There is a lot of talk going around about Virat Kohli’s break from international cricket. While many believe it’s already long overdue, some think he can go for few more months. Captain Kohli says he is not a robot and will ask for rest when he needs it.
“Definitely I do need rest, why don”t I need rest? When I think, of the time my body should be rested, I”ll ask for it. I am not a robot you can slice my skin and check I bleed,” Kohli told reporters on the eve of India”s first Test against Sri Lanka at the Eden Gardens from Thursday.
“For us as I said, is playing cricket for the country and we do what we are presented with”. Captain @imVkohli addresses the media ahead of the test series with @OfficialSLC starting tomorrow at #EdenGardens.#INDvSL #CAB pic.twitter.com/FQpEp4MyM7
— CABCricket (@CabCricket) November 15, 2017
When asked about Hardik Pandya’s unexpected break, Kohli said
“This is one thing which I don”t think people explain properly. There is a lot of talk from the outside in terms of workload — whether a player should be rested or should not be rested. All cricketers play 40 games in a year. Three guys who should get rest, their workloads are to be managed. 11 players play the game but not everyone would have batted 45 overs in an ODI game or not everyone would have bowled 30 overs in a Test match.”
“But the ones who are doing it regularly need to be assessed because the body takes that much time to recover. People only look at “oh everyone has played 40 games”. They don”t look at time spent on the crease,” Kohli said
'We as a team take every match and series seriously,' says Captain Virat Kohli ahead of the 1st Test against Sri Lanka #INDvSL pic.twitter.com/vo3vUM4QiB
— BCCI (@BCCI) November 15, 2017
“The number of runs that have been run between the wicket, the number of overs bowled in difficult conditions, what were the conditions, what were the temperatures like, have the bodies recovered or not I don”t think people go into that analysis. So from the outside, it looks like “why are people asking for rest, everyone has played a same number of games”.
It always feels nice to comeback to Test cricket as the challenges are different and it is something we look forward to – Virat Kohli #INDvSL pic.twitter.com/W49ZBk2Bt2
— BCCI (@BCCI) November 15, 2017
“But not everyone has the same kind of workload in every game. Only those who have a major workload, for example, Pujara during a Test season he will have maximum workload because he spends so much time at the crease. His game is built that way. So you can”t compare that to a counter-attacking batsman because the workload would have been lesser.
Hear what Captain @imVkohli has to say about how to decide on which players require to be rested.#INDvSL #CAB pic.twitter.com/nlfLMxXyU0
— CABCricket (@CabCricket) November 15, 2017
“So I think all these things have to be taken into consideration. Purely because of the fact that we have built such a strong core team now of 20-25 players, you don”t want important players breaking down at important times for the team,” Kohli elaborated.
India now plays Sri Lanka in 3 tests, 3 ODIs and 3T20Is in a series starting on November 16. After that in January, they tour South Africa in perhaps their toughest cricketing assignment in 2 years. 2017 has been a very successful year for Kohli with the bat. This year he has scored 1406 runs in ODIs at an average of 76 with 6 hundreds.
– by Atharva Apte
