Rohit Sharma responded with a touch of annoyance to questions about Virat Kohli's overseas performance in recent years, dismissing them as irrelevant "outside talk" that hold no significance for the team.
In the second Test match against the West Indies in Port of Spain, Trinidad, former India captain Kohli finally broke his five-year-long Test century drought on foreign soil.
On Wednesday, when a journalist raised concerns about Kohli's lack of substantial innings, the Indian captain brushed off such speculations, emphasizing that the team remains unaffected by external opinions.
"I've answered this question a lot of times. All the outside talk, who scored how many, took how many wickets... people who say such things don't know what happens inside," Rohit said during a pre-match press conference for the first ODI against the West Indies here on Thursday.
"For us, what happens inside stays inside. We prefer that. For us, the most important thing is to win matches or series, not who's talking what. It doesn't matter to us."
"Our priority is the three ODI matches right now, we're focussing on that," he added.
"Inside talks remain inside and we want it to stay inside only. This is something that I have said a number of times and in future as well I will say this only," he added.
(AI image)
In Kohli's milestone 500th international match, he notched up yet another century, marking his 76th century for India. Remarkably, this century also marked his first away century since December 2018.
However, in the first Test in Dominica, Kohli's innings came to an end when he was dismissed for 76.
(With agency inputs)
