Before we begin, let’s make it clear: this isn’t the BCCI writing a tribute to Virat Kohli as an afterthought to applaud his captaincy tenure.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ll be aware of the stream of news that has come out of India. The announcement of Rohit Sharma as Kohli’s replacement, the BCCI president’s words on how the organisation had asked for Kohli not to step down as T20I captain and how the India side couldn’t function with two white-ball captains. The “men’s” India side, I should add, for the board’s conditions haven’t applied to the women’s team, with Mithali Raj and Harmanpreet Kaur splitting duties.
Amidst all the mess, the BCCI’s Twitter handle went on a Kohli-lauding streak on Thursday. Coming a day after the initial news was silently revealed via an asterisk below the announcement of India’s Test squad to face South Africa, the posts praising the former white-ball skipper almost seemed farcical. Whether heartfelt or an indulgence, we’ll never know, but one thing should be clear: Kohli departs as one of the greatest ODI captains in the game.
No ICC trophy, so what?
Kohli’s inability to win the IPL, alongside India’s inability to clinch an ICC event under him has put a question mark over his abilities as a skipper. While winning tournaments remains the hallmark of a true leader, it should not be considered the be-all-and-end-all, for there are various other factors to consider. So far as a skipper, Kohli has led India in four ICC events: the 2017 Champions Trophy, the 2019 World Cup, the inaugural World Test Championship and the 2021 T20 World Cup.
India reached the final in 2017, where an unfortunate no-ball by Jasprit Bumrah turned the game around. It was the rain that played its part in the semi-final defeat two years later, and then again in the WTC final. The elimination from the first round in the T20 World Cup remains an aberration, but while it was bad play it was also luck, or the lack of it, that played its part.
We’ve spoken about how Kohli remains a T20I titan, both as captain and as batter, and his ODI numbers aren’t far behind either.
A leader who led the side with grit, passion & determination. 🇮🇳🔝
Thank you Captain @imVkohli!👏👏#TeamIndia pic.twitter.com/gz7r6KCuWF
— BCCI (@BCCI) December 9, 2021
The player led India in 95 matches, with India winning 65 games under him, to give him a win percentage of 70.43. He is ranked fourth among India captains with the most ODI wins, behind MS Dhoni, Mohammad Azharuddin and Sourav Ganguly. However, his w/l ratio of 2.407 is the best among the three aforementioned skippers. Overall, Kohli has the third-best win percentage among skippers who have led in at least 90 ODIs, with the list being led by Ricky Ponting (76.14), who is followed by Hansie Cronje (73.70).
The biggest test for a captain is usually how well he marshalled his troops overseas. Kohli excels in that department as well, with 41 victories out of 60 matches away or at neutral venues. He led India in 19 bilateral series, with India registering 15 wins under him. He also led India in 10 away series, with the Men in Blue winning seven of them, including a 5-1 win in South Africa in 2018, 4-1 victory in New Zealand in 2019, and a 2-1 triumph against the Australians that same year.
He was incredible with the bat too. Kohli averaged a whopping 72.65 in ODIs when he was skipper, the highest among all players who have led in at least 50 matches, and hit an astonishing 21 hundreds too. Ricky Ponting leads that category with 22, but that was after 230 matches as captain, more than double of Kohli’s sample size.
Though Kohli could not win an ICC trophy for India, it should not tarnish his image as a leader par excellence who helped India conquer teams across conditions. In BCCI’s words, he was filled with “grit, passion and determination”, which resulted in a great amount of success in the format under his leadership.
