Thousands of bowing heads in the electrifying ambience of the PCA Stadium here told only one story – Virat Kohli’s growth in stature as a cricketing super human. Kohli’s extraordinary batsmanship, which produced an unbeaten 51-ball 82, carried India to a memorable six-wicket win over Australia and earned the host a place in the World T20 semifinals. The class of Kohli’s knock, which came amidst extremely difficult circumstances and in a do-or-die match, reminded one of Sachin Tendulkar’s unforgettable assault on Australia in the summer of 1998 in Sharjah. Having achieved a vice-like grip on the match Australians were faltered to deceive when the much wanted wicket of Khawaja had gone. Instead of sending a bowling all rounder like Faulkner to take the fight to enemy’s camp with unorthodox method, Australia chose the wrong path and made a blunder of a blistering start. Despite early loss of wickets, Indian team led by Man of the Match Virat Kohli made mincemeat of the bowling and made Smith side a bad loser.
S Abhishek Ramaswamy
(The views expressed by the author in the article are his/her own.)
