India captain Virat Kohli on Saturday said he wouldn’t depend on two-three players to win an ICC tournament. India last won an ICC event back in 2013 – the Champions Trophy but failed to win another one since then. However, the focus has shifted on the T20 World Cup which will take place in Australia later this year.
“We need guys who are ready till numbers six and seven to win you games. It can’t be dependent on two guys or three guys in the batting line-up. You know, that’s not how you win ICC tournaments,” said Kohli ahead of T20 series opener against Sri Lanka. “So that’s our main focus to reveal situations to guys and expect them to come into their own and become those fearless match winners that we should have going into a big tournament.”
Shreyas Iyer has done well ever since his comeback but has not been tested in pressure situations. Rishabh Pant, however, has been criticised a lot for his rough patch.
“These next few series is going to be very exciting to see who stands up in pressure situations, how they react when may be Rohit or myself or KL or Shikhar at the top have not fired. I think because the tournament is in Australia, you will need these many options and back-ups ready to be able to take firstly your strongest XI or strongest squad and then have those back-ups in place, who also can come and do the job,” said the captain.
“It’s good that we identify five or six guys and it will be priority based on you know who goes and then back-ups will be in place. Also with fast bowlers, we know small niggles can happen every now and then. So yeah, we’re pretty sorted in that regard, not worried at all,” he added.
Virat Kohli also spoke about India’s top-order which is doing pretty well.
“As far as the series is concerned, it’s pretty straightforward. Both of them will start (Dhawan and Rahul). But when Rohit comes back, you know, it’s going to be a difficult thing to address because Shikhar has been an experienced player but KL is playing so well. So I think we’ll have to decide what is the best combination that we can go with and who are the best XI to take the field,” he said.
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He also shared his plans for this year which is going to be crucial for India.
“We have put the team on the right track in terms of, you know, being the team that everyone wants to be across formats. I think it is a very exciting position to be in. And that is something that we want to continue, keep the standards of the cricket that we’ve played as high as we have in the past couple of years,”
“I think we get involved in the rat race to an extent where we can go into our individual cocoons a lot of the times and that can hamper the team at an important stage. From a very young age, we are always, you know, focused on what we did as individuals. Even when we came back from a game, we were invariably asked, what did you do rather than did the team win?,” he shared.
“So I think that’s a mindset change that I see that happening in the last three years at a very big level where they started to appreciate small performances of guys who might have taken a catch or a great run-out in the game and they turned the whole game,” he told.
Kohli further talked about Rishabh Pant’s recent form as well.
“If someone you feel like is going into a shell, pull that guy out saying, don’t worry about it, just focus on the team, you’ll be fine. So I think these things are very important to address and speak about every now and then. Because as sportsman, we can tend to sort of take a lot of pressure in our own performances,” he concluded.
