NEW DELHI: It was the seventh time in 8 outings in the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy that star India batter Virat Kohli got dismissed fishing outside off.
Barring the 100 not out he scored in the series opener Perth, Kohli has been dismissed 7 times in the series so far — all of them caught behind.
The fateful Kohli end outside off happened once again in Sydney on Friday as Scott Boland forced the star India batter to poke at one of his deliveries outside off he fell for a hard-fought 68-ball 17.
With Kohli’s continued troubles outside off, former India batter Sanjay Manjrekar said that he has become a massive worry for the 36-year-old.
He also went on to say that Kohli’s troubles now run so deep that anyone can get him out outside the line of the off stump.
“You’ve got to feel for the guy because his biggest strength, you know when he arrived on the international scene was the cover drive and now that has turned out to be the biggest weakness for him. Let’s go back to the dismissals we just saw and I’ll tell you something that I have never seen before. It is a problem outside off. We saw that surface against Jimmy Anderson in 2014 in England. But if the balls were outside off that were full, you know the balls that he was driving at are the ones that he was getting out to. But now that problem has become so severe that all bowlers now have to do is to just bowl in that line on the fifth and sixth, doesn’t matter the length.
“You see the problem for Virat Kohli, it has actually compounded where it doesn’t matter what the length is. He is still getting out to balls in that channel whether it’s short or whether it’s full. Earlier it was only the full deliveries that troubled him and the short of length balls he used to manage. But now just a bowler, it could be anyone who has to just turn up and bowl outside off and you got to feel for him because he has just run out of scoring options, Manjrekar said on Star Sports.
Virat has struggled for runs in the ongoing series as he has just 184 runs in 8 outings at an average of 26.28.
On the opening day of the fifth and final Test, India were bowled out for 185 with Rishabh Pant (40) turning the top scorer for the side.
Australia ended the day at 9 for 1, losing Usman Khawaja on the final ball of the day.
