India's Rohit Sharma raises his bat after scoring hundred runs during the first day of the first cricket test match against South Africa in Visakhapatnam (AP)
Rohit Sharma announced himself as India's newest opener in the Test format with a stylish century on day 1 of the opening Test match against South Africa in Vishakhapatnam on Wednesday. And with his sensational and unbeaten 115 (as of the end of day 1), Rohit became the first Indian batsman to score a century each across formats as an opener, while also scripting three other records in the format, one of which places him alongside the greatest, Sir Don Bradman.
Rohit scored his first century as an opener in 2013, against Australia in Jaipur where he had notched up an unbeaten 141 to help India win by an emphatic margin of nine wickets. And a year, he ramped up an impressive 106 against South Africa in a T20I contest in 2015 at Dharamshala. While he has failed to achieve the triple-figure mark at a position down the batting order in T20Is, Rohit does have two tons under his belt when it comes to the ODI format both of which were scored batting at No.4. Meanwhile, in Test cricket, Rohit had scored three separate tons at No.6.
Overall, Rohit is the seventh batsman in the world to score a century in each format of the game as an opener, after Chris Gayle, Brendon McCullum, Martin Guptill, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Ahmed Shehzad, Shane Watson, and Tamim Iqbal.
Rohit also became the fourth Indian batsman to score a century in his maiden innings as a Test opener after Shikhar Dhawan (187 vs Australia Mohali 2012/13), KL Rahul (110 vs Australia SCG 2014/15) and Prithvi Shaw (134 vs West Indies Rajkot 2018/19). It was Rohit's fourth century overall with all being scored on home soil which places him third alongside Arjuna Ranatunga, Joe Hardstaff, R Mahanama, G Whittall and Aiden Markram in the list of most centuries at home without scoring one at home.
Earlier in the day, with Rohit reaching his half-century mark, the 32-year-old became the second Indian batsman after Rahul Dravid to score six straight fifty-plus scores on home soil. His last five scores at home are: 50* (vs Sri Lanka in 2017), 65* (vs Sri Lanka in 2017), 102* (vs Sri Lanka in 2017), 51* (vs New Zealand in 2017) and 82 (vs New Zealand in 2017).
But the statistics that stands out for the day is that in his 27-match Test career, Rohit has already managed to equal one of Bradman's greatest feat. Both the cricketers have the highest batting average at their respective home countries -- 98.22 (minimum 10 innings), although the legendary cricketer stands far ahead of the Indian in terms of runs scored. While Bradman managed 4322 runs in 33 Tests at home with 18 centuries, Rohit has managed to amass 884 runs in 10 Tests with four hundreds.
