Former India captain Virat Kohli’s knack of erring in the slips continued in the second innings of the first Test match against Australia at the Vidarbha Cricket Association Stadium today. The development means that Kohli has now failed at least once across departments on each of the three days of this match.
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The 34-year old player was at fault on the fourth delivery of the sixth over when he dropped a straightforward catch to hand a proper reprieve to Australia opening batter David Warner.
Wanting to defend a Ravichandran Ashwin delivery, Warner survived only and only because of Kohli not being able to hold his nerves. With Ashwin successfully inducing the outside edge of Warner’s bat, all Kohli needed to do was let the ball come to him. However, Kohli, who is mostly brimming with energy and enthusiasm especially in this format, failed to do the same to let down both his teammates and fans.
Had Kohli completed the catch, Ashwin would’ve got a couple of wickets in his first spell itself after being asked to open the bowling alongside pacer Mohammed Shami by captain Rohit Sharma. The dismissal would’ve also seen both the Australian openers get out for single-digit scores for the second time in the match.
It was in his first over that Ashwin enticed Usman Khawaja (5) to play a drive only for him to edge the ball to Kohli at first slip. While Kohli didn’t falter then, him repeatedly dropping catches in the slips could cost his team massively one day. For the unversed, former Australia batter Mark Waugh had lashed out at Kohli for dropping a similar catch in the first innings while calling the match for Star Sports Network.
Virat Kohli dropped catch today video
Meanwhile, a 52-run ninth-wicket partnership between India all-rounder Axar Patel (84) and Shami (37) in the previous session powered India’s first innings lead to a formidable 223 runs.
