NEWS
Follow UsMumbai Indians (MI) head coach Mark Boucher has said he will not hesitate in resting skipper Rohit Sharma for a couple of games if that brings out the best in him. There has been talks of workload management of Indian players given that they have the World Test Championship (WTC) final to play at The Oval, just 10 days after the Indian Premier League (IPL) final.
Rohit is going into IPL 2023 at the back of a busy international schedule, that saw him lead India in the Test and the ODI series against Australia at home. Before the Australia series, Rohit also led Team India in the white-ball series against New Zealand and Sri Lanka.
"He's the captain, hopefully he gets into good sort of form and hopefully he doesn't want to rest," Boucher said.
"We'll adapt to whatever the situation is. If I can get the best out of him as a captain and as a player, it'll be great. If it means that he's going to rest one or two games, then I'll do that, absolutely. Not a problem."
Rohit failed to score a single fifty last season for the first time in IPL. He also had his worst season with the bat managing just 268 runs at 19.14. His strike-rate of 120.17 is was also his worst since 2009 (114.97).
One of MI's biggest concerns is the fitness of fast bowler Jofra Archer. Archer was bought by MI in 2022, knowing that he will miss the season due to injury. Since his return, Archer has played in the SA20 and has also featured for England in a few white-ball matches. The coaches will hold their breath as they watch Archer in action during a warm-up game on Wednesday (March 29).
"Jofra has come off a major injury and he's been playing a lot of cricket of late which is good," Boucher said.
"He's in a good space at the moment, he's really ready to get out there and perform. Hopefully he can kickstart the IPL with a bang."
Boucher has also revealed that he has had a conversation with Suryakumar Yadav and has backed the batter to come good in the tournament despite coming off three golden ducks in the ODIs against Australia.
"You can't judge a guy's form based on how he's playing the first ball. Maybe he got out three times. I checked on him about how you are feeling, and he said, 'coach I am hitting the ball very well. I said, cool,'" Boucher said.
"You can't say that a guy is out of form if a guy does not get past the first ball. Unfortunately, he has been able to do that in the last three games. Hopefully, when he faces the first ball in the IPL, the whole crowd will cheer and he will be back to business. He's a great player and probably the best T20 player in the world for the moment."
MI kick-off their IPL 2023 campaign against Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bengaluru on Sunday (April 2).
