Former India spinner Harbhajan Singh raised the issue of captain Rohit Sharma's batting form and felt that it could impact his leadership skills as India suffered a 10-wicket crushing defeat to Australia in the second Test on Sunday.
Rohit, who missed the first Test of the series in Perth due to the birth of his second child, only scored 3 and 6 in the pink-ball Test at Adelaide Oval. The 37-year-old's form in Test cricket has been a topic of debate since India's historic 0-3 home loss to New Zealand last month.
In that series as well, Rohit was not close to his peak performances in the red-ball format as he could manage only 91 runs in six innings in which 52 came in the second innings of the Bengaluru Test.
He feels that the struggle with the bat also translates into poor decision-making in leading the team in the rest of the series.
"When such a big player doesn't score runs, it will become a slight cause for concern. We know that Rohit has great ability and has scored a lot of runs for India. However, he didn't score runs in this match and the previous series as well. When the runs are not scored, the pressure comes on the batter," said Harbhajan on Star Sports.
The former spinner also added that Rohit should forget all the past struggles and look forward to getting back into his form ahead of the WTC final.
"We don't want the Indian captain to be under pressure of scoring his own runs as it can hamper his captaincy too. We wish that he gets back into form. The conditions in Brisbane and other places might be apt for him. He needs to let go of this match and think what good can be done moving ahead and how the team can play better because the team is more important than his form," Harbhajan said.
It was Rohit's fourth successive Test defeat as captain that made him enter the unfortunate list of Indian Test captains with most consecutive losses that includes legends like MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli and Sachin Tendulkar.
In the absence of Rohit, Jasprti Bumrah led India to an emphatic 295-run win against Australia in the series opener in Perth. The third Test between India and Australia will be played in Brisbane from December 14.
