Virat Kohli at the age of 37, he is the sole player to turn out for the same team for all ten years of the competition. But speaking in an interview on RCB’s official podcast which was released on Tuesday, Kohli said he once thought of leaving the franchise.
Virat Kohli On Handling Too Much Pressure
Looking back at the trying times between 2016 and 2019, Kohli conceded he went through huge pressure from all sides. Finding a balance between mentoring the Indian national side as well as RCB was not easy for him. The constant criticism and pressure to perform ultimately forced him to question his role. It was under this period of mental struggle that the idea of switching sides flitted across his mind.
Virat Kohli Stepped Down From Captaincy
Kohli ultimately decided to relinquish the RCB captaincy following the IPL 2021 season, a decision that came before his own resignation from India’s T20I captaincy. This leadership role change had a ripple effect he was then removed as ODI captain by the BCCI, an action that created controversy and saw him at odds with then-BCCI president Sourav Ganguly in public. The saga came to an end as Kohli stepped down as Test captain in January 2022, one day after India’s series loss in South Africa.
“There Were Expectations From Me” Says Kohli
“I’ve told this before. I’ve had this opportunity to explore, to look elsewhere, especially in the peak years of my career. From 2016-19, I had these constant suggestions to switch. At one point it did become really tough for me because there was too much happening in my career. I was captaining India for a period of 7-8 years, was captaining RCB for 9 year. There were expectations from me from the batting perspective, every game I played.
Virat Kohli Wanted To Play Cricket Without Being Judged
“I did not have the sense, that attention was off me. I was always in the space where I didn’t know ‘what to do’? I was exposed to it 24×7 and it got really tough on me. I decided, if I wanted to be in this place, I needed to be happy. I wanted to be in space where I could just play my cricket, without being judged,” he told Mayanti Langer in the podcast.
