‘That you go out with just 45 minutes of bad cricket is saddening & it breaks your heart'
India captain Virat Kohli was poised in defeat on Wednesday when he and his team lost the biggest moment of the World Cup in a matter of just 45 minutes. That this quick ouster came after a grand run of good cricket spreading over nine matches, record breaking performances and top-ranking outings with both the bat and the ball, made the heartbreak even more unbearable, not just for the players in the dressing room but also the fans and the Indian media.
It must have been a difficult job to address the media after such a convulsive day but Kohli showed acquired maturity and balance to deal with the situation, urging the fans to strike the same balance in reacting to victory and defeat. “We lost the match due to the first 40 minutes of bad cricket,” the skipper said candidly.
“I don’t think that I would like to break things down immediately but in time would like to sit down and analyse what went wrong and what things we could have done right, in this game particularly,” Kohli said, talking about the heartbreak in the team which played good cricket throughout the tournament only to go out of the game because of just 45 minutes of bad cricket.
“You feel bad for the result. Everyone goes out there to win the game. We are sad but not devastated because we know where we stand as a team,” Kohli added.
He lauded the efforts of the New Zealand bowlers who put up a great show bowling with the new ball. “We lost three wickets for five runs and it is very difficult to come back from there,” he said.
“Rohit got a good ball. My ball was also decent…. Start is always important. The way they bowled did not give us any opportunity. The first seven or eight overs we did not get a ball to drive even one,” he said. “The perfect spell of fast bowling put us under a lot of pressure.”
He candidly admitted that “we are not good enough under pressure and we have to accept that,” Kohli said.
Talking about the shot that took away Rishabh Pant from the middle when he had a big task at hand, Kohli said mistakes happen. “He is an instinctive bowler. Still young, I made many errors when I was young in my career. He will learn. He will look back and think he could have taken a different option in that situation. He realises that already. All these guys have a lot of pride and passion to play. They are the ones who feel most disappointed when mistakes happen…. The talent is there, the character is there. It happens in sport, you make decisions you make errors and you have to accept it,” the skipper said. “The ones who make the error, trust me, are the ones who suffer the most,” he added.
He called Jadeja’s knock and Dhoni's partnership outstanding. Flicking away questions around the pace of Dhoni’s innings, he said, “the way they batted together, it was the perfect tempo for that situation." Talking about Dhoni’s dual role in the team, Kohli said: “He is been given that role of being in a situation where he can control one end like he did today or if there is a scenario that he could go and strike, then do so,” he said.
“Failures teach you and you learn from them,” he said philosophically.
Talking about his own personal heartbreak as a skipper and a player who could not bring in the victory in the knockout match, Kohli said: “You just go out with just 45 minutes of bad cricket is saddening and it break your heart also. We worked so hard throughout the tournament that we finish No 1 in the table and then a brief spell of bad cricket and you are out of the tournament completely. But we have to accept it. We have all come out better cricketers because of these setbacks. We have played some outstanding cricket and qualified for the semis. We should also take some positives from here because there were a lot,” he said.
Referring to Jadeja’s celebration after he got to his 50, taunting commentator Sanjay Manjrekar with a wave of his hands, Kohli said: “I don’t think we had anything to stop Jadeja after what had been going on for the past week. You saw the passion which he played. He has played like this in Test cricket also a couple of times. He played under tremendous pressure. He has got three triple hundreds in first class cricket. The talent has always been there. Watching Jadeja for 10 years and playing with him this is his best knock according to me.”
Kohli felt that Jadeja was very motivated. “We all felt that the game can be closed down he played so well but a mistake can happen at any stage. I don’t think that was a mistake. It was just lack of execution which in cricket happens. You have to take risks here and there so… He has been a very understated cricketer but…” he added.
He agreed to the question about the knockouts changing format and turning into playoffs, giving more chances to good teams. “If topping the table means anything than I think these things can come into consideration looking at the magnitude… it is a really valid point,” he added.