Bengaluru: It’s not easy to understand the pain that Virat Kohli must have gone through on Sunday night. For the third time, Kohli’s Royal Challengers Bangalore ended up second-best in the IPL, a tournament he has lit up over the years and especially the ninth edition where the ‘batman’ of the Challengers, left all others trailing with a mammoth 973-run aggregate from 16 games.
Yet, being second-best never sits well with Kohli, given the intensity that he brings to play. Each day. Every single match. For the country. For the club.
Like all great sportsmen, Kohli hates losing to the point of berating himself. Seven years ago, just out of his teens, a brash Kohli watched his team go down narrowly — by six runs — to Deccan Chargers in the Johannesburg final. He may have brushed it off then.
Two years later, under Anil Kumble’s leadership, the Challengers again made the final grade, only to fall to the Chennai Super Kings by 58 runs in a lop-sided encounter. He probably couldn’t brush it off then.
On Sunday when his team came close but failed to surmount the Sunrisers Hyderabad’s barrier. Kohli couldn’t brush it off; he was hurting. Keeping calm after the eight-run defeat, Kohli said at the presentation ceremony: “We are proud of the way we played as a team. This was for the people of Bangalore. Even when we had the worst seasons, they were there for us,” drawing huge cheers from the crowd.
“I was gutted; we couldn’t cross the line. Dan mentioned to me while thanking the crowd: we scored 200 and lost. It was weird that we still lost by eight runs. Me and AB getting out quickly was a big blow. Had I stayed with AB, we could have finished it. I just want to congratulate the Sunrisers. They deserved to win.”
From the wispy lad of 2009 to a leader of men in 2016, Kohli has traversed the distance. But his phenomenal run this season close to 1000 runs with four hundreds and seven fifties will take a lot to be surmounted.
“I surprised myself there. I opened the innings, someone batting at No.3 or No.4 may not have scored much. I just wanted to keep contributing. Why not, records are meant to be broken.” Touche.
