Indian skipper Virat Kohli recently grabbed headlines after announcing that he will be stepping down as India’s T20I captain after the upcoming T20 World Cup 2021 in UAE and Oman.
Kohli also clarified that the decision is taken after a long discussion with coach Ravi Shastri and his deputy Rohit Sharma.
The 32-year-old cricketer's childhood coach Rajkumar Sharma in his recent interaction revealed that the right-hand stylish batsman will be more "determined and focused" to win the upcoming ICC mega event in the middle east.
“New captain will bring new ideas and new strategies, so it will be interesting to see who is named as the skipper. Just like what Dhoni did, Virat too will like to play the same role and help the new captain. He will be more determined and focused to win the T20 World Cup as he will want to leave India's T20I captaincy on a high,” Sharma said.
The 56-year-old then talked about how he felt Kohli had taken the right decision as leading in three different formats takes a lot of physical and mental toll.
"We thank Virat for his tremendous performance as the T20I Captain" - BCCI President, Sourav Ganguly
“It is a thoughtful decision, he had discussed with me also about this. Captaining in three formats does put a player under pressure and hence he decided to step down from T20I captaincy,” said Rajkumar.
As the Delhi-based cricketer’s love for Test cricket is no secret, his childhood coach feels giving up T20 captaincy will ease a lot of pressure off Kohli and he can lead the team better in Tests and ODIs.
“We were discussing it as it is a big issue, I was sure about it. Virat loves the Test format and he will want to lead India in the Test format for a longer period and ODI too hence he decided to step down from T20I captaincy to ease off the pressure,” Sharma concluded.
The upcoming ICC showpiece event will be the last T20I tournament where this Indian team will be led by Virat Kohli. With India playing their campaign opener against arch-rivals Pakistan in Dubai, it will be exciting to see how the team performs.
(With ANI Inputs)
