Ex-Proteas star: Batting with Kohli made me ready to play a rugby match!

Kohli, who is one of the most talented and well-known batsman in all of world cricket, has endured a difficult run of poor form of late. In the ongoing Indian Premier League, Kohli has struggled to make his usual impact for Royal Challengers Bangalore.

However, that all changed on Thursday as Kohli scored a sensational 73 off just 54 balls against the Gujarat Titans, combining with in-form Faf du Plessis (44) to help lead RCB to a comfortable eight-wicket win.

After the game, Du Plessis provided a fascinating insight into the energy Kohli creates as a player.

“I understand Virat in the sense that it gets him going,” Du Plessis told Star Sports. “It’s that fire, that personality, the character. So I play the role with him, I am getting pumped up. And it’s really fun to bat out there when he is going like that. He has got so much emotion he pulls you with you. In the sense that you are almost ready to play a rugby match. Because of all the energy going through you.”

Kohli has played 221 IPL matches

Meanwhile, Kohli described how a mindset shift enabled him to finally get back to free-scoring form.

“You just need to keep the perspective right,” Kohli said. “You need to understand there are expectations because of what you have achieved and what you have done over so many years. And sometimes what happens is that in the need to perform and live up to those standards you kind of forget the process that why you ended up performing so well or so much over the years.

“So you just need to go back to the drawing board and say you know what I just want to look at the ball and hit it. Sometimes you can think of all the things that can go wrong and not the things that can go right when you are on the field. So I worked really hard before this game. I batted about 90 minutes in the net yesterday. I kept backing myself every ball. I wanted clarity every ball that I played. And I was able to achieve that for 90 minutes.’

“So I came to this game very free. And relaxed that I can back myself every ball out there and not think of what if something goes wrong. So that’s something that you can tend to go into when you have a lot of expectations from yourself.”

You can see the interview between Du Plessis and Kohli here