Former India head coach Ravi Shastri believes that star batsman Virat Kohli is under the influence of mental fatigue and he is in dire need of rest from cricket so that he can play for the country for the next seven-eight years. Kohli is not in good form right now. He has scored more than 40 runs only twice in seven matches for Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in the Indian Premier League (IPL). His fans are very disappointed with the poor performance of Run Machine. Social media users gave different reactions to Kohli after his failure against Lucknow.
The 33-year-old Delhi-based batsman has not scored a century in the last 100 matches across all formats. He had relinquished the T20 captaincy of both India and RCB. He has also stepped down from the Test captaincy while he was removed from the captaincy of the ODI team. Shastri feels a player like Kohli needs to be well looked after in an environment where players are confined to one place due to COVID-19.
Six-seven years of cricket is left- Shastri told Star Sports, “I am directly talking about the main player here. Fatigue dominates Virat Kohli due to busyness. If anyone needs rest, it is Kohli.” He said, “Whether it is a two-and-a-half month rest or one and a half month. Be it before or after the England tour, he needs rest because he has six-seven years of cricket left in him and you don’t want to lose him due to mental fatigue.
Need to show empathy towards players Kohli was dismissed on the first ball in the IPL match on Tuesday. RCB defeated Lucknow Super Giants by 18 runs in this match with the help of 96 runs by captain Faf du Plessis. Shastri said, “I started it for the first time when I was a coach. The first thing I said was that you need to show empathy towards the players. He will not be able to give his best. So we have to be very careful.”
Pietersen also agreed with Shastri’s point- Former England captain Kevin Pietersen also agreed with Shastri and said that Kohli will have to stay away from sports and social media for some time to regain his new energy. Peterson said, “He is involved in many things. He is the biggest star of this game. Virat Kohli desperately needs a break for some time. He has to stay away from social media and re-energize himself.
Disappointment among Kohli’s fans too- Kohli’s fans are also disappointed due to the continuous poor performance. As soon as he became a victim of Golden Duck, he started trending on social media. Fans gave different reactions and the memes also went viral. A woman in the stadium covered her face after his dismissal. Some said that seeing Virat Kohli like this broke his heart. King’s career seems to be over.