Virat Kohli had failed to make his 100th Test memorable in the only inning Indian team batted in Mohali against Sri Lanka, as he fell for 45 runs. Therefore, when India and Sri Lanka met in the second Test in Bengaluru, expectations were high that Kohli will score substantially.
However, it was not to be for the Delhi-batter, as he fell for 23 and 13 runs in the two innings of his 101st Test match, however, the troubling thing was that he got out in identical fashion. He played back to a decently full ball and was out LBW when the ball kept low and hit his pads.
Since the start of 2020, he has been dismissed by spinners on nine occasions out of 11 during home Tests, and four of them were leg-before wicket dismissals.
Dinesh Karthik analyzed Kohli’s strategy against spin and was surprised that the right-hander was taking a leg-stump guard and feels that even though he has applied this strategy to avoid getting
"I'm pretty surprised as to where he is standing in the crease. He is standing touch outside leg stump. And that you do when you are a little worried about LBW. But actually that in many ways, causes you more trouble the moment you stand outside the leg stump because of almost all the balls you need to meet across. But when you stand in the middle or between the middle and the leg stump, there is a good chance that the balls that are drifting into you, say, the middle stump, then you end up playing a lot straighter,” Karthik said on Cricbuzz.
"The moment you stand outside the leg stump, everything you do tends to go across, and so the one that comes in has the potential to get you lbw. So that is one thing that I have been very surprised with the strategy he has used to play spin, "he added.
Spin has become quite a potent weapon against Virat Kohli in both Tests and limited-overs formats. Also the wait for his 71st international century has extended more, given his last ton came in November 2019, against Bangladesh in a day-night Test match.
“Kohli, over the years, has consistently stood at the middle or between the middle and leg, and that allows him to play with softer hands. And this mindset has come because obviously, players who do not want to get LBW do that a lot. And he wants to avoid that. Interestingly, in both the innings he got out LBW. Yes, the ball was kept a little low in the first innings, but in the second innings, I guess it was a touch and was a kind of delivery you play on it. The place Kohli stood on the crease is a hard place to bat on, especially on these kinds of tracks," Karthik said.
In the ongoing two-Test series against Sri Lanka, Virat could only manage to score 81 runs in three innings, because of which his Test batting average also slipped below 50 for the first time in five years.
(Cricbuzz inputs)
