India Are Dependent On Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma, Says Harbhajan Singh

The Indian cricket team have been blessed with the likes of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma. Due to their consistent run-making at the top of the order, the men in blue have tasted some famous victories, especially in white-ball cricket. Yet, on the flip side, their occasional failure in crucial games, mainly in the ICC tournaments, has resulted in heartbreaking losses. Indian bowler Harbhajan Singh has bemoaned this very factor at the heart of the current side’s weakness.

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Rohit Sharma and Harbhajan Singh took to Instagram live chat and spoke on a variety of topics. One of those was when Rohit asked the experienced campaigner to point out the differences and similarities between the present and the past side. The off-spinner hasn’t played for the men in blue since 2016.

In his reply, the 39-year old singled out that the present team is overdependent on Virat and Rohit. He feels that if the duo doesn’t contribute substantially, the rest of the batters stumble and about 70 per cent of the match slips from their grasp.

Harbhajan Singh pointed out that in his time, the middle-order had candidates like Yuvraj and Dravid, who could handle the pressure. Yet, he admitted that today’s bunch has an abundance of talent, but need match-winners.

“I feel this team is a lot dependent on Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma. The team has really good players, but there is no faith that if Virat or Rohit gets out, then the match 70 per cent of time the match slips out of our hand. The rest of the team loses self-belief. In our time, we had faith that if one player does not perform, then Yuvi paaji, or Rahul Dravid will win the match.”

“But in this team, if the top three don’t perform, then the team feels like they will not be able to win the match. There is no shortage of talent, but the team needs match-winners.” the 39-year old stated.

Harbhajan Singh laments the problem of over-dependence for their World Cup loss:

The 2019 World Cup, which India lost, was a classic case of the men in blue being highly dependent on their top-order. Throughout the tournament, the likes of Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, and KL Rahul kept chipping in heavily. However, their failure in the semi-final against the Kiwis prevented them from making it to the final. Harbhajan Singh acknowledged that if 3-4 men were performing, India would have lifted the World Cup.

“You had a good World Cup, but then you lose in the semi-finals, if you had 3-4 guys performing, we would have won the World Cup.” he further added.

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