India is a nation with more than 130 crores of dreams. In every street, there are budding sports athletes who want to don the Indian jersey. Majority of them are inclined towards one famed sport ‘Cricket’. So, earning a spot in the Indian Cricket team is a proud achievement as millions are competing for a limited 15-member International squad.
What if you take that position for granted and become a liability to the team? Should past performances alone be the yardstick to reserve your spot, even after consistent failures at key moments? Isn’t it an injustice with the other talented Cricketers? As the opportunities are very scarce. Additionally, the inform player sitting out on benches doesn’t benefit the nation as by the time he gets a delayed chance, the peak form of the athlete is a gone case.
Earlier, the voices which were murmuring about the possibility of dropping Virat Kohli has gained support from former greats of Indian cricket. So isn’t it pragmatic that Virat gives way to inform players or selectors to stand up to him and do the much needed hard talk.
Read More: Virat Kohli has undone everything that he achieved in the last one decade
From ‘Greatest of All Time’ to ‘pathetic form’
The young Virat Kohli, full of passion and aggression literally ruled the 22-yard pitch with his master-class performances. With his splendid knocks he earned many famed titles like Run-Machine, Greatest of all time, Best batsmen in all formats, little master and what not. In the race of the best batsmen – Roots, Wiliamsons, Smiths and others were way behind his stature. But unfortunately it has been around three years without him scoring a century. His last century came way back in late 2019. On 22nd November 2019 he scored a blistering hundred against Bangladesh.
Since then he has no big achievement to show. After that marvellous inning against Bangladesh, he has played in 65 International matches and got the opportunity to bat 76 times. In these matches, his average is 36.37 which is below average for a player of his calibre. He has scored 2510 runs at a strike rate of 117.09 which stands on the lower side as compared to today’s fast paced cricketing era. In the ongoing T20 series with England, he made just 12 runs in two innings.
The table shows how he has struggled in scripting the same as yesteryear’s Virat could.
His scores in the last 11 International innings demonstrates that he is in the worst of form in his entire Cricket career. His best in last 11 matches is just 52 runs which in any manner doesn’t hint him to be the best batsmen in current time.
| Run | Format | Opponent |
| 18 | ODI | West Indies |
| 0 | ODI | West Indies |
| 17 | T20I | West Indies |
| 52 | T20I | West Indies |
| 45 | Test | Sri Lanka |
| 23 | Test | Sri Lanka |
| 13 | Test | Sri Lanka |
| 11 | Test | England |
| 20 | Test | England |
| 1 | T20I | England |
| 11 | T20I | England |
The breakaway of his knocks also hints that earlier, the Champion Kohli who had a habit of converting fifties to a big knock is falling shot to live upto his set standards.
| Score Range | Number of times out in that run range | Percentage wise |
| 0 | 8 | 12 |
| 1-9 | 12 | 17 |
| 10-19 | 14 | 20 |
| 20-29 | 7 | 10 |
| 30-39 | 3 | 4 |
| 40-49 | 6 | 9 |
| 50-89 | 19 | 28 |
| 90+ | 0 | 0 |
Domestic Cricket the way forward
The Cricketing legend Kapil Dev has come out openly to advocate the idea of dropping out-of-form Virat Kohli from the team. He asked a valid question that if the World’s number 2 test bowler Ashwin can be dropped from playing eleven then why not the same for Virat Kohli?
He said, “If he isn’t performing, you can’t continue to keep these boys out. I hope there’s a healthy fight for selection, the youngsters should look to outperform Kohli. But Kohli needs to think, ‘yes at one point I was a big player, but I need to play like that No. 1 player again’. That’s a problem for the team, it’s not a bad problem”.
He added, “If world No. 2 Test bowler Ashwin can be dropped from Test side then your No. 1 batter can also be dropped”.
The same was emphasised by another cricketing legend Venkatesh Prasad. He pointed out the stark difference between earlier times and current cricketing players. Earlier, it was seen that out-of-form star players were dropped from the team unlike today’s time when players are given rest instead. He has given notable examples of the past when greats like Sourabh Ganguly and others went back to domestic cricket and came back even stronger in the national team.
There was a time when you were out of form, you would be dropped irrespective of reputation. Sourav, Sehwag,Yuvraj,Zaheer, Bhajji all have been dropped when not in form. They have went back to domestic cricket, scored runs and staged a comeback. The yardsticks seem to have 1/2
— Venkatesh Prasad (@venkateshprasad) July 10, 2022
Team game and Performance of the day decides the result
Cricket is a game between bat and ball, not an individual driven sport where your attitude alone can decide the result on that day. Don’t forget on any given day, Ireland or any ICC associated member nation team can outperform a star studded English/Aussies/India/SouthAfrica or other inform champion side. A team with handy contributions of all 11 players often defeats a side where star players play on their past merit and fail to live up to their names on that day.
Read More: Virat Kohli was supposed to be the next Tendulkar but he ended up as an over accomplished Kambli
Indian Cricket team is not like Ireland, Netherland or even Bangladesh who depend on one star individual and Shakib has to be there to keep the morale high of the team. India is full of talented guys like Surya Kumar Yadav (SKY), Ambati Rayudu, Dinesh Kartik and Deepak Hudda among others who are knocking on the door with their peak in-form performance yet fail to make it through because of someone playing merely on past reputation.
Read More: Virat Kohli vs. Sunil Chhetri: One invites criticism and the other is closed to it.
India has a solid bench strength who had shown their mettle in the Aussie test series when several of our top mavericks were down and out with injuries. Yet India registered the one of the bravest and strongest fightbacks to clinch the Border-Gavaskar series with our reserves delivering at all key moments of the series.
India has moved from – Sachin! Sachin! To – Kohli! Kohli! So, it is not impossible
that some new prodigy just like the great Sachin and Kohli comes up and outperforms their legacy. Don’t forget Cricket is not a sport in India, it is more than that, to some it is even a religion.
Having said that, we hope that we are proven wrong in the very next game Virat plays and scores a feisty hundred which the nation is awaiting for far too long. While as a Kohli fan, we want that to happen asap but as a fan of Indian Cricket too pragmatic seems to be the need of the hour. So, recent performance by your bat and ball, not your past legacy, should be the yardstick to get you a spot in the much desired Indian cricket team.
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