At Eden Gardens Virat Kohli Showed He Is A Captain Of The Masses

Admin 03-Oct-2016 17:20:04 Inothernews

Virat Kohli, India's Test captain, is a character on the field. Everyone knows that. The man is full of energy as we have seen many a time in India's blue and Royal Challengers Bangalore's red and black. Considering most of those games are already sold out to full houses, Kohli doesn't really have to do much to get the crowd going. But during the second Test at Eden Gardens, Kohli played cheerleader for a sparse crowd on Monday, egging them on through out the day. The 12,000-odd crowd at Eden responded well too. Every time Kohli clapped at them, cupped his hands next to his ears or goaded them on, the roar was loud. And riding on that wave of support, India defeated New Zealand by 178 runs in the second Test to climb to the top of ICC Test rankings. Here's the video of one such instance:

#TeamIndia skipper, @imVkohli gets the fans together behind the team at Eden Gardens @Paytm Test Cricket #INDvNZ pic.twitter.com/2SQxFL0NwC
— BCCI (@BCCI) October 3, 2016

On a day which started on a difficult note for India, with New Zealand showing a lot of application, fighting it out after India set a target of 376. With the wickets proving difficult to come, Kohli looked to the crowd for some inspiration.

Four men around the bat for Nicholls and Kohli trying to get the crowd involved. Hostile environment you could say #indvnz ^CE
— BLACKCAPS (@BLACKCAPS) October 3, 2016

It was hot, it was energy-sapping but Kohli asked and the crowd obliged.

Uh huh. Nobody, i mean nobody, plays cricket with as much passion as this guy does.
C'mon Kohli give the umpires a rest buddy 😂
— ~Cricketician~ (@Cricketician) October 3, 2016

Sanjay Manjrekar, commentating for Star Sports, pointed out how this is unique for a Indian captain in Tests. He compared this to the calm demeanour of MS Dhoni and wondered if India ever had a captain who knew how to involve crowds better than Virat Kohli.