Three Indian Players Who Were Treated Unfairly By Captain Virat Kohli

Virat Kohli served as the captain of the Indian cricket team in all three formats from 2017 to 2021. There were a few notable performances of Team India under his leadership but Team India was unable to win an ICC trophy. Under Kohli’s captaincy, India achieved significant success in Test cricket, both at home and overseas. 

India secured Test series victories against several top cricketing nations, including Australia, England, South Africa, and the West Indies. During his captaincy, the Indian Test team reached the number one position in the ICC Test rankings, showcasing their dominance in the longest format of the game. 

India’s Test series win in Australia during the 2020-2021 Border-Gavaskar Trophy was particularly noteworthy. The team overcame injuries and tough challenges to secure a historic series victory on Australian soil.

India’s T20I team also performed admirably during Kohli’s captaincy, winning the series against various opponents and reaching the top position in the ICC T20I rankings.

Kohli’s captaincy was marked by a focus on fitness and maintaining high levels of intensity on the field. He set a personal example through his fitness regime and aggressive approach to the game. However, his performance started to decline and Kohli witnessed a major dip in his performance. 

Virat was unable to play constructive innings for team India and was consecutively failing to contribute to India’s win.

Under his captaincy, one more experience that Team India went through while Kohli was the leader, was the constant changes in the squad and the growing insecurity among the new players of losing their spot in the team.

Kohli and the selection committee tried too many combinations in the team and experimented with too many players at different times. 

In this process, there were few players, who had the potential but lost their space because they got very less chances to prove their talent.

1) Ambati Rayudu

When Ambati Rayudu made his debut in 2013, he immediately became the rising star in the team and was fixed for the number 4 spot in the team under the leadership of MS Dhoni. After performing consecutively well for the team, in 2019, Rayudu witnessed a slight dip in his performance while team India was touring Australia.

It was the time when Virat Kohli was preparing a team for the 2019 ODI World Cup. Considering the dip, Virat Kohli and the selection committee completely dropped Ambati Rayudu from the team and hence the international career of a talented cricketer came to an end.

2) Amit Mishra

Amit Mishra’s story will completely shock anyone who reads about it in detail. Mishra was one of the primary bowlers in 2016 and he was MS Dhoni’s trump card in the limited-over format. In a match in October 2016 against New Zealand, Mishra impressed everyone with his 5-wicket haul.

However, Virat Kohli took captaincy in 2017 and completely dropped the spin maestro. One of the primary reasons for dropping Mishra was that Kohli didn’t see a long-term prospect for Team India.

3) Karun Nair

Another victim of Virat Kohli’s captaincy was the immensely talented batsman Karun Nair. Nair made his Test debut against Australia in 2016 and became the only second Indian to score a triple century.

However, as 2017 came, Nair was completely ignored by Virat Kohli and the selection committee as he just got a chance to play only 3 more Test fixtures. Many cricket pundits believe that Nair should have gotten more chances to prove his talent and the captain should have supported him in his bad days.