New Delhi, December 7: Remaining unbeaten at 94, with six sixes and six boundaries Virat gave India a feast of victorious beginning in the 3-match T20I series against the West Indies. Kohli proved that he’s not a player who hits the ball in the air to entertain the crowd but someone who wants to do his job and win matches for the country.
“Hopefully I have an idea of when to come up the order as a captain, and in a pressure situation, it’s important to push yourself and it’s a pleasure to perform for your team any day and get them across the line,” says Virat Kohli.
Kohli's last 68 runs came off 25 balls. In a mammoth 208 run chase, Virat Kohli walked out to bat when Rohit Sharma fell for 8 in the 4th over itself. The skipper had a shaky start to his blistering innings as he failed to execute his shots timely a couple of times. At one point, Kohli was 3 off 9 balls and 20 off 20 but the swashbuckling batsman then got into the groove, finishing with 94 runs off 50 balls.
In the 5th over of India's innings, Kohli got an inside edge that West Indies did not review. The skipper then nearly chopped on in the 11th over as he seemed to be trying too hard to force things. It was only in the second half of the innings that Virat Kohli changed his playing style and there was no stopping the captain thereafter.
In the 16th over of India's innings, Virat Kohli hit Kesrick Williams for a maximum and then imitated the bowler's famous notebook celebration where Kohli used his beat as a notebook to "tick" Kesrick's name off. Talking about that, Kohli said, "Williams had given me the notebook when he dismissed me in Jamaica, so I remembered it from there. We gave each other a high-five later. Play hard but respect the opponent."
"I am not someone who wants to entertain by hitting in the air. The aim is not to play slam-bang cricket. One of Rohit or I have to play along in this team. That's the role I play in every team I play in. Basic funda is that I don't want to change my game too much for T20Is. I'm an all-format player. I just want to score runs every game. There are a lot of distractions when you're chasing a big total. Like the scoreboard. But after 4-5 dot balls, the game puts you in a zone where you have no option but to focus on the game again." - Virat Kohli
“A total of 208 to defend, on any day, you’d take that 10 out of 10 times. Where we lost the game was the extras and our bowling. Our execution was poor. If we had executed the plans we had spoken about, despite the good batting wicket, it would have been a different scenario,” he said.
After being awarded the Man of the Match in the post-match presentation ceremony, Kohli advised the young cricketers to not follow his first-half of the innings!