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Rohit Sharma and his magic potion of batting

Rohit Sharma oozes elegance, crafts finesse and represents swagger. Flair, style, élan: he'll make you feel ashamed if your vocabulary doesn't match his superlative batsmanship.

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Rohit Sharma and his magic potion of batting
Happy birthday, Rohit Sharma! May this year be as delightful as your batting. © Getty Images

He oozes elegance, crafts finesse and represents swagger. Flair, style, élan: he’ll make you feel ashamed if your vocabulary doesn’t match his superlative batsmanship. Rohit Gurunath Sharma is an amalgamation of Viv Richard’s strength and Gundappa Viswanath’s panache. Truth be told, the cricketer inside bromances with Rohit. I never thought, other than Rahul Dravid, I’d ever imitate someone’s stance and back lift. Indeed I was wrong. Ever since I saw Rohit, I always tried to emulate what he did with his wooden blade. However, a question always startles me time and again: how can someone be so talented? Talented—a word that annoyed Rohit more than it pleased him. Also read: How Rohit Sharma silenced me with his debut Test hundred

Yes, some people are gifted and some create their own fortune. For me, Rohit is a perfect blend of both. Imagine the expectations we cast on him. Expectations breed pressure, pressure breeds failure, failure breeds frustration. Usually, people bog down, drop their shoulders and even give up on their dreams once their frustration reaches to an optimum level. But Rohit marvelled us with his magic potion of batting and hooked well above the records set by the greats of the game. And I need not mention his feats! It’s beyond our cricketing logic, isn’t it?

Until Rohit started gracing cricket, the only way to put a yorker to the fence was to scoop it behind the wickets. Dougie Marillier in 2000 and Tilakaratne Dilshan now brought the scoop into existence. But how do you scythe a perfect yorker down town? Indeed it’s not easy to get under the ball if it’s fired at 145 kmph. But Rohit does it with ease. Sincere apologies, he does it with grace. I saw Owais Shah hitting a full toss over long off. However, he was a traditional power-hitter. His bat came down from an angle, making it easier for the ball to travel with the pace of the delivery. On the other hand, Rohit isn’t as muscular as Virat Kohli or strong as Matthew Hayden. He just sublimely times it. He waits for the ball to come onto the bat, makes full use of the crease, positions his head in the line of his toes and drives (not lofts) it over the sight screen. If you don’t believe me, watch his masterful hundred against Bangladesh in ICC Cricket World Cup 2015. It’ll give you an orgasm. Also read: Rohit Sharma 264: The joy of watching it live at Eden Gardens

He took his own time to translate talent into performance. And, when he did that, he translated the performance into magnificence. “He timed it to perfection,” commentator say every time he maneuvers a deceitful ball into the gap. “When he hits, it stays a hit,” a commentators say when the ball trysts at the middle of his bat. They have used all the clichés they could but still can’t get enough of him.

For any traditionalist, his flicks tickle our hearts, drives soothe our eyes and square cuts comfort our mind. He never leans towards the line of the ball; he eases it with his lazy elegance. Such is the impact of Rohit on a cricket purist like me!

Happy birthday, Rohit Sharma! May this year be as delightful as your batting.

(Kaustubh S. Mayekar, a reporter at CricketCountry, played cricket at U-16 level. Like his idol Rahul Dravid, he often shadow-practises cricket shots. His Twitter handle is @kaumedy_.)

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