The key to Virat Kohli's consistency is his ability to play almost everything close to his body and right under his eyes, especially while playing defensive strokes early in his innings. While most T20 batting stars hit the ground running, Kohli tends to take a bit more time and looks to play only orthodox cricket shots in the beginning
Incredible Virat
The Royal Challengers Bangalore skipper has scored 11 fifties and a hundred in his last 19 T20 innings at an average of 96.18 and a strike rate of 138.48. He has scored 40 or more in 14 of the 19 innings that he has batted in in 2016. These are Bradmanesque numbers, particularly in a format that allows only 120 balls to be distributed among the top five or six batsmen.
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Bengaluru
Virat Kohli has scored 11 fifties and a hundred in his last 19 T20 innings at an average of 96.18 and a strike rate of 138.48. He has scored 40 or more in 14 of the 19 innings that he has batted in in 2016. These are Bradmanesque numbers, particularly in a format that allows only 120 balls to be distributed among the top five or six batsmen.
T20 cricket forced cricketers to adjust to statistical benchmarks: 30 has become the new 50 when it comes to batting averages. No longer is it about digging in and playing a long innings, for T20 doesn't allow you the luxury of time. When you start biding your time, you fall so far behind in the game that it is almost impossible to recover.
In fact, the essence of T20 cricket is to keep going regardless of how many came off the previous over or the previous ball, and that means inconsistency. One remembers when Rahul Dravid, during the first year of the IPL, voicing his reservations about the fact that it was being considered okay to get out after scoring a quick 30. (And 30 is still considered a decent score in T20, unless your name is Virat Kohli.)
When ODI cricket came along, everyone treated it like a shortened Test match and went about their business as they would in a Test match innings - save for the last ten overs. It took some time and some rule changes to force teams to start viewing ODI cricket as a different sport, and that changed the momentum of the format forever. Nowadays batsmen go on the offensive from the first ball and don't take their foot off the accelerator till the end. Earlier, scoring a run a ball was limited to only the death overs, but now 300-plus scores are achieved as a matter of course.
Similarly, when T20 started, everyone treated it as a 120-ball slogfest. But as the approach to ODI cricket changed, so is it changing with T20, as players approach T20 innings with a slightly different method.
While they still go hard at most stages of the game, they no longer see the need to slog every ball to score 12 an over. And that is where Kohli leads the pack. T20 cricket is fast becoming synonymous with power-hitting and innovative stroke-making, but Kohli is still doing his stuff the old-fashioned way. He doesn't go aerial all the time, he doesn't hit sixes as often as some of the top T20 batsmen do, and he doesn't play the lap or the reverse lap shot. So how does he manage to not just stay relevant but also rule the shortest format?
AB de Villiers spoke about (and demonstrated) his method of playing, where he referred to an imaginary box around him that he ensures to stay within. In short, he talks about how keeping arms and legs close to each other allows him to maintain better shape.
While Kohli hasn't spoken similarly about his method, he's quite like de Villiers in his approach. The key to his consistency is his ability to play almost everything close to his body and right under his eyes, especially while playing defensive strokes early in his innings. While most T20 batting stars hit the ground running, Kohli tends to take a bit more time and looks to play only orthodox cricket shots in the beginning.
