Pakistan skipper Babar Azam was brutally trolled on social media after Team India became the No.1 ODI side in the world following their 3-0 whitewash of New Zealand in Indore on Tuesday.
Netizens poked fun at Babar Azam, reminding the Pakistan star about their poor record across formats at home. The Men in Green recently lost a 50-over series to New Zealand and had suffered a similar fate against England in Tests last year.
The Indian cricket team, meanwhile, has begun 2023 in a dominant fashion, having already clean-swept Sri Lanka and New Zealand 3-0 in One-Day Internationals.
After India sealed a comfortable victory over the Kiwis at the Holkar Stadium, the supporters of the Men in Blue took to Twitter to mock Babar Azam's credentials as skipper as the Pakistan captain has been unable to lead his team to wins in even bilateral competitions.
Rohit Sharma showing to Babar Azam pic.twitter.com/AtV6BMxKts
— Ankit Pathak 🇮🇳 (@ankit_acerbic) January 24, 2023
Latham to Babar 😭🤣#IndvsNZ @BCCI #ShubmanGill #RohitSharma𓃵 pic.twitter.com/QXASJRAvgU
— Sindhian (@vishy_vishal) January 24, 2023
https://twitter.com/itz_pratham7/status/1617834411004919810
What is this behavior Babar Azam? 😂 😂 😂 pic.twitter.com/DrRePiavnC
— Ctrl C Ctrl Memes (@Ctrlmemes_) January 21, 2023
Speaking about India's triumph over New Zealand, captain Rohit Sharma and opener Shubman Gill were the heroes of the team's comfortable 90-run win as the two not only scored centuries but were also involved in a 212-run partnership for the opening wicket.
Continuing his outstanding form in the 50-over format, Shubman Gill smashed his second ton in the series against the Black Caps following his blistering double hundred in the first match in Hyderabad last week.
For the unversed, this was Shubman Gill's third three-figure score in his last four ODIs after hitting 116 against Sri Lanka in the final ODI and 208 against the Kiwis in the series opener.
En route to his explosive innings of 112 off 78 balls, Shubman Gill matched Babar Azam's record of scoring the most runs in a three-match ODI series.
With scores of 208, 40, and 112, the 23-year-old cricketer notched 360 runs in three games against the Tom Latham-led side, thus putting himself on par with Babar Azam.
On his part, Babar Azam had scored the same amount of runs against the West Indies in 2016.
Among other records that Shubman Gill created in Madhya Pradesh was going past Shikhar Dhawan's feat to become the fastest to four centuries in ODIs. While Shikhar Dhawan needed 24 knocks to get there, the Fazilka-born player achieved it in 21 innings.
Shubman Gill bettered Virat Kohli to become the first Indian to score at least 300 runs in a three-match ODI bilateral series. Previously, Virat Kohli held the record with his tally of 283 runs against Sri Lanka earlier this month.
Gill was aggressive from the outset, taking the New Zealand bowlers on from ball one. With loads of runs behind him in recent memory, the youngster started hitting the ball with brute force right from the start of the Indian innings, taking almost every New Zealand bowler to the cleaners.
Carrying on with his splendid run, the India batter cruised to his half-century in just 33 deliveries, before reaching his fourth ODI hundred sometime later. His knock of 112 was laced with 13 boundaries and five huge sixes.
On the other hand, Rohit Sharma after the India captain equaled Australian legend Ricky Ponting's record of 30 ODI hundreds in the third and final ODI against New Zealand in Indore on Tuesday.
Rohit Sharma's 101-run innings off 85 deliveries was his first international hundred across formats after 509 days and his first in ODIs since January 2020.
The last time Rohit Sharma made a century in any format of international cricket was in September 2021 when he reached the three-figure mark in the Oval Test against England. Since then, he had gone 53 innings without a ton, making 1555 runs with 12 fifties.
Laced by nine fours and six sixes, Rohit Sharma raced through to the landmark at the Holkar Stadium, finally bringing an end to his three-year wait for a 50-over hundred.
With Rohit Sharma joining Ricky Ponting to become the third-highest century scorer in ODIs, only two men stand ahead of him – Sachin Tendulkar (49) and Virat Kohli (46).
Alongside Ricky Ponting, Rohit Sharma now is the joint third-highest century-scorer in One-Day Internationals.
Captain Rohit Sharma was ecstatic after watching his side's comprehensive performance in all departments of the game.
“In the last six games we've done most things right in ODIs. We're consistent in our approach with the bat and ball. Without Siraj and Shami we wanted to give opportunities to other guys on the bench. We wanted to bring Chahal and Umran in the mix, put them under pressure. We had runs on the board, but on this kind of ground no total is safe. We stuck to the plans, held our nerves,” Rohit Sharma said at the post-match presentation ceremony.
“Shardul has been doing this for a while, so some people call him ‘Magician'. every time I've given Kuldeep the ball, he brings wickets. Just need to give him more games under his belt, because wristspinners get better as they play more,” Rohit Sharma added.
“Honestly, we don't talk too much about rankings. It's about winning games and it won't be different when we play the Tests against Australia. It won't be an easy challenge but we're up for it,” the India skipper concluded.
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