Former India head coach Ravi Shastri said that he would have advocated for recently retired Test captain Rohit Sharma to play the final match against Australia in Sydney earlier this year as well. However, Rohit’s decision to retire from the Test came on the back of a poor ICC World Test Championship series loss for India in Australia, and his poor form with the bat in the Test format that saw him sit out the Border-Gavaskar series decider at the SCG in January as well.

Speaking with host Sanjana Ganesan on the latest edition of The ICC Review, Shastri said: “I saw Rohit a lot at the toss. At the toss, you don’t get enough time to speak. Though I did put my hand on his shoulder in one of the games.”

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“I think it was in Mumbai and told him, if I was coach you would have never not played that last Test match. You would have played that last Test match because the series wasn’t over. And I’m not someone who threw in the towel with the scoreline 2-1. If your mindset is you feel you are… that’s not the stage, you leave a team,” he further added.

From his three matches in Australia, having missed out on the first of five Test matches due to personal reasons, Rohit Sharma scored only 31 runs. In his last eight Tests, which also included home series against Bangladesh and New Zealand, Rohit was able to cross the 50-run mark only once, averaging 10.93 as well.

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“That was a 30-40 run game. And that’s exactly what I told him. The pitch was so spicy in Sydney. Whatever kind of form he was in, he’s a match-winner. If he had gone, sensed the situation, sensed the condition and smashed it for even 35-40 at the top, you never know. That series would have been level. But that’s each one to his own. Other people have different styles. This would have been my style and I let him know it. It’s sitting in my heart for a long time. I had to get it out. And I told him that,” Ravi Shastri concluded.