With each passing day, the realisation that Virat Kohli has retired from Test cricket continues to hit hard. And just imagine how tough it’ll be when, at the fall of India’s second wicket in the first Test against England in Headingley starting June 20, No. 18 Virat Kohli no longer walks out to bat. Irrespective of who it is – comeback man Karun Nair or India’s newly-appointed captain Shubman Gill, no Virat Kohli at No. 4 promises to be a tough pill to swallow.
Virat Kohli announced his retirement from Test cricket last month, sending shockwaves through the world of cricket. The veteran batter’s retirement came shortly after his skipper Rohit Sharma had made a similar decision, and just ahead of the BCCI’s squad announcement for the five-match England series.
Virat Kohli has announced his retirement from Test cricket, bringing the curtain down on a career that spanned 14 years and included 123 Tests – 68 of them as captain – in which he scored 9230 runs at an average of 46.85. Virat Kohli had communicated his desire to retire from Test cricket to the BCCI ahead of the big five-match series in England starting June 20, for which he was expected to be part of the squad. It was learnt at the time that Kohli had been having conversations on the matter with officials of the BCCI for the past month or so.
Virat Kohli’s stellar test cricket career spanning over 14 years
Virat Kohli made his Test debut on India’s tour of the West Indies in mid-2011, and after a quiet start in Kingston where he scored 4 and 15 – he totaled 76 runs in five innings on that tour – Kohli first showed glimpses of his ability against West Indies at Mumbai’s Wankhede Stadium later that year, scoring 52 and 63. It was a struggle initially on the subsequent, ill-fated tour of Australia, where India lost 4-0, but Kohli finished the series on a high, scoring his first Test century in the Adelaide Test.
Virat Kohli’s first really big Test series was also in Australia, in 2014-15, when he scored twin centuries in Adelaide, and followed it up with centuries in Melbourne and Sydney to aggregate 692 runs for the series at an average of 86.50. By then, he was also India’s Test captain. MS Dhoni was the designated captain, but missed the first Test because of a thumb injury, leading to Kohli’s elevation.
MS Dhoni returned for, and captained in, the second Test in Brisbane and continued in the position for the third Test in Melbourne, but retired from the format altogether after that game. Kohli took over the reins after that.
A glorious period ensued, where India won 40 of the 68 games Kohli led in, losing just 17. The 40 wins made Kohli India’s most successful Test captain of all time – Dhoni with 27 from 60 and Sourav Ganguly with 21 from 49 rank below him – and, at the time of his retirement, places him at No. 4 on the overall list of captains with the most Test wins, behind Graeme Smith (53 from 109), Ricky Ponting (48 from 77) and Steve Waugh (41 from 57).
The tour of England in 2018 was another high point. Virat Kohli was the top run-getter across the two sides in the five Tests, aggregating 583 at an average of 59.30 with two centuries. That it came after he had scored just 134 runs in ten innings on the previous tour, in 2014, made the performance that much more special. That year, 2018, was also his best in terms of aggregate for a year, when he scored 1322 runs.
During his golden run, he averaged 75.93 in 2016, 75.64 in 2017, 55.08 in 2018, and 68.00 in 2019. During that period between 2016 and 2018, Virat Kohli scored 3596 runs in 35 Tests at an average of 66.59, with 14 hundreds and eight fifties in 58 innings.
Virat Kohli had taken the cricketing world by surprise by announcing his retirement from Tests last month, more than a month before the five-match India-England series was to get underway and less than a week after captain Rohit Sharma bid goodbye to the format. Both Rohit and Virat Kohli had endured a disappointing run in the recent tour of Australia, where the former scored just 31 runs in three Tests and the latter’s form quickly nosedived after an unbeaten 100 in Perth.
However former England left-arm spinner Monty Panesar has made an explosive claim on Virat Kohli’s Test retirement, stating that the batting superstar decided to bail out of the upcoming tour of England in the last minute after coming to know that his place in the Test team was no longer a no-brainer.
Monty Panesar’s explosive revelation about Virat Kohli’s retirement from Tests
Former England spinner Monty Panesar feels star India batter Virat Kohli bailed out of the upcoming England tour. India are set to take on England in a five-match Test series beginning from June 20, which will also mark the start of World Test Championship Cycle 2025-27. Ahead of the all-important tour, Kohli announced his retirement from Test cricket, leaving everyone surprised. Recently, Monty Panesar shared his thoughts on Kohli’s retirement, saying that he expected the batting stalwart to play in England.
The former off-spinner claimed that the former India captain may have been given an ultimatum by the team management and hence he decided to bail out of the tour by calling time on his Test career. Monty Panesar questioned Ajit Agarkar and Gautam Gambhir’s role in Virat Kohli’s Test retirement ahead of the upcoming marquee England tour.
“I think he was definitely going to play. I think England were expecting, everyone was expecting him to play. I’m surprised he’s kind of like bailed out. But maybe the fact that outside off-stump, he’s just thinking, well, you know, they may have had a word with him.
They said, look, if you don’t score well in the first couple of Test matches, don’t expect to play all the five. So, he’s probably thinking, well, I’ll just call it a day and give the youngsters a go,” Panesar told Hindustan Times.
Furthermore, Panesar said that India have a great chance to win if their middle order, particularly Karun Nair and Shubman Gill, perform well.
“It would depend on how Karun Nair performs, he scored a double-hundred against the England Lions. He and Shubman Gill, that middle-order, how they bat. I think the batters who’ve played county cricket, if they are able to then transform that same form at the international level, then I think India have got a chance to win,” he added.
The upcoming series will also be the first assignment of Shubman Gill as the captain of the Indian Test team, who has been handed over the responsibility following Rohit Sharma’s retirement. The 25-year-old has a herculean task at hand to inspire the team full of young stars to help India win a series in England for the first time since 2007
Shubman Gill has since been appointed Rohit’s successor as Test captain, with Rishabh Pant as his deputy. However, it remains to be seen who gets to bat at the hallowed No 4 spot – a position that Kohli had made his own for more than a decade following the legendary Sachin Tendulkar’s retirement in 2013.
India’s five-Test tour of England in 2025 is set to commence on June 20 at Headingley in Leeds. The second Test will be held at Edgbaston in Birmingham from July 2 to 6, followed by the third Test at Lord’s in London from July 10 to 14.
The series then moves to Old Trafford in Manchester for the fourth Test, scheduled from July 23 to 27. The tour concludes with the fifth and final Test at The Oval in London, taking place from July 31 to August 4. This series marks the beginning of the 2025–27 ICC World Test Championship cycle for both teams.
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