India ODI captain and Mumbai Indians veteran Rohit Sharma is going through a rough phase while looking like a pale shadow of himself, reckons cricketer-turned-broadcaster Sanjay Manjrekar.

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After failing in the side’s tournament opener against Chennai Super Kings (CSK), where he got out on a four-ball duck, Rohit failed against Gujarat Titans (GT) in the next match, getting out inside the first over. Though he hit two good-looking shots for fours on the leg side, he failed to put bat to the ball to an incoming delivery from Mohammed Siraj, who clean bowled him on eight - his 80th single-digit dismissal in the cash-rich league. 

Watching him struggle against the moving ball time and again, Manjrekar feels Rohit is no more the Rohit of four or five years ago, as he has to put in extra yards every time to be among the runs.

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"Rohit Sharma is clearly going through a phase," Manjrekar said on JioStar after MI’s second loss of the season. "He's not the Rohit Sharma of, say, three to four years ago. He's at a stage in his career where he has to push himself every morning - train hard and be at his best - because things are slipping away for him. He's still relying on his natural talent and instincts."

Rohit endured a lean patch in international cricket the past season. Since the home season began, he failed to find his touch, scoring just one fifty (52) throughout (against Bangladesh in September). While his lowest came against New Zealand during the home Test series, where India got whitewashed for the first time in history, Rohit’s batting slump continued making headlines Down Under, where he scored just 31 runs in five innings. 

Despite changing positions, he failed to get going, leading to him sitting out of the fifth and final Test in Sydney, which India lost within three days and conceded the BGT for the first time in a decade.

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Though Rohit hit an ODI hundred against England in the lead-up to the first showpiece event of the year, his best came against New Zealand in the Champions Trophy final, wherein he scored a match-winning 76.

Manjrekar digs deep into MI’s loopholes

Explaining what went wrong for the former five-time winners who lost the second match by 36 runs, Manjrekar said they never looked comfortable in the chase after losing two wickets inside the Powerplay, even comparing it to how GT maximised their momentum in the first innings. 

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“Mumbai Indians didn't look in the race when they lost two wickets for 35 [against GT]. In comparison, Gujarat Titans had around 129 runs for their first two wickets. After that, it seemed like Tilak Varma and Suryakumar Yadav were trying to build a partnership. 

“The challenge with building a partnership in a chase of over 190 is that the required run rate starts to suffer, and that's exactly what happened. In the end, you have to say that Gujarat Titans batted better - I thought they got maybe 15 to 20 runs over par,” Manjrekar explained.

Meanwhile, Mumbai lost both contested games this season, with their next scheduled against the defending champions Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) at home on Monday (Mar 31). 

(With inputs from agencies)