World Cup 2023 | Another tricky chase, another Kohli masterclass

For nearly two decades until the end of 2013, the fall of the second Indian wicket in a Test match was met with raucous cheers by fans at every venue in India. It didn’t matter who the batsman dismissed was, or what his contribution had been. Such was the lot of the second batsman to fall in an Indian innings, because his exit would bring to the middle Sachin Tendulkar, the darling of millions of Indians.

Over the last 10 years, in a discernible passing of the baton, Virat Kohli has grabbed the consciousness of the Indian cricket fan. That’s why, when India lose their first wicket in a limited-overs international, the crowds go berserk. After all, at No. 3 is the man they call King Kohli, the man with a computer for a brain in a run chase, the man everyone loves to love everywhere in India.

So it was in Dharamsala on Sunday night. Rohit Sharma, India’s furiously aggressive captain, had gotten the team off to another blazing start in the quest for 274 to slay New Zealand and steer the team to a fifth consecutive victory when he dragged Lockie Ferguson on to his stumps. For just the teeniest fraction of a second, the audience went silent, struggling to cope with the unexpected outcome off an innocuous delivery. Then, collective realisation dawned upon them.

Exit Rohit meant enter Kohli. The fans found their feet, they found their voice, they found a reason to scream and cheer and shout and clap.

The Kohli effect isn’t hard to understand. After all, he is the premier batsman of his generation, a once-in-a-lifetime concoction of style and grace, power and elegance, technique and hunger, ambition and drive, skill and temperament. He is the symbol of new-age India, intrepid and unafraid, comfortable in his own skin, happy to mouth off, keen to engage the crowd, working his magic like the conductor of an orchestra. He is unapologetic and intensely proud, but he is also an entertainer whose mass appeal transcends the ordinary. Were we to engage in such odious comparisons, he is the modern-day equivalent of Tendulkar, with the snarls and the growls and the beard and the tattoo thrown in as additional props.

Watching Kohli go about his business during this World Cup, it’s impossible to imagine that this was a man who went 1,020 days without an international hundred. Who, for the better part of three years, batted from poor, fading memory. Who looked like Kohli but seemed like an impostor when he took guard. Whose confidence seemed to have deserted him, whose intensity appeared put on, whose interest seemed to be waning.

For nearly three years from the beginning of 2020, Kohli could do very little right. He lost his form, he lost his captaincy, he looked as if he had lost his mojo. Even given that he had earned himself the longest of ropes by sheer dint of the volume of his exceptional work, how long? How long could he continue to dawdle along, playing on reputation alone?

Those questions were answered one emotional night in the desert sands of Dubai in September last year. Until that evening at the T20 Asia Cup, Kohli had never made a Twenty20 International ton. He had many in the IPL for Royal Challengers Bangalore, yes, but not for the country. It seemed the least likely format to facilitate him ending his long drought. And yet, it was the 20-over shootout that came to his aid, Afghanistan taken apart in a remarkable exhibition of ball-striking.

That opened the floodgates. Since that hundred more than 13 and a half months back, Kohli has been in sensational touch – two centuries in nine Tests, five three-figure knocks in 24 ODIs. The King’s back, long live the King.

This has already been a World Cup of plenty for the former skipper. At the very first time of asking, he had to pull off one of his patented chases, against Australia in Chennai a fortnight back. Needing 200, India were three wickets down for two, Kohli holding fort alongside KL Rahul. When on 12, he essayed a pull from outside off against Josh Hazlewood; the ball got big on him and ballooned up in the air as Chepauk held its collective breath. Mitchell Marsh ran some 15 yards to his right from mid-wicket, but somehow allowed the ball to slip through his hands. You could see the colour return to Kohli’s face, you could sense then that it was going to be a long night for the Aussies.

True to expectations, Kohli made Marsh and Australia pay for that largesse, hauling India home with a magnificently composed 85. It was just the first act; two nights later, he breezed to an unbeaten 55 against Afghanistan at his Kotla home ground. A rare failure against Pakistan – out for 16 – didn’t matter much because the game was already in the bag, but Kohli took it to heart, punishing Bangladesh with his 48th ODI ton in Pune on Thursday.

He came to Dharamsala needing one to equal Tendulkar’s all-time record of 49 ODI hundreds, and a tryst with history seemed inevitable with India in a spot at 76 for two and 191 for five. No one was leaving the ground, not with Kohli in the middle; New Zealand weren’t breathing easy, because despite their unbeaten streak in all World Cups against India dating back to 2003, they still had Kohli to contend with.

With ridiculous focus and remarkable clarity, Kohli homed in on the twin targets – 274 for the team, 100 for himself. He played it out so beautifully that, with five needed for victory, he was five short of No. 49. One hit would do it, for team and self.

Kohli took one deep sigh and took on Matt Henry, hoping to clear long-on, to kill two birds with one stone. Except that the bat turned in his hand, the ball skewered off the inside half and nestled in the hands of the long-on fielder. This time, the crowd again rose as one. There was no disappointment at the five that had gotten away, only delight at the 95 priceless runs that had flowed off his bat. They knew, like Kohli, that No. 49 is round the corner. Some things, after all, are pre-ordained, aren’t they?