How did Kohli fool the whole world?

[Vijy]

16 hours ago, Suhaan said:

Talent over flowed from that man,he could bowl tremendous offspin, legspin and medium pace

I haven't seen people before him,started watching cricket in 90s but since those times I havent seen a single player as skilled as him

Had all the shots in the book,cut ,pull,drive,on drive,glance,paddle sweep everything

He was way too aggressive for his time

 

only cricketer about whom Sir Don said that he saw his own style of batting reflected at SRT's peak: aggressive, yet risk free.

 

And remember that Sir Don saw: Hutton, Sobers, three Ws, two Richards, Graeme Pollock, Lara, Punter, Greg Chappati, etc.

Edited January 4 by Vijy

[Frustrated]

Since Jan 1, 2022, King Chokli's test batting avg is lesser than Aus's No. 8 batter (Pat Cummins).  

[kepler37b]

24 minutes ago, Vijy said:

only cricketer about whom Sir Don said that he saw his own style of batting reflected at SRT's peak: aggressive, yet risk free.

 

And remember that Sir Don saw: Hutton, Sobers, three Ws, two Richards, Graeme Pollock, Lara, Punter, etc.

The man's only mistake was refusing to retire at the right time. 

[Vijy]

16 hours ago, kepler37b said:

The man's only mistake was refusing to retire at the right time. 

yes, should have left after 2011 WC. 99 centuries would be more poetic... like Bradman's 99.94

Edited January 4 by Vijy

[The Hound]

20 hours ago, Ultimate_Game said:

 

I'm sorry but that's patently false. Even during the 2013-2018 Kohli was only great in bilaterals with all those chases and 100s in ODIs coming in meaningless bilaterals. The moment there was a bit of pressure or a major ICC knockout he failed like always. Here're a few examples...

 

1. 2015 WC SF: We were chasing 328 but Dhawan had given us such a great start of around 80 at a high RR. If Kohli had played just a regular knock he used to play so often, we would've won. In fact he played 2-3 such knocks against Aussies in bilaterals chasing 300+ multiple times but when it was needed in a high pressure game he failed.

 

2. 2017 CT: Won the toss and decided to "chase" against traditional chokers Pak. And while batting was dropped on 0 and still got out on 1. As usual failed in an ICC final when the stakes were high.

 

3. 2019 WC SF: The "King" was at his peak at the time and all the so called "King" had to do to chase 239 was to handle the new ball and even if we score 20/1 off 10 overs and see off the opening spell from Boult and Henry, we win. And as usual the "King" scored 0 (or 1) and failed once again when it mattered.

 

4. Tests: None of his knocks resulted in wins or he made a difference the way Pujara did in 2018 or the way Pant in 2020-21. All his Away 100s came when the match was drawn or it was a lost cause, i.e. not much pressure. When the match was in balance he failed.

 

5. IPL playoffs: It's clear the "King" takes his IPL seriously and has opted out to "rest" in intl matches to play IPL. Kohli has played 14 matches in IPL knockouts and he averages in 20s with a SR in 120s. Those are not just poor numbers but Mandeep Singh kind of numbers. 14 playoff matches is a huge sample size and is as big as an IPL season! But the so called "King" couldn't deliver even one match-winning performance.

 

6. WTC Finals: Failed in both the WTC finals as usual. Someone like Head has shown how to play an impactful innings.

 

It's clear Kohli is a stat padder who feasted in meaningless bilaterals to score impactless runs. He could never handle pressure and make a difference in either ICC tourneys or IPL playoffs. Even his best ICC performances have come in group stages when there're chances for you to come back and you're not in last chance saloon. But when it came to performing in high pressure games with something riding on it, the so called "King" invariably folded like a cheap tent.

He's not an utter failure in ICC tournaments. Had a great T20 WC in 2014 (should've won if not for Yuvraj) and in 2016 during his peak. Also the top scorer in the CT 2013 final. 

[New guy]

15 hours ago, kepler37b said:

The man's only mistake was refusing to retire at the right time. 

He was in prime form till 2011 and barely played a year and some months. He averages 55, 48, 68, 78 and 47 in 5 years before  You can't fault him for thinking he still has it in him. Compare to kohli who has been in bad form for 5+ years

 

Meanwhile ponting hung on for 6 years despite never crossing 50 average in any of those years. He averaged over 40 in only 2 out of those 6 years.

 

Australian fans are never too harsh on ponting like some indian fans are on Sachin 

Edited January 4 by New guy

[New guy]

15 hours ago, Vijy said:

yes, should have left after 2011 WC. 99 centuries would be more poetic.

Why? He was in peak form till then. So he should have cared for his own selfish average over the team?

 

Rohit, kohli all swear his presence eased then into international and they learned a lot from him on the other end 

 

Meanwhile both sanga and Lara retired at "peak" and their team batting completely fell off a cliff and never retired. They were too selfish to groom the next generation 

[Vijy]

10 minutes ago, New guy said:

Why? He was in peak form till then. So he should have cared for his own selfish average over the team?

 

Rohit, kohli all swear his presence eased then into international and they learned a lot from him on the other end 

 

Meanwhile both sanga and Lara retired at "peak" and their team batting completely fell off a cliff and never retired. They were too selfish to groom the next generation 

Don't mistake me for some Sachin hater as some people on ICF may be. Always rated SRT as our best batter ever.

 

However, that is not going to stop me from saying that likes of Kapil Dev, Sachin, MSD overstayed in at least one format for a couple of years. The worst offender is obviously Kohli.

Edited January 4 by Vijy

[Muloghonto]

i spoke of this months ago here:

Kohli's greatest flaw as a batsman is that he has no cut shot. For a top order batsman, that is a fatal flaw, and almost ALL top order batsmen have been vicious cutters : from greenidge and gavaskar to Richards, Tendulkar, Lara, Sehwag, Ponting, Dravid, they were all excellent cutters.

Why is cutting so important ? because cut shot lets you exploit width while length is still under the bowler's control : ie, good length but slightly wide = cut for 4.

If you do not have this shot,then you are reliant on straight drives/cover drives as your scoring shot for good length balls and that means if u get width, you go chasing a drive and kick off - which is Kohli's trademark.

90% of the time he is getting out driving the ball,its because he should've cut it but cannot play the cut shot.

Kohli hid it early in his career due to being younger and having a young eye. Now, Kohli is 30+ and his decline after age of 30 is pretty much singularly due to his declining eye-sight making him extremely vulnerable to the lack of cut shot on the 4th-6th stump line of good length balls.

Now bowlers have gotten it figured out - just control length against Kohli and if u stray in line, no biggie, coz he wont cut u and most likely will nick off in the cordon trying to drive when he should cut.

 

Like all great players who used their eye to make up for technique or non technical shots - like Sehwag all his career or VVS/Viv flicking balls on 5th stump line to square leg, when you get to be 30+ and ur eyesight goes down a bit, your game massively suffers.
Kohli is in the same boat - he doesnt look like an 'eye based player' as much, because he doesnt play crazy fancy hand-eye coordination shots like Sehwag against the spin or Viv/VVS flicking balls headed to 1st slip to square leg, he instead uses it to hide his 'no cut viraat' style. And like them all, he now fails a lot because his eye cannot makeup for it anymore.

Which is also a reason for his significantly more precipitous decline than other great batsmen - coz cut shot is a vital shot for top order bats to have - that is how you release attacking 4th stump pressure from a McGrath or Pollock with 4 slips and gulley = you wait for slight error in width and cut the hell away and then go back to waiting, giving them ZERO breathing room for error in line AND length. If you do not have this, you are screwed, because a bowler like McG, Polly, Philander, etc. wont regularly mess up line AND length, they may occasionally mess up the line OR the length and without cut shot, you take away the ability to punish them when they err in line.

leaving u only the errors in length to prey on. Which means one scoring shot every 1 hour vs these guys.

 

This is also the same reason why Kohli is such  God in ODIs - his 'no cut Kohli, i nick to the cordon instead' is a MUCH MUCH less threat in ODIs, because 80% of the ODI innings has no slip cordon after the first 5-10 overs: without continuous slip cordon to fast bowling, you cannot capitalize on the 'no cut only drive' type of batting coz there aint anyone sitting around to gobble the nick !!

That is also why every single 50+ or 100+ score Kohli has in the last 4 years has involved at least one dropped catch off of a drive where he should've cut in the cordon or a few of those nicks bouncing before the fielders.

 

Edited January 4 by Muloghonto

[Vijy]

5 minutes ago, Muloghonto said:

i spoke of this months ago here:

Kohli's greatest flaw as a batsman is that he has no cut shot. For a top order batsman, that is a fatal flaw, and almost ALL top order batsmen have been vicious cutters : from greenidge and gavaskar to Richards, Tendulkar, Lara, Sehwag, Ponting, Dravid, they were all excellent cutters.

Why is cutting so important ? because cut shot lets you exploit width while length is still under the bowler's control : ie, good length but slightly wide = cut for 4.

If you do not have this shot,then you are reliant on straight drives/cover drives as your scoring shot for good length balls and that means if u get width, you go chasing a drive and kick off - which is Kohli's trademark.

90% of the time he is getting out driving the ball,its because he should've cut it but cannot play the cut shot.

Kohli hid it early in his career due to being younger and having a young eye. Now, Kohli is 30+ and his decline after age of 30 is pretty much singularly due to his declining eye-sight making him extremely vulnerable to the lack of cut shot on the 4th-6th stump line of good length balls.

Now bowlers have gotten it figured out - just control length against Kohli and if u stray in line, no biggie, coz he wont cut u and most likely will nick off in the cordon trying to drive when he should cut.

 

Like all great players who used their eye to make up for technique or non technical shots - like Sehwag all his career or VVS/Viv flicking balls on 5th stump line to square leg, when you get to be 30+ and ur eyesight goes down a bit, your game massively suffers.
Kohli is in the same boat - he doesnt look like an 'eye based player' as much, because he doesnt play crazy fancy hand-eye coordination shots like Sehwag against the spin or Viv/VVS flicking balls headed to 1st slip to square leg, he instead uses it to hide his 'no cut viraat' style. And like them all, he now fails a lot because his eye cannot makeup for it anymore.

Which is also a reason for his significantly more precipitous decline than other great batsmen - coz cut shot is a vital shot for top order bats to have - that is how you release attacking 4th stump pressure from a McGrath or Pollock with 4 slips and gulley = you wait for slight error in width and cut the hell away and then go back to waiting, giving them ZERO breathing room for error in line AND length. If you do not have this, you are screwed, because a bowler like McG, Polly, Philander, etc. wont regularly mess up line AND length, they may occasionally mess up the line OR the length and without cut shot, you take away the ability to punish them when they err in line.

leaving u only the errors in length to prey on. Which means one scoring shot every 1 hour vs these guys.

 

This is also the same reason why Kohli is such  God in ODIs - his 'no cut Kohli, i nick to the cordon instead' is a MUCH MUCH less threat in ODIs, because 80% of the ODI innings has no slip cordon after the first 5-10 overs: without continuous slip cordon to fast bowling, you cannot capitalize on the 'no cut only drive' type of batting coz there aint anyone sitting around to gobble the nick !!

That is also why every single 50+ or 100+ score Kohli has in the last 4 years has involved at least one dropped catch off of a drive where he should've cut in the cordon or a few of those nicks bouncing before the fielders.

 

it's not just lacking a cut shot, but also his leg side game has gone down a fair amount.

[Muloghonto]

1 minute ago, Vijy said:

it's not just lacking a cut shot, but also his leg side game has gone down a fair amount.

True, generally his game has declined like most players who approach 35 do, but he cannot make it up with smarts or cleverness, because of the fatal 'no cut virat' flaw.

It really is the biggest flaw u can have as a test batter because it really leaves u cornered against the 4th stump attacking channel bowling setup for slip practice.

Even if Viraat's leg side game had remained at its peak, he would still be screwed because his leg side game was never at God tier level like a Veeru or Laxman or Viv, where they could just flick a McGrath from 4th stump to square leg and go 'who needs to cut or drive when u can flick the ball 90 degrees anyways'.
So how is he gonna deal with the whole 'sustained 4th-5th stump channel pressure' where the bowler doesnt err in length ? If i keep dropping balls on good length to you and vary from middle stump to 6th stump line due to control issues, you can beat the heck outta me by cutting the ball whenever i go to 4th-6th stump line, coz you can cut good length ball if there is width, but unless u r 6'9, you cannot drive good length balls without nick.

So as a batter, Kohli gets cornered repeatedly in this trap because he just doesnt have a younger eye to pick up the line a fraction earlier and get into position to drive a ball he should cut as driving the ball requires one to make an early movement to get behind the ball, while cutting the ball u can remain adjacent to the ball and cut it.

And i can tell it is age related, because Kohli's trigger movement to 4th-6th stump balls on good length balls in his peak came earlier - he is still doing the same trigger movement but a fraction of a second too slow, so his drives are more adjacent than they should be and he nicks off.

 

As a bowler, you have a lot of pressure released off of you, if you are told 'just bowl good length. dont worry about line, as long as its not leg stump line, keep it 4th-th stump and the fecker wont cut u, he will try to drive and nick.

 

I am actually shocked that Virat never developed the cut shot in his career, given that how vital it is for a top order batter to cut the ball and how almost ALL top order greats were vicious cutters of the ball - players like Greenidge, Sehwag, Jayasurya etc. would cut a ball that is even 3cm too wide of the 4th stump line and release all pressure on them.

 

[Vijy]

1 minute ago, Muloghonto said:

True, generally his game has declined like most players who approach 35 do, but he cannot make it up with smarts or cleverness, because of the fatal 'no cut virat' flaw.

It really is the biggest flaw u can have as a test batter because it really leaves u cornered against the 4th stump attacking channel bowling setup for slip practice.

Even if Viraat's leg side game had remained at its peak, he would still be screwed because his leg side game was never at God tier level like a Veeru or Laxman or Viv, where they could just flick a McGrath from 4th stump to square leg and go 'who needs to cut or drive when u can flick the ball 90 degrees anyways'.
So how is he gonna deal with the whole 'sustained 4th-5th stump channel pressure' where the bowler doesnt err in length ? If i keep dropping balls on good length to you and vary from middle stump to 6th stump line due to control issues, you can beat the heck outta me by cutting the ball whenever i go to 4th-6th stump line, coz you can cut good length ball if there is width, but unless u r 6'9, you cannot drive good length balls without nick.

So as a batter, Kohli gets cornered repeatedly in this trap because he just doesnt have a younger eye to pick up the line a fraction earlier and get into position to drive a ball he should cut as driving the ball requires one to make an early movement to get behind the ball, while cutting the ball u can remain adjacent to the ball and cut it.

And i can tell it is age related, because Kohli's trigger movement to 4th-6th stump balls on good length balls in his peak came earlier - he is still doing the same trigger movement but a fraction of a second too slow, so his drives are more adjacent than they should be and he nicks off.

 

As a bowler, you have a lot of pressure released off of you, if you are told 'just bowl good length. dont worry about line, as long as its not leg stump line, keep it 4th-th stump and the fecker wont cut u, he will try to drive and nick.

 

I am actually shocked that Virat never developed the cut shot in his career, given that how vital it is for a top order batter to cut the ball and how almost ALL top order greats were vicious cutters of the ball - players like Greenidge, Sehwag, Jayasurya etc. would cut a ball that is even 3cm too wide of the 4th stump line and release all pressure on them.

 

yeah, it is age related - to focus on the highlighted text. his real age is likely a few yr older than his actual age, going by his looks, reflexes, tendency of some indian "prodigies" to often age fudge, etc.

[Muloghonto]

2 minutes ago, Vijy said:

yeah, it is age related - to focus on the highlighted text. his real age is likely a few yr older than his actual age, going by his looks, reflexes, tendency of some indian "prodigies" to often age fudge, etc.

Which Indian dude or lady scammed u in ur life that u think that every damn Indian is an age faker ??

Did u get honeytrapped as a teenager by a 30 year old pretending to be 16 with u or something ???

 

[Vijy]

2 minutes ago, Muloghonto said:

Which Indian dude or lady scammed u in ur life that u think that every damn Indian is an age faker ??

Did u get honeytrapped as a teenager by a 30 year old pretending to be 16 with u or something ???

 

Manjot Kalra, Rasikh Salam, Vaibhav Suryavanshi are all more-or-less confirmed. Strong doubts in my mind about Prithvi Shaw, Piyush Chawla, and Virat Kohli too.

 

I believe that SRT's correct age was reported though.

[Muloghonto]

1 minute ago, Vijy said:

Manjot Kalra, Rasikh Salam, Vaibhav Suryavanshi are all more-or-less confirmed. Strong doubts in my mind about Prithvi Shaw, Piyush Chawla, and Virat Kohli too.

 

I believe that SRT's correct age was reported though.

I dont see why Virat's age has any fudging concerns. Guy is not a child prodigy, he is your standard great/excellent batter trajectory like Viv, Lara, Dravid, Ponting, etc - all of whom show up around 19-20 in international cricket, make an early mark by age 20-22 and go on after that.

Nothing in Viraat's career says that he is an age fudger or he is ahead of the curve to a suspicious degree.

 

[HouMac]

His nonexistent backfoot play was always going to be a massive issue once he got older and his eyesight and reflexes declined. That's exactly what happened. Teams figured out as long as you bowled back of a length to him outside off he couldn't score. So he became overly reliant on a risky shot (cover drive) to score the majority of his runs. That just won't work on most wickets that aren't flat. 

 

Looking back it's almost astonishing he had the peak that he did with such a limited arsenal of shots. Youth and dogged determination sure goes a long way. 

Edited January 4 by HouMac

[Laaloo]

16 hours ago, Vijy said:

yes, should have left after 2011 WC. 99 centuries would be more poetic.

Yup. As a diehard sachin fan, Sachin retiring on 99 centuries and without dragging on would have been iconic. It was sad to see his average drop from 56+ to 53+

Edited January 4 by Laaloo

[Vijy]

9 minutes ago, HouMac said:

His nonexistent backfoot play was always going to be a massive issue once he got older and his eyesight and reflexes declined. That's exactly what happened. Teams figured out as long as you bowled back of a length to him outside off he couldn't score. So he became overly reliant on a risky shot (cover drive) to score the majority of his runs. That just won't work on most wickets that aren't flat. 

 

Looking back it's almost astonishing he had the peak that he did with such a limited arsenal of shots. Youth and dogged determination sure goes a long way. 

and also bowlers not being relentless enough in attacking those issues.

[Muloghonto]

12 minutes ago, HouMac said:

His nonexistent backfoot play was always going to be a massive issue once he got older and his eyesight and reflexes declined. That's exactly what happened. Teams figured out as long as you bowled back of a length to him outside off he couldn't score. So he became overly reliant on a risky shot (cover drive) to score the majority of his runs. That just won't work on most wickets that aren't flat. 

 

Looking back it's almost astonishing he had the peak that he did with such a limited arsenal of shots. Youth and dogged determination sure goes a long way. 

 

His lack of cutting ability IS due to his zero backfoot play, as cutting is always a backfoot shot, even against spinners.

Its not astonishing what he did early in his career because the human eye can significantly deteriorate past age 30 and we have seen plenty of batsmen who were god tier in their 20s suddenly become mortal in their 30s as their eyesight dimmed ever so fractionally and they lost the 0.2s extra time they had to play their shots.

 

[Ultimate_Game]

On 1/4/2025 at 1:43 PM, The Hound said:

He's not an utter failure in ICC tournaments. Had a great T20 WC in 2014 (should've won if not for Yuvraj) and in 2016 during his peak. Also the top scorer in the CT 2013 final. 

 

WT20 2014 yes and probably WT20 2016. These're the only two tourneys he did something of not but still not that good to make a difference. CT 2013 final was won by the bowlers as usual while defending 128 off 20 overs which was a below par total. In Tests and ODI tourneys Kohli has never showed up. For someone to be the so called "best in the world", you would expect the batter to show up a lot more. Even in T20s someone like Marlon Samuels overshadowed him by a distance.