Virat Kohli with Tom Latham© Twitter
After Mohamed Shami claimed five wickets in his maiden World Cup 2023 game, the ‘Virat Kohli wall’ stood in front of New Zealand and their 5th successive victory in the tournament. Kohli scored a whopping 95 runs as he led the Indian team’s successful chase of 274 runs. Though Virat missed out on a hundred, his 95-run knock was enough to take the team home with 2 overs to spare. After the match, even New Zealand’s stand-in skipper Tom Latham admitted that it’s difficult to come up with a strategy for Kohli as he has answers to most plans.
New Zealand rode on Rachin Ravindra‘s 75 and Daryl Mitchell‘s 130 as the Kiwis put 273 runs on the board. At one point, it looked like Latham’s men would easily go past the 300-run mark but the Indians pulled things back effectively with the ball.
After the match, Latham was full of praise for Virat Kohli.
“Kohli played a fantastic innings. Controlled the tempo and the rest could bat around him. As a captain, you have to be proactive but also work to your plans. Think about match-ups. Virat has a response to most plans,” Latham said in the presentation ceremony.
About his own team’s performance with the bat, Latha feels the Kiwis should’ve done better in the last 10 overs of the innings.
“We didn’t capitalise in the last ten overs (with the bat). India bowled well in the death and we left a few runs out there. With the ball, we never got a double breakthrough. I don’t think we capitalised, 30-40 short,” he stated.
“From a batting point of view, Ravindra and Daryll gave the perfect blueprint. Those are positions we want to be in, and when we get things right at the back end, we are dangerous,” Latham added.
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