Virat Kohli has played countless match-winning knocks for the Indian side. But, one of his innings stands high, for Tim Paine, the former Australian skipper.
Although Kohli and Paine belong to two very different game environments, the cricketing fraternity has seen both involved in several banters. The best of both came in the 2018-19 Border Gavaskar Trophy, where India won their first Test series in Australia after 71 years, under Kohli’s captaincy.
Kohli missed the last three Tests of the 2020-21 series, due to the birth of his first child. But the 31-year-old was there, for the first Test at Adelaide Oval. In the first innings of that test, the Indian openers fell early, against the Aussie bowling lineup.
That’s when Kohli came in to bat and built vital partnerships with Cheteshwar Pujara and Ajinkya Rahane. However, Rahane couldn’t execute a run properly and the former vice-captain of the Indian Test side ran Kohli out. Kohli was batting cautiously and had scored 74 runs in 180 deliveries, with 8 boundaries, then.
Paine stated in a documentary series ‘Bando Mein Tha Dum,’ streaming on VOOT: “Yeah, I must admit though when he was batting… he was on 20-30. Then the lights came on, and I was like ‘Wow, He did not look like getting out, did he? And I was like we are in some serious trouble here. I do remember for about 15 minutes, I was like ‘Oh Christ! Yeah, when he got through that first period of the night, I thought ‘Oh trouble’. Rahane looked just as good too there for a little while.”
After the middle-order trio, the remaining Indian lineup couldn’t sustain for long as India fell from 188/4 to 244 all out.
India were not far off taking that first Test completely away from us- Tim Paine
Furthermore, Paine said: “They were batting beautifully and then, thankfully, Rahane ran him out. It was brilliant. Particularly, when you feel so out of the game, we couldn’t create a chance and they were batting so well, to then be literally just gifted one, and a really simple one, of their best player who was making it look pretty easy, in a difficult condition for a new batter to come in against the pink ball under lights, it’s a hard place to start your innings, that was a huge shift in the game. They were not far off taking that first Test completely away from us.”
Besides, the second innings of India was a forgettable one. India, later came back stronger under Rahane and retained the Border Gavaskar Trophy.
Written By Prachi Pisal
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