India star Virat Kohli is usually a fireball on the pitch. Particularly during his time as India’s captain, Kohli had formed a reputation for wearing his heart on his sleeve and approaching every game with an aggressive, but fair, demeanour. However, Friday saw a contrasting side of Kohli’s during Day 3 of the first Test between India and New Zealand. With Rachin Ravindra given out, the entire team had gotten up in celebration. However, commentators Harsha Bhogle and Ian Smith spotted that Kohli had kept his celebrations muted.
In the 89th over of the New Zealand innings, Ravindra had been given out caught behind off Mohammed Siraj‘s bowling. Not only had the entirety of the Indian team gone up in celebration, even umpire Michael Gough had convincingly given it out.
However, after a hestitant review, replays showed that the ball actually had not touched Ravindra’s bat, but instead a separate noise had appeared. Therefore, Ravindra survived.
It was then that former batter and now commentator Ian Smith pointed out that Kohli, at first slip, had not celebrated at all during the whole proceedings. Replays confirmed that Kohli had indeed not celebrated.
Fellow commentator Harsha Bhogle then coined Virat Kohli as ‘top’ of the list of ‘most expressive people in the world’, and perhaps signifying that Kohli’s muted reaction may have hinted that it wasn’t out.
India vs New Zealand, 1st Test Day 3: As it happened
While India put up a much stronger batting effort compared to the first innings, they suffered a big blow right at the end of Day 3’s play. Virat Kohli, batting on 70, was out caught behind on the final ball of the day.
India ended Day 3 on 231/3, still trailing New Zealand by a big margin of 125 runs. Sarfaraz Khan remained unbeaten at the end of the day.
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