Former India Strength and Conditioning (S&C) coach Soham Desai has lashed out at former Indian captain Rohit Sharma’s critics, revealing that the latter overcame a career-threatening injury in 2017 after India’s defeat to Pakistan in the ICC Champions Trophy final.
In a podcast with Prashant Desai, Soham disclosed that Rohit underwent surgery on his hamstring and his hip flexor after sustaining a major injury in 2017. Notably, Rohit has worked a lot on his fitness lately after retiring from Tests and T20Is.
“So people say this Rohit is lazy, mota hai (that he’s fat), training nahi karta hai (that he doesn’t train). People need to understand this: that Rohit Sharma had a career-threatening injury around his hip in 2017 — Champions Trophy jab hum log hare the Pakistan ke samne final, wo wali mein (after the Champions Trophy final against Pakistan). So he has got surgeries in his hamstring and his hip flexor and all that,” Soham revealed.
“Around his hip is his weak spot. If he doesn’t train for a minimum of two strength sessions in a week, he is a red flag, he is a ticking bomb. And that is the scenario for the last seven to eight years. So if he was not working hard, if he was lazy, he wouldn’t have lasted till today. Forget about scoring runs, leading in the IPL, playing twelve months, all formats. For the last seven-eight years, so it has been non-negotiable. Either he has to do that or he has to work in a particular manner on the ground. Without those two, he cannot last and this is not a secret,” he added.
Soham, who currently works with Lucknow Super Giants, also highlighted the contrasting training methods of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma, noting that Rohit focuses more on explosive strength work and running due to his injury history, while Kohli primarily relies on lifting and basic strength training.
“Rohit is very strength based and very explosive and reactive based of training. And Virat [Kohli] almost never runs in comparison because he doesn’t need to. His work comes from the ground, and he does only lifting and basic strength work when it comes to training. Whereas for him [Rohit], because of his injury history, if he doesn’t do strength — particular manner of strength — then he is going to be creating that gap bigger and bigger. And also he needs to do his basic running work to keep his hamstring, quads and everything in good rhythm,” he observed.
“He (Rohit) has gotten time now. He retired from T20Is and Tests. So he’s got time where he can control things. When you are on the road playing three formats, you cannot control things. You have to play by what the game dictates,” he concluded.
