How Did Lendl Simmons Silence Aggressive Kohli in T20 World Cup 2016 Semi-Finals?

(Lendl Simmons during his knock against India in the 2016 T20 World Cup Semi-Finals)

Since the start of the T20 World Cup in 2007, India has been the winner only once in the inaugural edition. Despite having the biggest T20 League in the world, India has struggled in the T20 World Cups and has made it to the Finals just once after winning the cup in 2014. However, the 2016 T20 World Cup was in India and it brought an amazing chance for the Indian team to lift the trophy. But it was the Semi-Finals match against West Indies, where the dream of lifting the T20 World Cup was shattered. It was the innings of Lendl Simmons that brought back West Indies back into the game. But there is an inside story about how Virat Kohli riled up Simmons to come out and play that innings. Looking to know it? Read below.

Lendl Simmons's innings of 82 runs in Semi-Finals

The 2nd Semi-Finals of the T20 World Cup 2016 was scheduled between India and West Indies at the Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai, and the whole crowd was filled with Indian supporters wearing Indian jerseys. At the toss, West Indies got it in their favour and hence went to the field first as the Wankhede Stadium had always favoured the chasing teams here. The Indian innings started well as Rohit Sharma and Ajinkya Rahane played cautiously and then in the 7th over, Virat Kohli arrived on the crease to uplift the team’s score.

He started hitting boundaries and took his chances as he was given reprieves by the West Indies fielders after missing an easy run-out and a catch. In the 16th over of the game, Ajinkya Rahane walked back to the pavilions after getting dismissed and it was MS Dhoni who entered the ground. The running between the wickets picked up the pace as both the batters were good runners. At the end of the innings, Virat Kohli finished at 89 runs from just 47 balls while MS Dhoni made 15 runs from 9 balls to take the Indian team to a total of 192 runs with the loss of 2 wickets in their 20 overs.

(Virat Kohli during his knock against West Indies in the Semi-Finals)

With a target of 193 runs in 20 overs, the task was going to be tough for the West Indies team, and in the first 3 overs, they lost the wickets of Chris Gayle and Marlon Samuels which got the scorecard at 2-19. But it was the partnership between Lendl Simmons and Johnson Charles that kept the team in the game. However, there was an incident as while batting, Lendl Simmons was consistently being sledged by Virat Kohli and it agitated him. To this, he made sure that it was the perfect time to play a big innings and shut him here. In an interview, Lendl Simmons said:

“When he (Virat Kohli) fielded, he said something to me, and I said to myself, 'I'm going to show you you're not the only good batsman. That's the way he is. He's very arrogant, he's very aggressive when he fields, and when he bats as well. He's just a very aggressive person. Those things motivate our players and it certainly motivated me. That really urged me to bat the way I did - to show him that he's not the only one who can do it. That played a big role. Every cricketer has his day and you just need to cash in when it is your day. I took full opportunity of that (caught off no-balls) to bat until the end. It was mind-blowing doing that with all those people supporting India and being very loud. It was the highlight of my career.”

In that match, Lendl Simmons had luck on his side as during his batting, he was caught at short third man by Jasprit Bumrah on the bowling of R Ashwin. However, later it was revealed that Ashwin had overstepped and hence he was given a life. After this, it was the 15th over of the innings where Lendl Simmons was again caught out at the covers by R Ashwin and this time, Pandya had overstepped which again gave the batter a chance to bat.

(Andre Russell during his innings against India in the 2016 T20 World Cup Semi-Finals)

Meanwhile, at the other end, Johnson Charles completed his half-century and then was dismissed by Virat Kohli on just the first ball of his over. After that Andre Russell came into the middle and took the game away from the Indian camp. With 20 needed off the final 2 overs, Andre Russell smashed Ravindra Jadeja for 12 runs, and then Virat Kohli came out to bowl the last over of the match with just 8 runs required. In just the 4 balls of the last over, Russell finished the match with a six and gave West Indies a spot in the Finals.

2016 T20 World Cup: A one to remember for Virat Kohli

The 2016 T20 World Cup took place in India and all the fans were eager to see the Indian team lifting their second T20 World Cup after 2007. Throughout the tournament, India played well and even reached the Semi-Finals of the tournament. But a defeat against West Indies knocked them out of the tournament and broke the dreams of 1.30 billion fans. However, the whole tournament was about just one batsman from the Indian team who carried the team in the batting department. Virat “King” Kohli was the batsman who made India get a place in the knockouts of the tournament.

(Virat Kohli in the 2016 T20 World Cup)

Name of the Player	Matches Played	Runs Scored	Average	Strike Rate
Virat Kohli	5	273	136.5	146.77
MS Dhoni	5	89	89	127.14
Rohit Sharma	5	88	17.6	107.31
Yuvraj Singh	4	52	13	100
Shikhar Dhawan	4	43	10.75	82.69

(India’s top run scorers in the 2016 T20 World Cup)

In the 5 matches played, Virat Kohli alone scored 273 runs while the other 4 batters combined weren’t able to score that much and it shows how much dependent the team was on Virat Kohli. Furthermore, his innings against Pakistan where he scored a crucial half-century made the team win. Besides this, the 82 runs knock against Australia was just unbelievable as he single-handedly knocked out the opponents from the T20 World Cup.