For India, Diwali came a day early, and it was all thanks to Virat Kohli who played one of his best knocks to steer India to a famous win over arch rivals Pakistan in their opening game of the T20 World Cup 2022 at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.
After putting Pakistan to bat after winning the toss, India restricted the Men In Green to 159 runs as Shan Masood and Ifthikar Ahmed scored half centuries. Chasing 160 to win, India were in a bit of trouble as they lost both openers KL Rahul and Rohit Sharma in the first four overs. India then further lost the wickets of Suryakumar Yadav and Axar Patel as the Men in Blue were reeling at 31-4 after 6.1 overs.
It was then that Virat Kohli came into the fore, and slowly and steadily changed the game for India, like he has done in so many times in the past. He stayed put on his crease as he stitched a century partnership for the fifth wicket with Hardik Pandya. He then went berserk at the end, as he smashed 82 runs off 53 balls in an innings studded with 6 fours and four sixes. In fact, the game changed, when he hit two consecutive sixes off Haris Rauf, before hitting a match changing six against Mohammad Nawaz in the final over.
Pakistan fast bowling legend Wasim Akram was mightily impressed by Kohli’s match winning innings against the Men in Green. He called him an alien amongst humans for his incredible record while chasing the innings.
“Aliens do walk among us, he’s one of the best I’ve seen in the recent or modern greats. He has been scoring for the last 15 years, and he has the best average while chasing,” the former Pakistan captain said on the post match show on Pakistan TV channel A Sports.
After his innings, Kohli said that he would rate this innings at one of his best. “Standing here I just feel like it was meant to be. Till today Mohali was my best innings against Australia. Today I will count this one higher,” he said in the post match interview.
