By Kuntal Chakraborty
Despite holding almost all the batting records in international cricket, Sachin Tendulkar had never been a good captain. He wanted his colleagues to perform like him. He failed to understand the fact that not everyone was as gifted as him and hence can't perform to his level of expectations.
On the other hand captains like Sourav Ganguly and MS Dhoni believed in a completely different philosophy; that is to bring the best out of every cricketer as all of them are not gifted ones.
Perhaps, Virat Kohli's philosophy of captaincy is more like that of Sachin Tendulkar. In every Test match Virat has changed the team combination from the last couple of years and as a result he failed to build up a core group. Sometimes he dropped Rahane, sometimes Ashwin didn't find a place in the squad. Bhubaneshwar Kumar, despite taking 6 wickets in a Test match was dropped in the very next game.
Virat perhaps thinks that all batsmen will bat like him and very easily gets annoyed with his teammates when they fail in one or two innings.
Now, with a couple of failures, a sense of insecurity grows within the cricketers and their level of performance drops down. Take the example of Ajinkya Rahane. The middle-order batsman who had an overseas average of 54 before the start of the series was dropped from the team to accommodate Rohit Sharma.
Rahane had just failed in one series at home before being dropped from the playing eleven and when he finally got an opportunity again his confidence perhaps had taken a serious beating.
Now, the cricket experts here in South Africa feel that same kind of mentality perhaps had triggered Virat Kohli to decide that they will bat first after winning the toss at the Wanderers. On a green top that is showing signs of a tennis ball kind of bounce, Virat rather than chosing to bowl, took batting. KL Rahul and Murali Vijay weren't good enough to counter the South African pace battery on a surface like this. Virat himself rode some luck to score a fifty but the others were thrown into a corridor of uncertainty because of his decision.
Virat wants same kind of ' intent ' in everyone. But despite showing the best of intents, not everyone can perform like Virat.
On a green top that is seaming and bouncing, most Indian batsmen will fail and it wouldn't have been a bad decision at all to bowl first on track like this when you have five pacers in your team.
Now, it’s high time for Virat Kohli to understand that most cricketers are not born with the same kind of talent and calibre as he does.
Batting skills and the skills of a good captain are completely different. It is high time someone in BCCI speaks to Virat Kohli, otherwise Team India will receive a serious beating in the away series to come and perform no better than what they are doing in South Africa.