Former Indian opener Aakash Chopra feels Virat Kohli doesn’t need to be overaggressive against West Indies in the second ODI.
Kohli was dismissed after scoring eight runs off four balls in the first ODI against the Windies. In fact, it was a very uncharacteristic cameo from the former Indian skipper as he looked a bit impatient at the crease.
Kohli got a boundary on the first ball he faced as Alzarri Joseph was able to produce his outside edge. Subsequently, the right-hander got another boundary as he played an uppercut. Kohli duged to the next short delivery but went for the pull shot on the fourth ball he faced. The talisman got an upper edge and was caught at deep fine leg.
Chopra feels Kohli isn’t in the right frame of mind and thus he played in that fashion.
Aakash Chopra said on his YouTube Channel, “Kohli has scored a lot of runs. This horse will keep running but the truth is that the mind space is not right at the moment. So go back to the basics, follow the formula to the T. The foot movement in order to make runs but in my opinion, there is no need to be overaggressive.”.
“For the first time, we saw Virat Kohli playing in a different fashion. What made Virat special was that he was a process-driven person, he used to go with discipline and he was slightly different from the others.”
In fact, Kohli is well known to take his time out in the middle and looks to build his innings by rotating the strike for ones and twos. Thus, Kohli’s approach in the first ODI was a bit baffling.
“When he comes at the start he used to defend or leave deliveries along with singles and doubles. Although he was always looking for runs, he never played big shots when he had just come to the crease or he will just defend at the start.”
Chopra added that Kohli was defensive in his approach on the tour of South Africa.
“But if you see the last few encounters, if you see South Africa it seemed he was too defensive, and in one match he started hitting, that he is just going to hit. That’s exactly how he played in the last game, four balls, shot after shot, and then out. This is not the Virat Kohli we see.”
The second ODI will be played on Wednesday.
