Virat Kohli’s struggle against the deliveries outside off-stump was once again exposed as the former Indian captain perished for just seven on the opening day of the second pink-ball Test against Australia on Friday in Adelaide. After KL Rahul departed for a gritty 37 off 63 balls, all eyes were Kohli as he walked out at the Adelaide Oval much to the cheer of the Indian fans who thronged the stadium.
With more than 500 runs at this venue and an impressive average of over 63, Virat Kohli was expected to hold the Indian innings with Shubman Gill settled at the other end. However, Kohli didn’t do much justice to those statistics as the right-hander edged to Steve Smith at second slip off Mitchell Starc.
The Australian pacer banged in a short-off-length as the ball angled in across Kohli on the fifth-sixth stump line. The Indian batter, in two minds, withdrew his bat late, as the ball took a thick edge off the face of the willow and went straight to Smith.
Kohli could have left the ball. He looked visibly frustrated and inspected his to-end of the bat before walking out.
Former India cricketer Sanjay Manjrekar echoed the same on his social media post and called Kohli adamant for not trying other ways to rectify his weakness. “One important reason why Virat’s average has slipped to 48 now, is the unfortunate weakness outside off. But more crucially his adamance to not try another way to tackle it,” Manjrekar wrote.
Meanwhile, India suffered a top-order collapse before tea. Yashasvi Jaiswal, centurion in the first Test in Perth, was undone by Starc on the very first ball of the match. Gill and KL Rahul stitched 69 runs for the second wicket before the latter was out for 37.
Gill too followed suit for 31 off the bowling of Scott Boland. At tea, India were 82/4 with Rishabh Pant and captain Rohit Sharma on the crease. Earlier, India made three changes with Rohit, Gill and Ravichandran Ashwin replacing Devdutt Padikkal, Dhruv Jurel and Washington Sundar.
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