Virat Kohli's biggest fears unlocked by Bangladesh on Test return; DRS brain-fade only make matters worse

Virat Kohli’s return to Test cricket after an extended eight-and-a-half-month hiatus has been far from memorable from a personal perspective. Across two innings, India’s most prolific batter of his generation spent less than an hour at the crease, making 23 runs off 43 deliveries.

Many will argue that Rohit Sharma’s corresponding numbers are even less impressive – 11 runs, 40 minutes’ stay, 26 deliveries faced – but this isn’t a Kohli vs Rohit comparison. In any case, India’s skipper came into this series with two centuries in his last three Tests, and received two excellent deliveries early on, both edging up in the hands of the slip cordon to defensive strokes.

Kohli will be the first to admit that more than the bowler, he was responsible for his twin dismissals in the first Test against Bangladesh. On Thursday’s day one, with India floundering at 34 for two, the former captain optimistically wafted at a delivery well outside off from Hasan Mahmud that could and should have been studiously ignored. The intention was to send the ball scurrying to the cover fence, the outcome was a feather to Liton Das behind the stumps.

On Friday, Kohli walked in after Yashasvi Jaiswal reprised his own dismissal of the first innings with the last of several ambitious drives on a tricky surface. India were 28 for two when Kohli joined a composed Shubman Gill at the crease. Greeted by loud applause from a crowd numbering 13,500, Kohli immediately got down to business, moving nicely, using soft hands when the need arose and unleashing a one-for-the-scrapbook whip-flick off Mahmud that raced across the turf through mid-wicket like greased lightning.

A little later, when off-spinner Mehidy Hasan Miraz served out a long-hop, Kohli rocked back and nonchalantly pulled him over square-leg with the strut and swagger that are his companions when he is feeling good about himself.

Then, disaster struck.

The next ball was full on off-stump and Kohli played all around it, trying to whip it squarer than he would have liked. The ball slid past the angled bat and thudded into his pad, and umpire Richard Kettleborough had little hesitation in raising the dreaded right index finger. Nonplussed for a moment, Kohli walked down for a chat with Gill and shook his head ‘no’, ostensibly in reply to whether he had got a nick. Gill, in all likelihood, told him then that there was no reason to challenge the verdict, at which point Kohli made his way to the dressing room.

Only to find, to his great consternation a few minutes later, that he had got an inside-edge, that a review would have resulted in the ‘Out’ decision being overturned. As light as the contact might be, batters almost always know when the ball has hit the bat. For once, Kohli didn’t, hence his second failure of the game. It was one of those brain-fade moments that happen occasionally, but more worrisome was the manner of his two dismissals at the MA Chidambaram Stadium.

Virat Kohli's familiar foes return to haunt

The first-innings fall was almost textbook in conditions where the ball is nibbling off the seam. Kohli has great hands and wonderful coordination which together help him go hard at the ball and find gaps along the ground on surfaces that don’t encourage lateral movement. But several times in the past, when there has been seam or reasonable swing, Kohli has been culpable of nicking off early in his innings, reaching out for deliveries easily left alone perhaps because he likes feeling ball on bat in the nascent stages of his knock.

The second-innings dismissal wasn’t out of character, either. Since the beginning of 2022, Kohli has perished to spin 12 times in 24 outs; in his last 15 innings, off-spinners have had his number on a staggering seven occasions. It’s inevitable that in a career as long as Kohli has had, minute analysis will reveal statistics that leave themselves open to interpretation as per convenience, but it’s hard to argue against these numbers, or against the fact that in the last two and a half years, he has been dismissed five times within the first 30 deliveries of facing up to spin.

Kohli might be unaware of these exact numbers, but it won’t escape him that there is an issue. Or twin issues, if you like – against sucker balls outside off from quicks, and against off-spin more than any other variety of spin. He also knows he can’t wish the problems away, so he will work on them in typical Kohli fashion – with undiluted focus and unwavering commitment that, he will hope, will translate to more favourable outcomes.