All Eyes on KOHLI

by Abhishek Chakraborty 

The Indian Cricket Team is all set to lock horns with the mighty Aussies in yet another tour down under. And guess what to no one’s surprise, it ain’t ‘Mission India’ but ‘Mission Kohli’ for the kangaroos this time around. They have their ploy set, and it ain’t sledging!! No, you don’t do that to Virat Kohli, he rides on it and pays it heavily back at you. He’s being literally worshipped like they do it here in India, he’s being given gala treatment, almost naming him as the ‘Best Player on the Planet Currently’ & now that he has set foot on their soil, let the festivities begin.

The Indian contingent will be on their first international assignment post COVID resumption of cricket in bio-bubble environment. After the successful completion of the 13th edition of the Indian Premier League in UAE that saw Mumbai Indians secure their 5th title overall with back to back championships, the fans of the cricket frenzy nation of India are divided over one aspect of the game – Captaincy across formats ~ Kohli vs Rohit !!

A left hamstring injury in the IPL saw India’s one of the most successful limited overs opener, Rohit Sharma getting only named in the Test squad and being omitted from the ODIs and T20Is which led to massive speculation back home over the clarity upon the decision making. Now, since Rohit lifted his 5th IPL trophy as the MI skipper, while Kohli continues to struggle to bag one for eight consecutive years, the jury is out there. Also Rohit had a massive 2019 ICC ODI World Cup in India’s semifinal campaign and oozed enough glimpses to push his name in there to be thought for split captaincy roles as many other cricket playing nations have opted that course and has beared fruit. Therefore it all leads up nicely to an interesting tour where Virat Kohli must prove his mettle in leading the side well (more so in limited overs) versus an unhandicapped Aussie side this time around. The likes of Warner, Smith, Starc, Cummins will be eyeing redemption.

Kohli is slated to return back home on paternity leave after the 1st D/N pink ball Adelaide Test, so his litmus test spans for that while of the tour. Rohit’s absence has meant KL Rahul will don the hat of vice captaincy in the limited overs formats deservedly while Rahane takes over the Test side from Kohli in his absence from the 2nd Test. Rahane’s taking over of the Test side has raised enough eyebrows since he hasn’t been in that leader’s frame of mind for long now as Kohli has done relatively better as skipper in the longest format of the game and Rahane, himself hasn’t been in the best of forms in the last two to three series, hence it remains to be a question on, “Will he (Rahane) be able to run the side with the same authority and command his presence as a skipper of the side in such a high voltage prestigious Border-Gavaskar Trophy series?” Australian tours are known to be among the toughest of all tours in the cricketing fraternity as it is often said they (Aussies) hunt in packs since the time you land in there, be it the general public, news agencies, the dailies & the spectators, all set a particular narrative and abide by it throughout the tour duration facilitating opposition’s mental disintegration as there is no respite. But Aussie experts like Justin Langer, Allan Border and the likes of Pat Cummins, Tim Paine has gone the way of appeasing Kohli to the highest extent.

It would be interesting to see how Kohli performs having got the importance that he has and also knowing that results of such tours can go a long way in determining his captaincy future as the ICC World Cups are round the corner and that too in home soil, India. Well going by his batting stats, Kohli kinda rules it down under, he is the only overseas batsman to have scored 5 or 5+ Centuries in both ODI & Test formats in Australia, 6 in Tests while 5 in ODIs to be precise. In the absence of Rohit in the limited overs series back to back, the onus would highly shift on Kohli to lead from the front with the bat along with in form KL Rahul & Shikhar Dhawan. Having not got a satisfactory IPL outing, one hopes the hunger of Virat Kohli will be all the more and send all kinds of speculations to rest by performing above par and repeating the feats of the last tour yet again or even better it against this highly capable strong Aussie squad in their own backyard.