Virat Kohli produced one of the greatest T20 World Cup innings of all time to script India’s thrilling four-wicket victory over arch-rivals Pakistan at MCG on Sunday (October 23).
Chasing 160 to win, the Men in Blue were in dire straits at 31/4 after 6.1 overs. Amid the pressure situation, Kohli rose to the occasion and smashed 82 not out off 53 balls to take his team over the line.
In the process, he was involved in a 113-run partnership for the fifth wicket with Hardik Pandya, who scored 40 off 37 balls.
While his knock broke the heart of many Pakistanis, Kohli was lauded for his match-winning prowess by Pakistan skipper Babar Azam.
"Our bowlers were outstanding in the first 10 overs. Credit to Virat and Hardik, for the manner in which they finished the game," said Babar in the post-match press conference.
"Virat Kohli just showed his class today. It was a close game and people enjoyed it," he added.
Babar agreed that winning a high-octane game for his country will boost Kohli's morale after a lean patch of three years.
"Pakistan vs India are always extra pressure games and the more quickly you can overcome it, the better. That's why he is a big player, there was pressure on him and he overcame it and then built his innings. The way they built partnership was a turning point," the Pakistan captain stated.
"This innings must have given him a lot of confidence and when you win these kinds of games, you mentally feel good," he further said.
Babar Azam also explained why left-arm spinner Mohammed Nawaz was brought in the 20th over and pacers' quota of overs was exhausted before.
"When the partnership (Kohli-Pandya) was building, we needed to get wickets and I thought of bringing my main bowler and building pressure.
"But the plan didn't work out as I would have thought. He (Nawaz) will learn from this and when next time he faces this kind of a situation, he will realise what he needs to do."
For Babar, it is important that his team learn from this defeat and move on as the tournament has just started.
"We will remain confident. We will learn from this defeat. Some good things happened and some mistakes happened. We will deliberate and it's just the start of the tournament and we have a lot of games left.
"The quicker we get over it, the better it is. We have back-to-back matches and we need to focus on that."
(With PTI inputs)
