4 min readChennaiUpdated: Jul 14, 2026 09:41 PM IST There is something Rohit Sharma needs more than runs at the moment. It is the assurance that his place is safe for now as far as the plans for the 2027 World Cup are concerned. Since announcing his retirement from Test cricket ahead of the Australia tour last October, Rohit’s string of scores in ODIs before the IPL read: 8, 73, 121*, 57, 14, 75, 26, 24 and 11 against South Africa and New Zealand. This season, which began with a cloud of uncertainty around his future darker than ever, he had returns of 16, 48 and 79 against Afghanistan. On Tuesday, at Edgbaston, he was dismissed for 11 off 21 deliveries. More than the runs, the noticeable change is that the attacking template which set the tone at the 2023 World Cup has quietly disappeared. It was Rohit who, back in 2022, gauged the trend in white-ball cricket and laid a blueprint that India followed through to the T20 World Cup. The plan was simple: …