Indore Test: Australia spinners continue to haunt Virat Kohli in Border-Gavaskar Trophy
Border-Gavaskar Trophy: Virat Kohli’s poor form in Test matches continued as he once again fell cheaply to an Australian spinner at Indore’s Holkar Stadium.
Indore Test: Australia spinners continue to haunt Virat Kohli in BGT (AFP Photo)
By India Today Web Desk: Australian spinners continued to haunt Virat Kohli as the star Indian batter fell for 22 to Todd Murphy in the morning session of Day 1 of the Indore Test. This is the fifth time that an Australian spinner has managed to dismiss Virat Kohli in the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
While Todd Murphy got the better of Kohli in the series opener in Nagpur and the second innings of the Delhi Test, Matthew Kuhnemann accounted for the star batter’s wicket in the first innings of the second match. India were in deep trouble after electing to bat first in the third Test against Australia in Indore on Wednesday. Matt Kuhnemann dismissed openers Rohit Sharma (12) and Shubman Gill (21), and Nathan Lyon dismissed Cheteshwar Pujara for 1.
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After the top-order’s failure, India also lost Ravindra Jadeja for 4, while Shreyas Iyer was unable to open his account. Todd Murphy then wrapped Virat Kohli on the pads and even the DRS could not save the star batter. R Ashwin had to join Axar Patel in the middle after KS Bharat also fell for 17.
Although Kohli ended his century drought in international cricket in a T20I last September – he has also hit three ODI centuries since then – he hasn’t scored a Test hundred since scoring 136 against Bangladesh in Kolkata in November 2019. He has shown glimpses of his vintage best in limited-overs cricket recently, but his Test numbers have been far from impressive.
Kohli registered scores of 1, 19*, 24 and 1 in the two-match Test series in Bangladesh towards the end of 2022 as well. In the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy, he has scored 12, 44, 20 and 22. Kohli has averaged less than 30 in the longest format of the game in each of the last three years, dropping his Test average below 50. Kohli had an average of more than 40 from 2012 to 2019.
