Virat Kohli’s success as the captain of the Indian team has been unprecedented, at least as far as statistics are concerned. However, the lack of ICC trophies has seen demands for a change in white-ball captaincy rising over the last couple of years. On Thursday, Kohli himself announced the decision to step down as the captain of the Indian team from the shortest format after this year’s T20 World Cup.
Rumours of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) contemplating a change in captaincy were afloat of late. However, as per a report in the Times of India, Kohli’s decision to relinquish T20I captaincy is completely his own and the Indian board’s. The 32-year-old, in his post on social media, himself also explained that he is taking the call in order to allow him some breathing space, having been overburdened with responsibilities.
“Understanding workload is a very important thing…I feel I need to give myself space to be fully ready to lead the Indian team in Test and ODI cricket. I have given everything to the team during my time as T20 captain and I will continue to do so for the T20 team as a batsman moving forward,” the 32-year-old said in his post.
As per the report, Kohli made the decision purely on the basis of his own workload. The India captain wants to focus on his batting more having not been in the best of form with the bat of late. There, however, was no pressure from the team management to take such a call.
