India Vs England 2021: Virat Kohli Defends Rishabh Pant, Says 'Want To Give Him All The Space To Play His Game'

Virat Kohli has come in support of Rishabh Pant after the latter has immensely struggled to score runs in ongoing India’s tour of England. The Indian skipper has said that he wants to give all the pace to Rishabh Pant to play his game and understand the match situation. Among Indian batsmen, Rishabh Pant is the least run-scorer for the team against England so far.

In 5 innings so far, the left-handed batsman has piled up only 87 runs, aggregating 17.40. He has failed to cross the 40-run mark in India vs England Test series so far, scoring 25, 37, 22, 2, and 1 across 5 innings. During India vs England 3rd Test in Leeds, Pant was expected to carry forward the team’s total with his batting. However, he lost his wicket for 1 run after facing 7 deliveries.

We Want To Give Rishabh Pant All The Space To Play His Game: Virat Kohli

Speaking during the post-match presentation, Virat Kohli backed Rishabh Pant saying that team wants to give him all the space to play his game. Kohli also reckoned that he can’t start analyzing players with one loss.

“Well, again, as I said, with one loss I can’t assess or start analyzing that as a captain. Definitely the management isn’t going to start doing that because we are not failing as a team, as in, consistently we are not losing. We certainly failed in this game and we take responsibility for that.

“And similar conversations were being initiated about Pujara as well which seem to have disappeared after yesterday so we want to give Rishabh, as I have said before, all the space to play his game and understand the situations and take responsibility like is expected of everyone else in the batting order,” Kohli said.

Virat Kohli also said that it is not the right time to analyze or judge players on their success or failures as it should be done post the completion of the Test series.

“You can’t judge people all the time on numbers and whether they are succeeding or failing. That’s not how you make a team. There’s still time in the series. After two more Test matches, we can look back, reflect and analyze like, ‘Okay, these are the areas that were not quite right’. But at this moment, it’s not the time,” Virat Kohli further said.

India lost the 3rd Test in Leeds to England by an innings and 78 runs. Against a lead of 354 runs in 2nd innings, India were bowled out for 278 runs. England pacer Ollie Robinson grabbed 5 wickets in the 2nd innings to win the Player of The Match award. The series is tied 1-1 and India and England will battle against each other in the 4th Test from September 2 (Thursday). The encounter will take place at Kennington Oval in London.

Also Read: Ravi Shastri Needs To Motivate Ajinkya Rahane; Says Maninder Singh After Indian Vice-Captain’s Poor Batting Show Against England