Virat Kohli Recalls The Moment When RCB's Game Changed In 2011
Published - 04 Feb 2022, 06:31 PM | Updated - 23 Aug 2024, 01:04 AM
Former Royal Challengers Bangalore skipper mentioned about the biggest change for him in his 14-long IPL career.
Kohli is the only player who has been with Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) since the inception of the Indian Premier League in 2008.
Kohli has played 207 matches for the franchise in the last 14 seasons and is the current leading run-scorer of the tournament with 6283 runs at the strike rate of 129.95.
The game changed when AB was bought in 2011 and Chris was signed mid-season: Virat Kohli
Kohli was appointed as the team’s captain, taking over the reins from New Zealand’s Daniel Vettori in the middle of IPL 2012. Kohli led the Bangalore outfit in 140 matches and won 64 matches with a 48.16 win percentage.
Kohli formed a great troika with West Indies swashbuckling batter Chris Gayle and South Africa’s Mr 360° AB de Villiers from 2011 to 2017.
“For me, the game changed when AB was bought in 2011 and Chris was signed mid-season 2011. You know what the bowlers think when they are running in to bowl, that (out of) these three guys, if two bat together for a while, it’s trouble for us,” Kohli said on ‘The RCB Podcasts’.
Gayle was released by the franchise in 2017 and de Villiers retired from all formats of the game in November 2021.
Virat Kohli & RCB will wait for their elusive IPL title
They were very close to the title in 2016 when they were chasing 209 against David Warner’s Sunrisers Hyderabad.
Gayle and Kohli had laid the foundation for the chase as they put together 114 runs for their opening stand. Once the duo was sent back to the dugout, RCB’ batting slumped and lost the match by eight runs.
In the last two seasons, they managed to qualify for the playoffs but exited in the Eliminator round. RCB has retained Kohli, Australian all-rounder Glenn Maxwell and Indian pacer Mohammed Siraj for IPL 2022.
Also Read: ‘Virat Kohli And MS Dhoni Rarely Missed Games, Rohit Sharma Should Focus On His Fitness’- Former Indian Pacer
