Kohli rues: ‘We let ourselves down’
For a batting colossus with 70 international centuries and an average of 50-plus in all three formats, Virat Kohli has now gone 20 innings without raising his bat and helmet.
If you’re an Indian fan that’s worrying, but not quite as alarming as the manner of their 10-wicket defeat to New Zealand in the first test at Wellington’s Basin Reserve.
Kohli scored two and 19 as
India managed just 165 and 191 after being sent in to bat.
Ranked
No 1 in the world in test and ODI cricket, Kohli hasn’t fired in New Zealand as the tourists have now lost four straight.
His 51 in the first ODI in Hamilton, before he was fooled by an Ish Sodhi googly, remains Kohli’s highest score of the past month and he averages 22.33 from nine innings on tour.
Kohli’s most recent international century was in the second test against Bangladesh in Kolkata in November. It’s been two Wellington innings and nine each in ODIs and T20s since then, but the skipper said: ‘‘I’m absolutely fine. I am batting really well.’’
New Zealand swing bowler Trent Boult noted how Kohli and others liked to feel ball on bat early in their innings, hence the short-pitched approach to frustrate them on day three.
Kohli was removed by debutant Kyle Jamieson on day one fishing at a wider one, then Boult snared his prized wicket with a helmet-high bouncer that Kohli took on and edged.
India’s skipper told a packed press conference at the Basin’s Norwood Room: ‘‘When you play so much cricket and you play for so long, obviously you’ll have 3-4 innings that don’t go your way. If you try and make too much out of it, it’ll keep piling on.
‘‘It’s about staying in a good space and I know the chat on the outside changes with one innings. But I don’t think like that. If I thought like people on the outside, I would probably be on the outside right now.’’
Having arrived in New Zealand after seven straight test wins and built a runaway lead in the World Test Championship, India’s bubble burst at the Basin.
‘‘We didn’t show enough competitiveness. We let ourselves down massively with the bat in the first innings,’’ Kohli said.