Former Australia leg-spinner Kerry O’Keeffe feels the hosts will go really hard on Team India stalwarts Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli in the upcoming all-important Test series. Both Rohit (91) and Kohli (93) failed to reach triple figures as India slumped to a historic 0-3 loss at home to New Zealand earlier this month. Rohit is likely to miss the first Test in Perth, with reports claiming that his wife is expected to give birth to their second child. While there’s no official confirmation regarding Rohit’s participation, the Indian captain didn’t travel to Australia with the rest of the team. O’Keeffe feels the Australian team will throw everything at Rohit whenever he joins the visitor’s Down Under.
“Rohit Sharma may miss one or two Tests, but he is the captain, and Australia always tries to torpedo the visiting captain. It’s been a tactic they’ve used forever, and I think they’ll go very hard at Rohit Sharma,” O’Keeffe told Fox Sports.
Similarly, O’Keefe also fired shots at Kohli and suggested that the former Indian captain is “slightly weaker” because of his recent slump.
“Kohli, who has worried them (Australia) over the years, what a stunning player he’s been; but in sport, if you sense that the king of the jungle is slightly weaker, you poke a bit of cheek at him,” the cricketer-turned-commentator added.
O’Keefe, however, feels that Kohli’s form could be the deciding factor in the outcome of the series.
“I’m fascinated to see what Virat Kohli ends up with at the end of the summer. It could be the decisive point in the whole summer. If he has an absolutely blazing series, India could win.”
Meanwhile, Rohit has managed 588 runs in 11 Tests at an average of just 29.40 this year, while Kohli has accumulated 250 runs in six Test at an average of 22.72.
India’s squad for Border-Gavaskar Series: Rohit Sharma (c), Jasprit Bumrah (vc), Ravichandran Ashwin, Mohammad Shami, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Shubman Gill, Ravindra Jadeja, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Dhruv Jurel (wk), Sarfaraz Khan, Virat Kohli, Prasidh Krishna, Rishabh Pant (wk), KL Rahul, Harshit Rana, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Mohammed Siraj, Washington Sundar.
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