IPL 2017: Virat Kohli, the lone warrior in Bangalore camp

Virat Kohli will reflect on the 2016-17 with mixed emotions and finally concede that cricket is a funny game. He broke records while leading India to nine Test wins in the home season against four opponents. He himself got a thousand-plus runs and everything was going fine.

It seemed that whatever he touched turned gold. But the harsh reality of life hit him hard when his Royal Challengers Bangalore could neither win at home or in their away games. The hard-core RCB fans that paint the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru red must be feeling let down by the most famed batting line-up. The likes of Chris Gayle and AB de Villiers have won matches single-handedly from any position. But, not this time around.

So much so that if the 49 all out in Kolkata was the lowest point in the RCB history, their 96/9 on Saturday evening in Pune before coming here for Monday’s 4.00 pm game against second-placed Mumbai Indians by the Pune-Mumbai Expressway was no better.

Remove Kohli’s 55 and the rest of the batsmen including Mr Extras have a combined 41. One may have expected the Gayles, the ABs, the Kedar Jadhavs, all of whom have come to the IPL fresh to complement their tired captain.

Despite recovering from the shoulder injury that kept him out of the fourth and final Test against Australia in Dharamsala, Kohli must be a tired man. Having gone through the pressures of leading India to one series victory after another from September to March, Kohli did not show the mental stress that he may be under.

He may try to hide the fatigue and still look fresh for every IPL game. That is a tribute to his supreme fitness. But, after all he is a human being and cannot go on and on like a well-oiled machine. Even if he tries to, the odd grey strand of hair here and there on his well-trimmed beard gives away the kind of pressure that he is under. After all, it is not easy carrying a billion hopes on his 28-year-old shoulders.

Added to the mental tiredness, Kohli may not have had enough time to switch from the Test to the T20 mode that IPL is. Despite this, he has been scoring a fifty every second IPL innings this season. But this is nowhere near the near-1,000 runs he amassed in IPL-2016 with four centuries to boot. Perhaps, the fact that Kohli was coming into last year’s IPL from the World T20 in which he was his brilliant self helped him carry on with the momentum. Not this time, as he was coming off a long Test season.

Too much expectations on Kohli, and lack of support from the rest of the team, has been a bane for RCB. Now, with their chances of making the playoffs out of their hands, last year’s runners-up will look to amend their sorry-looking win-loss record. They can play party-poopers and upset the equation of the other teams that, barring Kolkata Knight Riders and Mumbai Indians, are still fighting for the other two play-off spots.