Dubai: Virat Kohli has given Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) the kind of profile that very few cricketers can give. However, Virat Kohli couldn’t end his leadership stint the way he would have liked, according to the legendary Sunil Gavaskar. This praise came in spite of Virat Kohli losing more matches as captain than winning. In the 140 games Kohli led RCB, they won 66 matches and lost 70 with four not producing any result.
Gavaskar said not all scripts are written in the manner players want them to. Kohli had announced that he would step down as RCB skipper after the end of the 14th edition of the lucrative league.
“He (Kohli)has given RCB that kind of profile, that brand recognition that very (few) cricketers have given to their franchise,” Gavaskar told Star Sports.
The former India captain compared Kohli’s last match as RCB skipper with the farewells of Sir Donald Bradman and Sachin Tendulkar.
“Everybody wants to finish on a high. But these things never always happen according to your or fans’ wishes. Look at what happened to Sir Don Bradman. Just four runs were needed in his last innings to have an average of 100 and he gets out for a zero,” Gavaskar pointed out.
“Sachin Tendulkar would have wanted to finish with a hundred, he got 79 (Tendulkar scored 74) in Mumbai, his 200th Test match. The innings is not bad but somebody who is used to making hundreds would have wanted to get those extra 21 runs and then end his Test career there,” Gavaskar added.
Sharing his thoughts on Kohli’s failure to lift an IPL trophy, Gavaskar said Kohli had an ever-lasting impact on the team and mentioned the 2016 season when he amassed close to 1000 runs in a single edition.
“The script is not always written that way. Not everybody has this great fortune of going on a high. But can one ever dispute what he has done for RCB? He has done magnificently,” asserted Gavaskar.
“There was one season when he got 973 runs in the IPL, 27 runs short of 1,000 runs. Nobody has done it, nobody looks like ever getting to 1000 runs,” added the former Indian captain.
Since taking over as RCB’s captain in 2013, Kohli has led the team to the play-offs four times, including the last two seasons. Under him, RCB have played the final once.
