Indian legends Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli were seen interchanging in the nets ahead of the second ODI in Raipur. During such practice sessions, Rohit can be seen saving his head from direct hits from Virat Kohli.
India defeated South Africa by a close margin of 17 runs in a thrilling, high-scoring encounter at the Ranchi JSCA International Cricket Stadium. After a winning start, the team moved towards Raipur looking more confident than before.
However, the Proteas will remain one of the most challenging opponents as they have set a high standard in the first ODI. The Protea middle order and lower order took them very close to victory.
Virat Kohli almost broke Rohit Sharma’s head with a direct hit.
Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma are two modern talented players of international white ball cricket from India. With over 25000 runs between the two greats in ODI cricket, this could be the strongest pair ever to play together for any team.
Earlier, Sourav Ganguly and Sachin Tendulkar had made a pair that scored similar number of runs for India. Before the Raipur ODI, both were seen chatting in the nets. While batting, Virat Kohli lofted a ball over Rohit’s head, and the Indian opener was taken by surprise.
Thereafter, Rohit soon came on strike and looked to play more on the square boundaries, unlike Kohli, who looked quite focused on scoring runs in the V, which is between mid-wicket and the deep extra-cover region.
Virat Kohli hit such a straight shot that Rohit Sharma standing at the other end got scared and immediately bowed down.
RO-KO moment pic.twitter.com/xL2ldQkH0E
– ๐๐ฎ๐ฌ๐ก๐ข๐ข๐ขโดโต (@Rushiii_12) 3 December 2025
Rohit and Virat are now the second best ODI pair in the history of the game
In the Ranchi match, Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli had put on 136 runs for the second wicket for India, giving the Blues a solid start and the much-needed momentum early in the innings.
With this partnership, he overtook the former record of Kumar Sangakkara and T. Dilshan for the second highest number of runs in a partnership in the ODI format. With 5500+ runs and 20 century partnerships, they are now behind only the great Sachin-Sourav duo in ODIs.
Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly opened the innings for India for a long time and have scored over 8000+ runs in the partnership between them.
Indian batsmen find balls in the nets as Raipur prepares for a high-end thriller between India and South Africa
The stage is set for an exciting second ODI match between India and South Africa in Raipur. Indian batsmen have been successful in winning the matches with their big hits. From Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Rishabh Pant and Ravindra Jadeja to Dhruv Jurel and Nitish Kumar Reddy, everyone has hit the ball out of the park.
Tilak Verma also admitted that every player was busy hitting sixes; Only KL Rahul and Tilak Verma were seen making some different efforts in the nets. India will probably not make any changes in the second ODI as the bowlers have also performed very impressively in Ranchi.
Raipur
Vibe set for 2⃣th #INDvSA ODI#TeamIndia , @IDFCFIRSTBANK pic.twitter.com/35RMFvux9J
โ BCCI (@BCCI) 3 December 2025
Also read: Rohit Sharma received information from BCCI about his future
