Team India has reached at least the semi-finals in every major tournament since 2013.
Team India has started favorites in every ICC tournament held post-2013 and has reached at least the semi-finals in every major tournament but have faltered in big matches. The consecutive defeats have led the fans and critics to frame team India as chokers.
The Virat Kohli-led team has, however, reached new heights in all three formats and has won a few historic bilateral series in the same period of time. In June 2021, Kohli-led India once again came close to winning a major tournament -- after their missed opportunities in the 2017 Champions Trophy final and 2019 ODI World Cup semi-final -- but came second in the inaugural WTC final, losing to Kane Williamson-led New Zealand.
Talking about India’s performances in the ICC tournaments, former Pakistan captain Salman Butt said that it is too early to term team India as chokers.
“India doesn’t have a long history of not winning an ICC event. Under previous captain MS Dhoni, India won the Champions Trophy (2013), the World T20 (2007), and the 50-over World Cup (2011). Recently, India played the World Test Championship (WTC) final and the 2019 World Cup semi-final. They have been almost there among the world’s Top 2 teams. So, the frequency of India’s losses is not that much to term them as chokers,” Salman Butt said on his YouTube channel.
“Look at the number of semi-finals New Zealand have played in the World Cup. They have played two finals as well (2015 and 2019). Nobody called them chokers. South Africa was termed chokers because they frequently lost big matches. They went down in a lot of finals and crunch games. That isn’t the case with India as yet," he pointed out.
Virat Kohli's India will be seen in the T20 World Cup 2021 which will be hosted by the BCCI in UAE in October-November.