Visakhapatnam: Rohit Sharma made mincemeat of an ordinary West Indies attack at his own languid pace, complemented by an equally elegant KL Rahul, as their twin centuries steered India to an imposing 387/5 in the second ODI here Wednesday.
The Indian vice-captain hit his 28th ODI hundred — 159 off 138 balls and added 227 for the opening stand with Rahul (102 off 104 balls) to set the stage for an all-out assault by the Indian middle-order.
Rishabh Pant (39 off 16 balls) and Shreyas Iyer (53 off 32 balls) used their brute power to add 72 runs in only four overs.
Rohit, as usual, batted at his own pace and looked like the bandmaster of an orchestra, who made the Caribbean bowlers dance to his tune.
Sheldon Cottrell (2/83 in 9 overs) was punished with such ferocity that he didn’t have energy to do a customary ‘Cottrell Salute’ once Iyer was out and it was more or less similar for all others like Alzarri Joseph (0/68 in 9 overs) and Keemo Paul (0/62 in 9 overs).
It was also a perfect demonstration on how to press the accelerator in this format — first 50 off 67, the next off 40 balls and the last off only 25.
The innings had 17 boundaries and five sixes and Rohit played the same shot again and again. It was a swivel off his hips between fine leg and deep fine leg to rising deliveries.
The West Indies bowlers were wary of pitching it up to him fearing his drives but ended up bowling short on the hips and the Indian gleefully played the shot again and again.
At times, they did realise the mistake and pitched it up but then ‘Retro Rohit’ came out from nowhere playing 1980s slog shots, shuffling towards leg-stump and making room to hit over cover boundary.
There was a bowler’s back-drive off Joseph to show who is the boss.
Incidentally, Rohit was much behind Rahul in the race for half-century but reached the three-figure mark before the Karnataka batsman.
The biscuit coloured 22-yard, devoid of any grass, was supposed to be a nightmare for the bowlers and it stayed true to its character.
As Rohit took his own sweet time to settle down, Rahul went on the offensive taking on Cottrell first up with a flurry of boundaries.
By the time Rahul was into his 30s, Rohit hadn’t crossed 20 but it was just a matter of time. Once his Mumbai Indians teammate Alzarri Joseph came into the attack and the pull shot also came out of the drawer.
Alzarri’s extra bounce was exactly what Rohit required as he rode on top of it and played a range of strokes to slowly catch up.
It was a rare failure for skipper Virat Kohli (0) but the capacity crowd at the YSR ACA-VDCA Stadium was not disappointed as Pant and Iyer hit eight sixes between them in a span of four overs to ensure the score went past 375.
PTI
