Virat Kohli has been one of the best batters in the Indian Premier League but the legendary cricketer is yet to peak at the MA Chidambaram stadium in Chennai.
Kohli has scored 7263 runs from 237 IPL matches with seven hundreds and a strike-rate of 130. However, he averages 30 and has a strike-rate of 111 in Chepauk.
Former India off-spinner Harbhajan Singh said that is is important for the right-handed batter to score runs when RCB face the defending champions Chennai Super Kings in the first match of the season in IPL 2024 on March 22.
“The greatness of Virat has been reduced in terms of his batting display in Chennai. It not easy to bat over here for the opening batter because of the tennis ball type bounce.
“CSK have Ravindra Jadeja in their squad, who bowls stump to stump. He gets the odd ball to turn and that makes batting a bit difficult in Chennai.”
Kohli has been dismissed in the powerplay overs three times in his last five innings against the MS Dhon-led team, and Harbhajan said the star batter will have to bat for a long duration of time.
“Virat will have to bat for 20 overs to make a match-winning contribution against CSK. Scoring hundreds at Chinnaswamy doesn’t guarantee success in Chennai,” he added.
Kohli has amassed 985 runs in 30 matches with a highest score of 90 against CSK. Former CSK and MI player, Harbhajan said Kohli needs to have a season like 2016 to win the IPL trophy for the first time.
“It’s important for Virat to score runs like he did in 2016 to stand a chance of winning the trophy. I can’t confirm their success but players like Glenn Maxwell, Cameron Green and Rajat Patidar can take them close to glory. I think RCB have a good batting unit and everyone wants to see Kohli among runs.”
Kohli accumulated 973 runs from 16 matches with four hundreds and seven fifties in 2016.
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