New white-ball captain Rohit Sharma wants to create a strong bond in the Indian team with the help of Rahul Dravid

Rohit Sharma has been appointed as the new ODI captain of Team India ahead of the tour of South Africa. He had also been appointed leader of the T20I side following Virat Kohli’s decision to step down after the T20 World Cup. Rohit’s recent appointment and the alleged sacking of Kohli who wanted to continue leading the ODI team has been met with strong reactions from several quarters recently.

Rohit Sharma, however, wants his team to shut itself from outside noise and distractions. The focus, at the end of the day, should always be on cricket. In order to create this strong bond between the players as well as a competitive environment, Rohit will also find the help of new head coach Rahul Dravid.

“What I think of x, y, z is important as you want to create a strong bond between the players and that is what will help us in achieving the goal we want. Rahul (Dravid) bhai is obviously gonna help us in doing that so we look forward to that,” said Sharma in a video posted by BCCI.

Rohit Sharma has also been appointed as the new vice-captain of the Indian Test team replacing Ajinkya Rahane whose indisputable status in the team is no longer guaranteed. Virat Kohli continues to hold the reins in the purest format of the sport and will now be assisted by Rohit during matches.

The pressure will be even greater on Rohit who has won five IPL trophies with Mumbai Indians. However, the opener isn’t fazed by the challenge as pressure is something that every cricketer representing Team India has to deal with.

“When you are playing cricket for India, it’s gonna be always high pressure. The pressure is always gonna be there; a lot of people talking about the positives and negatives but for me personally as a cricketer, not as a captain as a cricketer, for me it’s important to focus on my job and not to focus on what people are talking about because you can’t control that,” he mentioned.

In recent years, captains of Team India including the likes of MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli have always stressed on the need to focus on controlling the controllables. Several factors during high-profile tournaments remain outside the team’s purview and focusing on that can often lead to distractions. Rohit Sharma wants to impose a similar vision as leader.

“I have said million times about this and I will keep saying that and that is what the message is to the team as well; like, even the team understands that when we are playing a high-profile tournament, there will be a lot of talks.

“It’s just important for us to focus on what we have in hand, which is to go and win games, play the way you are known to play. I think those talks that happen outside are immaterial. For us, it’s important what we think of each other and that is more important,” he concluded.