Former Team India skipper Sunil Gavaskar believes Royal Challengers Bangalore skipper Virat Kohli failed to live up to his expectations with the bat. Incidentally, Bangalore bowed out of IPL 2020 losing to Sunrisers Hyderabad on Friday at the Sheikh Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi.
Meanwhile, Virat Kohli & Co did extremely well to take it deep during the run chase. But a masterclass from Kane Williamson took Sunrisers Hyderabad home in the 20th over. The Kiwi skipper shared a crucial partnership with Jason Holder to see off the target and set up a clash with Delhi Capitals in the Qualifier 2.
Virat Kohli didn’t match his expectations – Sunil Gavaskar
Earlier in the day, Royal Challengers Bangalore posted a modest total of 131 runs thanks to AB de Villiers half-century. Sunrisers Hyderabad bowled extremely well to contain the batters in the middle-overs but de Villiers guided them to a respectable total on a difficult wicket.
Virat Kohli, who showed intent promoting himself to open the innings didn’t work out as he got out for a paltry score of six runs before Jason Holder got him out. Kohli’s campaign ended on 466 runs from 15 innings at a strike rate of 121.35 which is quite below his standards.
Sunil Gavaskar threw some light on it saying that Virat Kohli failed to match his expectations which were one of the reasons RCB didn’t go through.
“Looking at the high standards that he sets for himself, maybe he would say he didn’t quite match that and that’s one of the reasons why RCB weren’t able to go through. Because when he scores those big runs along with AB de Villiers, they invariably have big scores,” Gavaskar told Star Sports.
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Gavaskar said that RCB have always been a batting-heavy team with their bowlers mostly faltering at the big stage. The veteran also asked the team to assign a proper role to Shivam Dube, who he reckons, is ‘confused’ about his position in the side.
“I think where they need to do a little bit of thinking is to give Shivam Dube a proper role. Dube has gone down and Sundar has gone up and down. If he can be given a role and told to go out there and thrash the ball, it might help him. He is confused now,” Sunil Gavaskar added.