Fearless Rohit’s selfless approach

Mumbai: Rohit Sharma’s batting approach has been the talk of the World Cup where he has given blazing starts, without bothering about stacking up milestones, and played the situation when needed (against England). The Indian skipper spoke about his selfless approach, pollution level in Mumbai, Hardik Pandya’s recovery, among other things, on the eve of India’s match against Sri Lanka here on Wednesday.    

On his selfless approach: I’m obviously keeping the situation of the team in mind, it’s not like I just have to go and swing the bat. I have to swing it well, play well and keep the team in a good situation. This is my mindset. When I open, the scoreboard starts from zero. So as a batsman I have to think, I have to set the tone for the game. So, I have that advantage or you can call it a benefit that I am starting the batting and there is no pressure of wickets because everything is 0-0, so when you have to start like that. You can be fearless and you can play the way you want to play but then last game we were put under pressure a little bit in the power play. We lost three wickets. So, the game should be changed. So, I think as a batsman my focus is on what the team needs at that time. What is needed in the first over, what is needed in the fifth over, what is needed in the 10th over. All these things. I think about all these things when I bat.

On high pollution level in Mumbai: I mean, in an ideal world, you don’t want a situation like this, but I’m pretty sure the concerned people are taking the necessary steps to avoid these kind of situation. It’s not ideal, everyone knows that. But obviously, looking at our future generation, your kids, my kids, obviously, it’s quite important that they get to live without any fear. So, yeah, every time I get to speak outside of cricket, if we are not discussing cricket, I always talk about this, that you know we have to look after our future generation.

On Hardik Pandya’s recovery: His procedure after the injury is very positive. Whatever procedure he had to undergo after the injury at the NCA, there were a lot of positive things. Right now, he is not available for tomorrow’s (Thursday) match. But it is an injury that we have to see every day how much percent he has improved, how much recovery has been made, how much bowling/ batting has been done. So, on a day-to-day basis, we would like to take a call. 

On beating Sri Lanka in Asia Cup and 2011 World Cup finals: I think in this World Cup, we have seen a lot of games, a lot of - I wouldn't call it an upset, because every team is here to win games, so it's not an upset. But every team is trying to beat the other team, so at no point or no game you can think that this is a cakewalk for us. It's important that you stay in the present, do your processes, keep working as a team, what you've been doing as a team, focus on all those aspects and as a team that is what we are trying to do. And speaking of the past, obviously, there's hardly one or two players from their squad, from that team, maybe one guy, Angelo Mathews, and the same from our side as well. There's only two guys in the squad. It's been more than a decade now since that has happened. So, I don't think that is going to be a factor.