'Will never leave RCB till the time I play IPL ' says Virat Kohli

Mumbai, April 25: Indian captain Virat Kohli who is also the captain of the Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB)  though the side has not won a title in 12 years, he stated, he will never leave RCB till the time he plays for Indian Premier League (IPL) citing the love and loyalty of the RCB fans as the reason behind it.

 

 

Kohli had held an Instagram live session with RCB teammate AB de Villiers on Friday. “It has been 12 years. It has been such an amazing journey, so surreal. It is always going to be our dream, winning the IPL together. There is no scenario where I could think of leaving the team ever. You can feel emotional about the season going well or not but to have that loyalty with Bangalore with RCB it's quite surreal. Till the time I am playing IPL, I am never leaving this team. The fans, their loyalty has been amazing,” said Kohli.

 

The skipper has played 177 matches for RCB so far and has managed to score 5,412 runs in the tournament. He has created a record of scoring most runs in IPL edition where he had smashed 973 runs including four centuries and seven half-centuries.

 

De Villers, too stated, “Same for me. I never want to leave RCB but to do that I got to keep scoring runs. I am not the captain you see”.

 

The duo even went to pick India-South Africa ODI XI players. The list included Sachin Tendulkar, Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, Ab de Villiers, Jacques Kallis, MS Dhoni (captain), Yuvraj Singh, Yuzvendra Chahal, Dale Steyn, Jasprit Bumrah and Kagiso Rabada.

 

Both of them informed their fans that they will be auctioning their RCB kits of the match against Gujarat Lions in the 2016 IPL edition to raise funds in combating the coronavirus pandemic.

 

In the Green Day match against Gujarat Lions, both of them had scored centuries where they put a challenging 248 target against Gujarat Lions. RCB had won the match by 144 runs. "In 2016 IPL match against Gujarat Lions, we both scored centuries, it was a good partnership, it was an enjoyable one, I got 120 odd and you got your hundred towards the end, it was Green game, we did our bit for creating awareness about the environment," the South African batsman said.

 

He added, "The plan now is to get our kits to go for an online auction, the green kits would go for auction, people can go and bid and all the proceed will go the COVID-19 fund and it is a cause which will provide food to the maximum number of people."

 

The IPL 2020 which was supposed to kick-start on March 29 has been postponed due to the novel coronavirus pandemic.