Rohit Sharma was present at the Oval on Day 3 of the fifth Test and he saw quite a show with the bat from India, with Akash Deep scoring a half-century, Yashasvi Jaiswal scoring his second ton of the series and Washington Sundar later taking the England bowlers to the cleaners. Jaiswal, who played a majority of his Test career as Rohit’s opening partner, said that the former captain had a few words for him on Day 3.
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“I saw Rohit bhai and I said hi to him. Unhone mujhe yehi message diya ki khelte rehna (He gave me a message to bat on), that was it,” he told reporters after Stumps. Rohit had quite suddenly announced his retirement from Test cricket during the 2025 Indian Premier League (IPL), just days before India set out on the ongoing tour of England for the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy.
Jaiswal, who scored a masterful 118 off 164 balls on Day 3, said that he is relishing the challenges he has faced in the three five-match Test series he has played thus far. His first was when England toured India last year, in which he became just the second Indian after Sunil Gavaskar all the way back in 1971 to score more than 700 runs in a single Test series. This was followed by the Border-Gavaskar Trophy in Australia earlier this year before the ongoing five-Test series in England.
“The challenges are different in different places. If you are playing in India the challenges are different, you are going to spin a lot. There will be three spinners, when you play in England or Australia there will be four seamers. I need to plan my innings (accordingly), where my shots are and where I am going to score runs,” said Jaiswal.
“I keep getting all these messages and playing with the seniors for as long as I have like Rohit bhai, Virat bhai helped me grow as a person a lot. Seeing what they have done in Test cricket, how they prepared themselves, it really helped me especially to improve. Also playing with all my mates now, KL (Rahul) bhai the way we chat, (Shubman) Gill bhai, how we think about the game, it’s very interesting and I am really enjoying it.”
