Virat Kohli is India’s most successful Test captain, winning 40 of his 68 Tests.© X (Twitter)
Former India batting coach Sanjay Bangar feels Virat Kohli could’ve continued leading the Test team for a longer period. Kohli stepped down as the Test captain of Team India in January 2022 following the side’s defeat to South Africa in the third and final Test, with the series ending 2-1 in favour of the Proteas. During his sever-year-long tenure as captain of the Test side, Kohli took the Indian team to new heights, including first-ever Test series win on Australia soil in 2018-19. It was due to his aggressive brand of cricket that made India the dominant force in the longest format of the game.
Bangar, who closely followed Kohli’s progress as captain and player, feels that the star batter could’ve continued to lead the team, but agreed that the captaincy pressure took a toll on his individual performances.
“Captaincy of the Indian team is a 24/7 job. Lot of on and off the field things happen like selection, non-selection and team performance. So, it does take a toll (on individual performances). Him giving up captaincy at that time means he is now playing with lesser responsibilities. Even though I personally feel he could have continued a bit longer as Test captain,” Bangar said on The Rao Podcast.
Bangar also recalled the time when Kohli was not scoring double centuries in Test, and confessed his failure to do so. Bangar also added that after making some slight tweaks to his name, Kohli managed to score five double tons in a season.
“It is humanly impossible to sustain at the level at which he was playing between 2014 and 2019. The dip had to come. When you play with that sort of passion he was scoring daddy hundreds. But he told me that he wasn’t scoring a double hundred. After a while he realised that there is a process to which he can make double hundreds and once he tasted that he made four or five in one season,” he added.
For the unversed, Kohli is India’s most successful Test captain, winning 40 of his 68 Tests.
In the overall list of Test captains, he is only behind legends Graeme Smith (53), Ricky Ponting (48), and Steve Waugh (41), respectively.
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