England’s veteran batter Joe Root feels it will be nice to try and keep the duo of Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli as quiet as possible in the ongoing series. While Kohli missed the first two Test matches against England due to personal reasons, Rohit has only managed 90 runs in two games at an average of 22.50.
Furthermore, it has been reported by ESPN Cricinfo that Kohli will miss the third and fourth Test match. India has been deeply missing the services of the talisman as the team has an inexperienced batting unit.
Joe Root said on Jio Cinema about Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma: “You mentioned two of the greats of the modern era. Of course, there’s going to be focus. We know how good they are and they are also very senior within this current Indian batting lineup. You want to make sure that you try and get on top of them early.”
He further added: “They’ve got the ability to get big scores and we’ve been on the wrong end of that a few times, so it would be nice to try and keep them as quiet as we can throughout the series.”
On the other hand, Root has thus far scored only 52 runs in two Test matches against India at an average of 13 and he hasn’t been at his best.
The veteran batter scored 16 runs in the second innings of the second Test match at Vizag and was dismissed while trying to play a big shot against Ravichandran Ashwin.
Root has scored 11468 runs in 137 Test matches at an average of 49.65 and he is going to hold the key in the rest of the series against India.
The third Test match between India and England will be played at Rajkot from 15th February onwards.