Tranquil Kohli’s 'twitchy' failure means nothing for team India
Getty
Tranquil, calm, composed are not some of the words that we attach to the Indian skipper Virat Kohli, however, against New Zealand he was all of that, more than ‘twitchy.’ Kohli as a batsman has always thrived on driving the opponents with his confidence - helping him convert the start into totals.
A 2020 version of the Indian skipper Virat Kohli is everything of that, calm and composed when batting at the crease without over-the-top exuberant celebration. The near Buddha-esque version of Kohli when India is batting has been one of the best versions of the skipper that we have seen on a cricket field. The 31-year-old’s technique perhaps if any has been twitchy, as exposed early in the 2014 Test series against England. A picturesque memory for the English fans, a painful pill-like experience for the Indians, seeing one of the best in the world reduced to one outside off. His struggle was real, one that you could not bear to see with your eyes, one that gives the Indian fans nightmare.
For we have not seen such dismissals in a very long time, with the likes of Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid all punching and caressing it effortlessly through the covers. The signs were reading danger, but never, in reality, read it in bold. When it is in bolds, that is when a batsmen’s time at the crease, in the dressing room is coming to an end. The kind of bold ones that Murali Vijay got during his end-game with the Indian team. He was lacking confidence and technique, similar to Kohli in England you suppose. There was one difference, the Delhi batsmen punched his weight beyond and came out like a ‘sun’ in the gloomy English weather the next time India visited England.
And in between the away tours to England, the Indian skipper brought his ‘A’ game against Australia. Just to rekindle the grey cells in your brain, Kohli scored only 692 runs in the series, in five Tests averaging a paltry 86.50. Well, by his standards, he should have been over 100 right? After all, Kohli is an alien, the kind of one that has eluded India ever since Sachin Tendulkar last stepped on the field. Effortlessly, he stroked it past the Australians, both with his performance and with his ‘middle-finger,’ to the home side and the fans. Four hundreds in Australia, and Kohli suddenly becomes the main-stay Indian batsman from the struggling one that he put against England.
Same Kohli, a few days apart, carried the entire nation on his wrist. The flicky wrist, the calming mind yet emotionally, his mind filled as much as a balloon with water before it is about to pop. Yet, he put in long sessions, soaked in the emotional cacophony of his own self, battling the inner demon that prevented him in the harshest of the English conditions.
Out of all, it was Kohli, himself, who shut all the critics, put himself into the cocoon and produced the results. In 2020, after just one Test against New Zealand, the cocoon has come back, this time in multi-folds after just two innings. The reason, Kohli’s astronomical rise in cricket, in Test cricket where he has challenged some of the best, posing a real threat to Sachin Tendulkar’s record. Averaging 10.5, scoring 21 runs, fingers have come back pointing at India’s centre-piece. While 2014 was his worst season thus far, he came back strong in the next two, pulling everything in his end, putting the doubts aside. In 2015, he averaged 42.66 for his 640 runs in 15 innings.
And, 2016, he put an end to his slump, scoring 1215 runs at an average of 75.93, which is astronomical to even be compared with some of the legends from the yesteryears. In an age and year, when critics are coming in from every nook and corner, Kohli admitted that the best thing to do is shut yourself from all the noises.
“First things first, block all the noise from outside. People want us to think it is a massive loss so that our preparations are blocked. Keeping us mentally in a bad space will help some sides. We as a side have never paid heed to the outside noise and we will continue to do that. Wins and losses on an international level are part of things,” the 30-year-old said after the Test.
In 2014, his form, confidence all were shattered, because of the noise from outside. In his peak, Sachin Tendulkar too was a victim of the noise from outside and when he shut it down, he owned the ring like a raging boxer. His punches vicious, landing straight at the opponent’s face leaving some bowlers undesired. He made the greatest of bowlers look like a muppet, his strength was countering the mental games from the opposition.
In Australia, when Sachin was edging everything outside the off, he decided that the best thing for him to do was to hit the ball on the up straight. That one decision, shaped, reshaped the way Sachin was looked at, for the ‘God’ of cricket wanted to change himself after a few bad games. That is Sachin, and this is Kohli. The brutal, the more vigorous version of the master himself, who relies on playing the mind games, mastering Australia in their own backyard. All of this, purely, down to the fact that his aggression plays a vital role. This series, Kohli has looked calm and composed, which has not quite helped his cause. For the Kohli, we know, has a trigger response to the raging response and sledges from the opposition.
And, hence, the animated Kohli in the field, when it looked so unnecessary on his part. He plays the game that way, rather, he plays his music that way, loud and a few find it annoying as well. However, at the end of the day, that gives him the result, and the result is not even comparable to some of the players out there, it has broken all the walls. Early in his career, many put up their opinion of just giving one more go to Kohli, yet ten years down the lane, the opinion and the numbers are put to a well-deserved rest.
"I am batting well. I think the occasional score does not reflect your batsmen and it happens when you are unable to implement your plans properly," said Kohli after the first Test.
For all the questions about his technique, it has given him the result in the past. When he was down and out against England, he came back against James Anderson, the bowler who haunted him as the darkness does for a child. Yet, he grew up to be the boy who shut the darkness in its own game, and here in his own backyard. Such is Kohli’s calibre and his dedication, is beyond one’s imagination. Yes, his technique has invited some unwanted applications in the past, but he has corrected them from time to time, and this time too one inning, the burst of confidence will mute all the critics circling on Twitter. His confidence has always been the one that has been at the crosshair of his aim, and if it is on point, it is only time before he pulls off an audacious cover drive off a similar delivery, sending the Trent Boult demon out of Hagley Oval, probably to the Basin Reserve.
