It was the Rohit Sharma show during India's final Super Eight match against Australia in St Lucia as the captain pretty much set up the game for his team with a blazing knock of 92 in 41 balls. Rohit batted with almost wild abandon, smashing seven fours and eight sixes in his innings and India got to a total of 205/5 in 20 overs.

The next best score from an Indian batter was Suryakumar Yadav's 31 in 16 balls. Rohit put up a stand of 87 runs off just 38 balls for the second wicket with Rishabh Pant, in which the latter scored just 15 in 14 balls. He got to his half-century in just 19 deliveries and it was only an unplayable yorker from Mitchell Starc that fell him, just eight runs short of his century.

Former Pakistan all-rounder Mohammad Hafeez was all praise for Rohit after India won the match by 24 runs. “When you set big goals then your pedigree increases. If I talk about Rohit, India’s leadership deserves to win the World Cup. The way he played unconditional cricket like a champion player. He didn’t care if there was any seam or swing," said Hafeez in a clip from a show on PTV Sports HD.

“Special effort and you can’t praise anyone enough when you weigh their performances with Rohit, others efforts would only look smaller. Rohit is the only person at the moment who deserves to win this World Cup for India.”

'He doesn't want a hundred centuries, he wants to be champion'

Hafeez said that while there was never any doubting the quality that Rohit possessed, the Indian captain's switch to being more selfless and scoring as quickly as possible was commendable. Rohit's approach was on display the 2023 ODI World Cup as well, in which he scored 597 runs in 11 matches at an average of 54.27 and a strike rate of a whopping 125.94. Rohit has scored 191 runs in the ongoing T20 World Cup in six matches at a strike rate of 159.16.

“The way he played his innings, he planned this last year and started the execution accordingly. If you see the last 50-over World Cup, he was the standout performer for India. Regardless of the situation, he was playing selfless.

“The most impressing part of his innings was that he was not thinking about any of his milestones and was hitting the ball accordingly. And at the post-match he said, '50s and 100s doesn't matter to me now'. Because he knows what he wants to be, he doesn't want a hundred centuries. He wants to be a champion player, who will always be remembered, winning ICC trophies,” said Hafeez.

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