Former Indian player turned veteran commentator Sanjay Manjrekar felt skipper Rohit Sharma’s recent struggles in the longer format come from the lack of trust in his defensive game. His analysis came after India faced a humiliating 3-0 home Test series whitewash against New Zealand. However, Rohit averaged only a bit over 15 with the bat in the three Tests and under 14 over his last five Tests – all at home against Bangladesh and New Zealand.

Speaking on ESPNcricinfo after the series, Manjrekar said, “I will never say that he is reckless because he is finding his own way to ensure that he gets runs, to get the team to win. He clearly doesn’t trust his defense anymore, you could see that, there was a lbw appeal and that must have just made him feel unsettled ever more. So the next thing that he looks to do is counter-attack and he did that because the target wasn’t a huge one, and who knows a couple of shots here and there and he would have maybe replicated that Bangladesh run chase.”

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However, Sanjay Manjrekar further added that Rohit Sharma’s recent batting performance by highlighting his mishitting of attempted big shots, while not trusting his defence as well. Apart from his batting woes, he also became the first Indian captain to face a home Test series whitewash with three or more matches as well.

“The shot that he played to get out (2nd innings of the 3rd Test) was where he was trying to hit the ball into the stands rather than just make the connection. He is missing a few of his big hits. There was one in the first Test match as well, where he stepped out and tried to hit the ball out of the ground, so he is mis-hitting a lot of his attacking shots and he is not trusting his defense enough. So that is a real problem for Rohit Sharma currently,” Sanjay Manjrekar concluded.