Kohli — the good, the bad and the ugly

Virat Kohli is a man of many parts. A fantastic batter. An extraordinary athlete. The fittest man in the Indian team for the last decade, even though he recently celebrated his 36th birthday. Proud, passionate, intense. An almost senior statesman, who is in his 17th year in international cricket. Statistically India’s most successful captain, even though the team didn’t win a single major title under his watch.

Kohli is also a scrapper, a streetfighter, someone who takes offence easily even where none is intended. He is private and guards his privacy zealously, is particularly sensitive when it comes to his young family, yet very vocal, very visible, very in-your-face on the cricket field. Perhaps, as they say, you can take the boy out of Delhi, but you can’t take Delhi out of the boy.

Learning to love Kohli

In Australia, they have learned to love Kohli. Oh, make no mistake, some sections love to hate him, but the majority loves to love him. That wasn’t always the case. On his first senior tour Down Under in 2011-12, he flipped a retaliatory bird at an abusive Sydney crowd in his first Test in Australia, a gesture that earned him the match officials’ wrath and a 50% fine of his match fee, slapped by match referee Ranjan Madugalle.

Kohli’s next foray to the batting crease, in the same Test, yielded only nine, but it wasn’t long before he started the earn the respect, if not the affection, of Australian crowds. In the next game on the famous WACA strip in Perth, he made 44 and 75 and finished off the Test leg with 116 (his maiden Test ton) and 22 in the last game in Adelaide. The triangular series that followed saw Kohli in sublime touch, his extraordinary unbeaten 133 off just 86 deliveries in a knock where he treated Lasith Malinga with absolute disdain striking a chord in the Australian fan.

It was on his following Test tour, in 2014-15, that Kohli made it impossible for the Aussies not to like him. He responded to Mitchell Johnson’s instinctive throw on his follow-through that struck him on the body, and a blow to the helmet from the same bowler, to uncork centuries in his first two innings as stand-in captain. By the time he finished the four-Test series as the full-time captain in the aftermath of Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s shock retirement, he had stacked up four centuries, done so with flair and authority and panache and a certain arrogance that the Australians identified with. He had suddenly become the most non-Aussie Aussie, if that makes sense. Virat Kohli was now one of their own, even if he wasn’t exactly their own.

That didn’t mean they didn’t heckle him or needle him. They realised that Kohli could rise to the bait, that he didn’t take kindly to being targeted and barracked. Kohli didn’t disappoint; he interacted and alternated between snarling and charming, taking over the role of the conductor of the crowd orchestra even from his position in the slip cordon, egging on the sizeable Indian section and completely disregarding the majority Australian presence.

Kohli locked horns with Steve Smith on Australia’s tour of India in 2017, stopping short of calling him a cheat when the Aussie skipper briefly looked in the direction of the dressing room during the Bengaluru Test, as if seeking clues on whether he should opt for the DRS challenge upon being adjudged leg before. By the end of that fractious tour, Kohli had all but severed links with all Aussie players – it didn’t help that Glenn Maxwell mocked the shoulder injury that kept Kohli out of the series decider in Dharamshala.

When India came to Australia towards the end of 2018, the Aussies had a new captain in place, the outwardly placid Tim Paine who, in reality, lived up to his surname. Paine was borderline nasty, using Kohli as the punching bag even when the Indian captain wasn’t batting. No prizes for guessing who had the last laugh. Kohli became the first Indian skipper to win a Test series in Australia, Paine the first home captain to suffer the ignominy of defeat in his own backyard.

During that tour, Kohli played one of the great Test match knocks in Australia, a memorable 123 punctuated by some of the most glorious strokes on the debut of Perth’s modern monstrosity, the Optus Stadium, as a Test venue. It didn’t prevent a big defeat, but the legend of Kohli was firmed up in Australia, the manner in which the runs were accrued reminiscent of some of the counter-punching Australian batters the home fans had come to revere and adore, if not deify.

Each time he came to Australia, Kohli produced something extraordinary. Like his century against South Africa in the 50-over World Cup in Melbourne in 2015. Like that magical unbeaten 82, when all seemed lost, in the T20 World Cup against Pakistan, also at the MCG, in October 2022. It was as if the air in Australia inspired Kohli to his best, as if the energy of the fans propelled him, as if the rush and the electricity was the drug that elevated him to glorious highs.

When he landed in Perth some eight and a half weeks back, it was to the general assumption that his fifth Test tour of Australia would most likely be his last. In each of the earlier outings apart from 2020-21, when he played just one Test, Kohli had made at least one century. Australians wanted more of him. So much more. The lead-up to the series was marked by images of Kohli splashed across most Australian newspapers, accompanied by captions and headlines in Hindi. It was as if India had come armed with Kohli, and several others. Until Jasprit Bumrah decided to do something about it.

Kohli responded like only he can, with a century in the second innings of the first Test at the Optus. The headline-hunters were thrilled, those marketing a series that, truth be told doesn’t need any marketing, were delighted. What more could they have asked for to keep the fire burning than an Indian win, a century from ‘King’ Kohli?

Kohli’s bat has gone cold since that unbeaten hundred in Perth, his woes outside the off-stump mounting with every passing outing. The regularity with which his bat has been magnetically attracted to the carrot dangled in the corridor of uncertainty has been chronicled extensively. In the past, Kohli has shown himself to be a quick and excellent learner, but those skills have deserted him, hopefully temporarily. But the scrapper in him is very much intact, as a massive crowd at the MCG was reminded on day one of the Boxing Day Test last Thursday.

Maybe Kohli saw a little bit of him in an era gone by in Sam Konstas. Most likely, he did – borderline irreverent, no respect for pedigree or reputation, no sign of fear or nerves, no hesitation or uncertainty or self-doubt. After being beaten four times in the first over of his debut Test, the 19-year-old turned on Bumrah. Ruthlessly. Unexpectedly. Unorthodoxly. He scooped and reverse-scooped the best bowler in the world with impunity, with swag and audacity, dare we say with arrogance. There were gasps of collective disbelief, even a little outrage – ‘Who does he think he is, treating Bumrah like this?’ – and Kohli decided to do something about it, shoulder-butting the young lad as he walked from slip to slip between overs.

It didn’t make for a good look. Kohli made it seem as if it was accidental, Konstas went so far after the game as to insist it was accidental – was he advised to embrace damage-control? – but match referee Andy Pycroft was having none of it, imposing a fine of 20% of the match fee on the former Indian captain. Did Kohli get away lightly? Potentially yes, though the fine and a single demerit point was the maximum penalty for the category under which he was charged. Just to refresh memories, current India head coach Gautam Gambhir was banned for one Test for shoulder-butting Shane Watson whilst running between the wickets during his 206 in the Delhi Test of 2008.

Heat of the moment or accidental?

Maybe Kohli allowed himself to be consumed by the heat of the moment, maybe it really was ‘accidental’, maybe he didn’t approve of Konstas’ onslaught on Bumrah, but there can be no excuse for physical contact in a non-contact sport. Some have suggested it was just a ‘harmless coming together of shoulders’ which shouldn’t be blown out of proportion, but things aren’t as simple as that. Kohli is expected at this stage of his career to assuage frayed nerves and douse simmering fires, not take the opposite route. Not only does it not make for good optics, it continues to send wrong signals to thousands of his young fans and followers who worship him and believe that he can do no wrong and that what he does on the cricket field is always worth emulating.

His gesture to the Indian section of the crowd at The Oval during the 50-over World Cup in 2019 to stop booing Smith, who had just returned from a ban for his role in ‘Sandpapergate’, and to treat him with the respect he deserved had elevated him immensely in the eyes of the Australians. He has fallen hugely in their estimation after the unnecessary bust-up with Konstas. Thereafter, he was greeted with boos and jeers every time he was in the action in MCG. How will SCG treat him? And more importantly, how will Kohli treat the SCG?