The dust has settled. The tornado warning is over. And team India is due to take their flight from Barbados back to their country where people are waiting to laud the national heroes and, if they get lucky enough, touch the coveted silverware. After the trophy comes home after almost two decades. But critics and devils dwell in the details and there is not a greater duo in cricket than hindsight and weeding through the details. Despite the euphoria outbreak in the cricket-mad country, some pundits have managed to extract some killjoy details to question the victory, with Sanjay Manjrekar being one of those.
Virat Kohli, the player of the match in the final game of the tournament, played a 59-ball-76 knock which stabilized India after the remaining top order failed to make a mark. Although the innings were crucial in match context, Kohli’s slow batting nearly cost India the match. He ended with a strike rate of 128, which in itself is low by T20 standards, but it does not capture the whole story. For much of his innings, his scoring rate was even lower and reached 128 courtesy of a few late-innings boundaries. The right-handed batter took two overs less than half the innings to reach his 50 runs. Interestingly, the pitch was not as difficult to bat. Both Axar Patel and Shivam Dube struck at more than 150 while batting alongside Kohli. To make things worse for Kohli, Heinrich Klassen’s blitzkrieg almost pushed Virat to end his career at a sour point. However, the bowlers and Suryakumar Yadav’s blinder rescued the top-order batter from capping his magnificent career with something as meager.
Sanjay Manjrekar, while talking to ESPN Cricinfo, also nodded to the same view. Praising Pandya for his explosive knock, he said it all could have ended in vain, had the bowlers not saved the day.
Citing the same reason, he said that the knock was not as great to eclipse the bowlers’ performance and give the Player of the Match award to Virat Kohli.
The recently concluded T20 World Cup was a nightmare for Virat Kohli, who usually thrashes opponents for a living in tournaments. Barring the final game, he accumulated only 75 runs in seven innings with a timid strike rate of 100. While many see his knock in the final as vindication for a player as great as him, a lot of people believe that he could have played at a faster rate or let other teammates take the charge instead of dilly-dallying through the innings.
