The Indian National Cricket Team had superstar Virat Kohli leading the team in the second Test of the 2024-25 Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
Virat Kohli stepped in as captain, albeit briefly, during the Adelaide Test against the Australian National Cricket Team on Friday, December 6.
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Watch: Virat Kohli dons the captain’s cap
Kohli is the most successful Indian captain in the history of Test cricket. Under his leadership, he transformed the Test team and turned them into an unbeatable force at home and a dominant side in overseas matches.
He brought a culture of fitness to the team and built an excellent fast bowling unit with coaches who helped Team India register some historic victories in the SENA Tests.
Virat Kohli captained the Test team in 68 matches from 2014 to 2022 and won 48 matches. He has lost only 17 matches as the captain of the red ball and achieved a winning percentage of 58.82.
From time to time, he was seen helping captain Rohit Sharma on the field. A similar thing happened on Day 1 of the Adelaide Test.
He gave captain Rohit Sharma some suggestions to break the partnership between Nathan McSweeney and Marnus Labuschagne.
On the 17th, Virat Kohli walked up to Rohit and had a small chat with him. It seems that he gave some suggestions to Rohit Sharma and after that he told Siraj to change the field.
Watch: Virat Kohli sets the field in the 2nd Test
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However, Virat Kohli’s bids did not pay off as Australians Nathan McSweeney and Marnus Labuschagne remained unbeaten at the end of the first day’s play.
The duo were involved in a perfect partnership of 62 as the Australian National Cricket Team were at 86/1 at stumps.
Speaking of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma’s performances with the bat, the Indian skipper managed to score just 3 runs off 23 balls, while the powerful batsman, who scored a century in the Perth Test, scored 7 runs off 8 balls.
Indian bowlers have not really used the pink ball as well as they should – Sunil Gavaskar
Speaking to Star Sports, Indian National Cricket Team great Sunil Gavaskar expressed disappointment with the performance of the Indian bowling unit.
He said that the Jasprit Bumrah-led bowling attack did not use the pink ball properly, which led to their failure on the first day.
“They’ve got to make the hitters play as hard as they can. And that’s what happens when you make the hitters play as hard as they can.
“You can set them up by bowling a couple of deliveries outside off and then bring the ball back like he did with Nathan McSweeney in the Perth Test or Labuschagne in the Perth Test. Like Bumrah did. The Indian bowlers really didn’t use the pink ball as well as they should have,” Gavaskar said.
