Rohit Sharma is living the dream. He may have been stripped off Mumbai Indians captaincy, but the India skipper has had a couple of fantastic months. After leading India to a famous win at the T20 World Cup, Rohit was named the International Cricketer of the Year at the CEAT Awards in Mumbai on Wednesday. Since taking over full-time in November of 2021, Rohit's stature as captain has only grown. He obviously is one of India's batting stalwarts but it's his nature that has floored his peers, seniors and juniors alike. If there's one thing common between the youngsters that have played under Rohit, it's the collective admiration for their captain. The team environment under Rohit is something else altogether. Relive the medal celebrations during the World Cup or what former head coach Rahul Dravid had to say about Rohit. Just the kind of human being that he is trumps everything else.

But being Rohit hasn't always a bed of roses. As Jatin Sapru pointed out, Rohit is like that older brother, who will scold you for your mistakes, but also love you later and make up for it. But while the love part tends to sound hunky dory, the scary side of Rohit is not something a player would want to entertain. Mohammed Shami, the India pacer, explained how Rohit, as captain, is brilliant, but also warned against riling him up.

"The best thing about Rohit Sharma is that he gives you freedom but if you don't live up to his expectations then the reactions we see on the screen, the ones we understand without him saying anything, start to come out," Shami said at the award function.

Rohit is a full-on entertainer. Visuals of him being up to his shenanigans – most of which are recorded on the stump-mic, is what has made watching his fielding as entertaining as his batting. It wasn't too long ago that Rohit immortalised the phrase 'Garden mein ghoomne waale ladke'. For Rohit to understand it, it's imperative that deep down at some stage, he too, at some point in his career, was one of the 'garden-strolling' cricketers. But at the same time, he takes his job equally seriously.

Shreyas Iyer agrees

Shami's sentiments were echoed by Shreyas Iyer, who was in attendance. Iyer, one of Rohit's old mates from the Mumbai cricketing circuit touched on another fascinating trait of his skipper – his tendency to lose words – saying it's up to the players to guess, the who, what, when, where and why.

"Shami is actually right. We have to fill in the worlds. Woh, yeh, usko, isko. So these words are for us to fill. We just visualise, who and what it is that he is talking about. But we understand his feelings; we've been playing with him for so many years," Iyer said.

That is when Rohit capped off the segment in his typical witty fashion: "I keep asking them to be themselves, right? But for that, I have to be myself," he said, triggering a laughter in the arena.

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