Virat Kohli’s breakout century in Perth, amid the personal gloom of 2024, is looking more and more like a false dawn with every failure.
The Indian legend came to Australia down on form but rose to the occasion brilliantly in the Perth victory. On Monday, he followed twin failures in the Adelaide second Test loss with another flop, caught behind off Josh Hazlewood for three off 16 balls.
It continued the Aussie paceman’s incredible hold over the Indian batter. Hazlewood has now dismissed Kohli 11 times in internationals – five in Test matches, five in ODIs and once in a T20i.
The nature of his dismissal – again tempted into a loose shot outside off for the fourth time in the series – angered Indian fans and pundits, who are fast running out of patience with him.
Before the Perth ton Kohli had had averaged 20.62 across his ten most recent Test innings, going seven Tests and 17 months without reaching three figures. Five of his six innings against New Zealand ended in failure, along with a 70.
For the first time since December 2014, Kohli found himself outside the top 20 on the ICC Test batting rankings this year. After Perth, he’s back in 20th spot.
Indian legend Sunil Gavaskar slammed Kohli for a “poor” choice, coming just before one of the several rain delays.
“If it was on the fourth stump I could understand,” Gavaskar said on Channel 7. “This was wide, on the seventh, eighth stump, you could say. There’s no need to play that.
“He’d be very, very disappointed, he’d be very upset with that. Even before Rishabh Pant faced a ball, the rain started to come down and the covers have come on. If Kohli had shown a bit of patience he could be not out with KL Rahul.”
Former star Sanjay Manjrekar pointed the finger at the team’s coaching staff as Kohli suffered a familiar fate amidst a top order collapse of 4-48.
Gautam Gambhir is the team’s head coach while Abhishek Nayar and Ryan ten Doeschate are working as the assistant coaches.
“I guess the time has come to scrutinise the role of a batting coach in the Indian team. Why major technical issues have remained unresolved for so long with certain Indian batters,” Manjrekar wrote on X.
In reply one fan wrote “Who’s gonna teach Virat to play? To stop flirting outside the off stump? It’s not that he doesn’t know all this. Only, a casual and adamant attitude can lead to the same dismissal every single time.”
Another added: “It’s a joke. but who’s the batting coach..?”
Indian fans on social media hammered their one-time hero – with many suggesting it was time for the 36-year-old to call it a day.