Indian batting bigwig Rohit Sharma failed to score big on his return to international cricket during the first ODI against Australia on Sunday in Perth. Playing for Team India for the first time since the Champions Trophy 2025 final, Rohit was dismissed for 8 by Josh Hazlewood. Despite this low score, Rohit achieved a big feat as the first ODI became his 500th appearance in international cricket. He became the fifth India to achieve this feat, following Sachin Tendulkar, Virat Kohli, MS Dhoni, and Rahul Dravid.
Along with Rohit, the first ODI against Australia also marked the return of star batter Virat Kohli to Team India. Just like Rohit, Kohli also failed to impress with the bat as he was dismissed for a duck by Mitchell Starc.
Talking about Rohit, the former India skipper competed in the Indian Premier League (IPL), which concluded in June and since then has been out of action for months.
In 500 matches, Rohit scored 19,708 runs at an average of 42.18, with 49 centuries and 108 fifties and a best score of 264.
Rohit needs 54 more runs to overcome former indian captain Sourav Ganguly (11,221 runs) to become India's third-highest ODI run-getter.
In 273 matches, he has scored 11,168 runs at an average of 48.76 and a strike rate of 92.80, with 32 centuries and 58 fifties and a best score of 264.
Just three more centuries' worth of runs, and Rohit will be the 14th player to complete 20,000 international runs and only the fourth Indian player to do so.
With 49 international centuries to his name, his next century will be his 50th international cricket century, something only nine cricketers and only two from India, Sachin Tendulkar (100) and Virat Kohli (82), have done before.