Courtesy: BCCI/IPL
After Mumbai Indians (MI) suffered a tough defeat by 36 runs against Gujarat Titans (GT) in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025, Sanjay Manjrekar, the former Indian cricketer, spoke at length about the lean patch with the bat for Rohit Sharma over the past few months. In the first couple of matches of the IPL 2025, the Mumbai Indians batter was dismissed in the first over, and it led to Sanjay Manjrekar stating that “he’s not the Rohit Sharma of, say, three to four years ago”.
Notably, in the IPL 2025 match concluded last night, Rohit Sharma was cleaned-up by Mohammed Siraj of GT with an inswinger in the first over after he had struck a couple of fours on the leg side at the Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad. In the opening match of the new IPL season against Chennai Super Kings (CSK), Khaleel Ahmed got the better of the right-handed batter for no score on the third ball in the first over.
Rohit Sharma is clearly going through a phase: Sanjay Manjrekar
In the past few months, Rohit Sharma has struggled immensely in the Test format for India, needing to drop himself in the fifth and final Test of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) series against Australia. The right-handed batter scored runs at an average of 10.93 in eight Test matches since September 2024 with only one fifty-plus score, and while he has fared better in ODI cricket, scoring a fifty in the ICC Champions Trophy 2024 versus New Zealand, his batting has fallen off the cliff.
During his interview on JioStar after MI’s defeat to GT in the IPL 2025 clash, Sanjay Manjrekar stated that things aren’t quite the same for Rohit Sharma in comparison to the past. He was quoted as saying, as per ESPNcricinfo, “Rohit Sharma is clearly going through a phase. He's not the Rohit Sharma of, say, three to four years ago. He's at a stage in his career where he has to push himself every morning - train hard and be at his best - because things are slipping away for him. He's still relying on his natural talent and instincts.”
Moreover, Ryan Rickelton, the opening partner of Rohit Sharma, hasn’t started the IPL 2025 well for MI either, and the franchise have lost their first two matches of the competition.
