Rohit Sharma Reveals Reason Behind No Century Celebration In 5th ODI

Opener Rohit Sharma ended a personal South African hoodoo and set up a series win for India in the 5th ODI at St George's Park on Tuesday. The stylish right-hander's 115 was his first major innings in three tours of South Africa -- and India's 73-run win enabled the tourists to take a winning 4-1 lead in the six-match series, their first success in seven bilateral or multi-team series in South Africa. Rohit's 17th ODI century ended a run of low scores in South Africa. In 19 previous innings across both Tests and One-day Internationals, his previous highest score was 47 and he had scored only 249 runs at an average of 13.11. Given the pressure that had mounted on him to deliver, Rohit's subdued celebration after reaching the three-figure mark came as a surprise.

During the post-match press conference, Rohit revealed the reason for his quiet century celebration. 

“Two guys got run out before me so there was nothing to celebrate about. It depends on what kind of mood you are in. Two of our batsmen got run out, so I wanted to carry on and the celebration was not in my mind at all,” Rohit said during the post-match press conference.

The Mumbai batsman was involved in two run outs, that of captain Virat Kohli and middle-order batsman Ajinkya Rahane.

"I got out in three matches only, how can you say form is bad after three matches? You guys put people in good form after one match, and if somebody doesn't have three good matches, you say he is in bad form," Sharma quipped.

"In 2013 it was different. I had just turned into an opener from a middle-order batsman. The way I am batting now, it has evolved a lot. Whatever happened before 2013 and in 2013, forget about that," he added, referring to his poor past record in South Africa. Sharma said it was just not fair to declare anybody a failure or success on the basis of two or three performances.

(With inputs from PTI)