Former Australia skipper Ricky Ponting believes that time has come for Virat Kohli to step away from the game following his constant trouble on deliveries pitched outside the off-stump. The India batter was dismissed numerous times on the same type of deliveries during the recently concluded Border-Gavaskar series.
“The challenge is, and I can see it with Virat now, you can see how much he wants it. He’s trying so hard that actually makes batting harder. The harder you try sometimes with batting, the less success you’re going to have,” Ponting said.
“I started thinking more about not getting out rather than scoring runs and that might sound strange but that’s what it was. I was trying to be so perfect set the right example play exactly the way my team needed me all the time but when I was playing my best I didn’t think about any of that,” Ponting added.
Ponting believes that Kohli needs to rediscover his love for the game, adding that the India batter doesn’t want to play the deliveries pitched outside his off-stump, however there is some mental block due to which he is doing so.
“I just walked out and thought about scoring runs. I can just see a little bit of that with Virat now. Even the way that he’s getting out you can see he doesn’t want to be playing at those balls he’s trying not to do it but he’s there’s some mental block there that’s making him feel for that one outside the off stump,” Ponting said.
“He had a mental break (in the past) where he stepped away for a while and then came back and find the love for the game again. So right now it just seems like that real love of the game for him is not there because he’s making it too hard to enjoy. So if he wants to continue playing Test match cricket, he might just need to have a little spell for a while, find the love for the game again” Ponting added.
