‘There’s a batsman…batting for 2-3 days…’: Rohit Sharma remembered hilarious case regarding Cheteshwar Pujara

On the occasion of the release of Cheteshwar Pujara’s wife Pooja’s book ‘The Diary of a Cricketer’s Wife’, former Indian Test captain Rohit Sharma told a special story related to junior cricket that was related to Cheteshwar Pujara.

Rohit reminisced that the wicket of Pujara was often the difference between a victory or defeat for his team in age-group matches, the early signs of the doughty batter who made 7,195 runs at 43.60 with 19 tons and 35 fifties from 103 Tests.

“I still remember, team meetings only revolved around him (on) how to get him out, and if we don’t get him out, probably we’d lose the game,” Rohit said. “All I remember is that when I used to go to the ground, when I was 14-years-old, and when I came back in the evening, the colour of my face would be completely different because he used to bat all day and we used to field in the sun for (even) 2-3 days,” he said.

The former India skipper quipped that his looks would change so much after playing against Pujara under the sun that even his mother would fret a bit. “I still remember that my mother asked me a couple of times that when you go to play from home, you look different and when you come home, after a week or 10 days, you look different. I would say, ‘mom, what do I do? There’s a batsman by the name of Cheteshwar Pujara. He’s been batting for three days’… so that is the first impression that we had of him,” Rohit added.