Rohit Sharma is the only batter in the history of the Indian Premier League to have a hat-trick and a century to his name. Although he has multiple centuries in the IPL but he has mentioned in the past on podcasts how much he enjoyed his hat-trick for the Deccan Chargers in 2009. However, as his career progressed, he limited himself to rolling his arm over during the games, but he started his cricketing aspirations as an off-spinner.
Rohit’s childhood coach, Dinesh Lad, speaking in a podcast with Gaurav Mangalani, revealed the transition of Rohit from off-spinner to batter: “I first saw him as a bowler, he was about 12 years old. I saw him playing a match against us. Then I told his uncle (Chacha) to get him admitted to my school. The school started in 1995, and I saw Rohit in 1999. He took admission that year. In the first year, he was in under 14. During practice, I kept making him bowl. Next year, Rohit went to 8th standard and was 14 years old.”
“I felt he should be kept in both the under-16 and under-14 teams. One day, while entering the school, I saw a boy knocking (batting). From outside, I saw the bat was coming very straight and good. I didn’t know it was Rohit at first. When I went inside, I asked him if he was batting. He said yes, sir. Then I gave him some batting in the nets at number six or seven. Before that, I had never given him batting practice. That was my mistake,” he continued.
“He batted well. In a match, he went in at number seven and scored 40 runs. Very good 40, but unfortunately, we lost the match. When the under-14 practice started after the Harris Shield, the Giles Shield practice was on, I started giving him batting at second and third position in nets. The way he was batting, I felt he had a very good talent for batting. So it was important for him to focus on it. I told him to focus more on batting but keep bowling too,” Lad said.
Rohit, the batter, ended up scoring 4301 runs from 67 Tests, 11168 runs from 273 ODIs, and 4231 runs in 159 T20Is for India
