After scoring 41 and 45 in the second and third ODIs against England respectively,
Ajinkya Rahane vowed to convert his starts into big scores in the coming matches. In the next match, he played one of the more attractive innings we have seen, to bring up his first ODI century.
Rahane’s 106 off 100 balls at Edgbaston led India to a historic series win in England with a match to spare. Talking about his knock at the top-order in the absence of Rohit Sharma, Rahane said he was determined to make a big score and break the shackles of soft dismissals in the 40s.
“Somewhere I knew that a big innings was around the corner,” Rahane said. “When you are batting well, you don’t think too much. The only conscious effort I made was to focus more between 40 and 50 runs. I spoke to Ravi Shastri and that’s what he said as well. Once I crossed 50, I resumed with my natural game.
“I was really hurt with the way I got out in the third ODI – stumped for 45 – and I couldn’t sleep that night because it was a silly mistake on my part. But I was really determined in the fourth ODI to make it count,” he said.
Once again, Rahane was honest enough in admitting that his focus wavered a bit during that phase and was grateful to his team-mates for helping him correct it.
“When you get out softly in 30s and 40s, you have to admit that your focus is wavering a bit,” he said. “All my team-mates also helped me realize that, including the captain. He asked me to play as straight as possible for those 10 runs. It did increase my focus level a bit and it was enough.”
Rahane said that the key for him was to approach the 40s the same way as he would the 90s – with conscious concentration as well as positivity.
“It was similar. When I was on 44, I was determined to hit a six to get to my half century if I get the right ball. When I got to 47, Moeen Ali was bowling and Cook had six fielders up. I thought if I got the ball in my area, I will go for that six. I got it and I brought up the 50 with a sweep for a boundary. So, while I was trying hard to focus, I was also looking to be positive in my approach.”
Rahane’s free-flowing and confident strokeplay had a very positive impact on his opening partner, Shikhar Dhawan, who broke the streak of low scores in the Test series and the first couple of ODIs and posted an aggressive unbeaten 97 in Birmingham.
After the match, Dhawan acknowledged the calming effect Rahane had on him during their 183-run opening stand. Rahane said the plan was for him to put the England bowlers under pressure and let Dhawan play himself in.
“The ball was seaming around for the first five-six overs. I told him (Shikhar) that I will look to bat with a positive approach and will go for the big shots if the ball is there to be hit,” Rahane said. “I managed to get four boundaries off Anderson’s over and the momentum shifted totally in our favour.
“Shikhar told me to continue to back my game and play in the same way, which I did. That gave Shikhar the time to play himself in and after that I enjoyed his shots from the non-striker’s end.”
On his second tour to England, Rahane said he learned a lot of lessons from this experience and is a better cricketer for it.
“We were really hurt after the Test loss. The way we came back and played in the ODIs is really great. I learned a lot about my batting, how to approach Tests and ODIs and be ready mentally for any situation,” he said.
