarely gets discussed in detail. 'We are always given this glamorous role when that is not the case. Behind the smiles and cheering in the stadium, there are 20,000 thoughts in our head. They keep switching the cameras to the spouses. And that's where the story ends, right? Nobody follows up or nobody hears from the spouse also much after that,' she tells The Indian Express. Puja's book introduces readers to a world where the men of the house are perpetually absent. It's a peek into the lives of women who, at times, have a lonely existence with only fear and anxiety for company. While the cricketers get hailed as gladiators, the wives are left to deal with the daily battles of raising kids and being the first, and at times, the only responders, to medical emergencies of elders. Most times, they don't even have the option of sharing their problems with their cricketer partners. What if it disturbs the men burdened with unreasonable expectations of a cricket-crazy nation? That was the reason, according to the book, why Puja hid from her husband the news about his father's heart condition while he was in the middle of that 2018-2019 historic series in Australia. She was holding the fort at home when Cheteshwar with three hundreds in four Test matches was conquering Australia — India's first-ever series win Down Under. With the second Test at Perth to start in a few hours, it was 2.30 am at the Pujara household in Rajkot. At that ungodly hour, Puja's phone rang. Next to her bed was her daughter, in the cradle yet to celebrate her first birthday. It was her father-in-law calling from the first-floor of their home. He had a heart condition and was now suddenly feeling uneasy. Puja called Cheteshwar's cricketer-friend Kuldeep. She also reached out to his siblings and other relatives to take care of her daughter while she headed to the hospital. The doctor would later recommend 'a heart ablation procedure'. Sleepless and stressed, she got the usual pre-match call from Cheteshwar — a ritual they had followed for years. Puja had to act normal. The book captures that delicate moment of deception wonderfully. 'The second Test was beginning that very morning, so I freshened up, took a short nap and woke up in time to wish Cheteshwar luck for the match. I carefully omitted all mention of the events of the previous night… 'How's the hamstring,' I asked casually. 'Fine,' he answered, insouciantly. 'Best of luck for the match,' I wished him, with a spurious attempt at jollity. 'Thanks,' he replied, distractedly, his mind already on the game ahead,' Puja writes. After the game, Cheteshwar was informed about his father's condition and the impending operation in Mumbai. That date clashed with the final Test in Sydney. When Puja was on the flight to Mumbai with her father-in-law, Cheteshwar was fighting the Aussie bowlers. When she reached the hospital, her husband had crossed a hundred. The book says that while in the hospital lift, Puja saw attendants watching the India-Australia game on their mobile phones. Little did they know that the batsman they were following diligently had their hospital on his mind. When the operation ended, the day's play was over. Cheteshwar was unbeaten on 130. Next day, he ended up scoring 193. Cheteshwar had played the path-breaker, the Aussie bastion had fallen. Puja awaited the homecoming of the national hero but was once again stumped by cricket's uncertainties. She describes in the book another of those long-distance conversations with her famous husband. 'A vacation? A teeny-weeny break — as a treat for all the sleepless nights I had endured? These dreams lasted till Cheteshwar's next phone call. He had already booked his tickets to travel to Kanpur for Saurashtra's quarter-final game,' Puja writes. That wasn't new to Puja. Cheteshwar had missed the birth of his daughter because of another Ranji game previously. Not a regular member of the India team, Cheteshwar tries his best these days to compensate for his long absences. He drops his daughter to school and in the days ahead will take a 'back seat' if Puja wants to start a business or any other new venture. Speaking to this newspaper, Puja refers to Cheteshwar's acknowledgment of the role she has played in his career and describes the joy of 'being part of someone equally' and how that has made 'everything worth it'. She goes back to the 2018-19 series in Australia to make her point. 'Though I did not travel to Australia, just those raw emotions of fans gives you warmth and love. No matter how small or big a part you have played, it just feels so, so special. I feel like it's my victory as well. The warmth you see everywhere you travel, it just feels there's so much gratitude,' she says.
