India's tottering Border-Gavaskar Trophy defence may soon claim a second victim with skipper Rohit Sharma looking at the end of his test career after being dropped for the fifth and final test against Australia on Friday.

Unlike spinner Ravichandran Ashwin, who quit international cricket altogether after playing one of the first three tests in Australia, Rohit is likely to stay on as India's ODI captain with a home series against England and the Champions Trophy looming.

Rohit quit T20 Internationals immediately after guiding India to their second 20-overs World Cup title last year but his test career is likely to end not with a bang but with a whimper.

Trailing 2-1 heading into the series finale in Sydney, India took the "emotional" decision of dropping their struggling captain, who cannot find his mojo either in his usual opener's role or in the middle order.

Rohit has a single fifty in his last 15 test innings that include 10 single-digit scores and had to vacate his place so India could accommodate Shubman Gill back in the top order.

With their hopes of making the World Test Championship final effectively over, India's next test assignment will be a five-match series England in June-July.

Rohit will be 38 by then and few expect the Mumbai player to don the test whites again.

"I think it probably means that (if) India don't qualify for the WTC final, the Melbourne Test will be Rohit Sharma's last game," former India captain Sunil Gavaskar said during the lunch break on day one.

"We have probably seen Rohit Sharma for the last time in test cricket."

TOUGH DECISION

Former India coach Ravi Shastri had a similar feeling.

"If there was a home season coming up he might have thought of carrying on, but I think he might just pull the plug at the end of this test," Shastri said while commentating.

"He's not getting younger ... it's not that India don't have youngsters. There are very, very good players in the wings and it's time to build. Tough decisions, but there is a time for everything."

Rohit is a limited-overs stalwart scoring nearly 11,000 ODI runs with a 49-plus average.

He is the only batsman with three double hundreds in ODIs, including a 264 against Sri Lanka, which remains the highest individual score in this format.

Rohit could not reach the same high in test cricket though, and averages 40.57 after 67 matches with only two of his 12 hundreds coming abroad.

Jasprit Bumrah, who is leading India in Sydney, said Rohit had "opted out" of the match dismissing reports of any "selfishness" in the squad.

After Friday's play, wicketkeeper Rishabh Pant said it was a tough decision by the team management to drop the captain.

"Definitely it was an emotional decision because he's been captain for a long time," said Pant, whose fighting 40 was the highest individual score in India's first innings 185.

"We see him as a leader of the team... it was the management's call."