Delhi: Virat Kohli has indeed proven why he is so highly rated by everyone as he went to to register his sixth double ton in Test cricket and etch his name into the record books.
Ater registering his highest Test score-243 at the Feroz Shah Kotla, the Indian skipper revealed that it was Cheteshwar Pujara, who had actually inspired him to score big hundreds.
On his double ton at his home ground, Kohli, in an informal chat with Pujara on bcci.tv said, “Feels wonderful. It was always my mindset to score big hundreds, something that I have watched you do a lot in your career early on and learnt also, how to concentrate for longer periods.”
“We have all learnt from Pujara’s long innings, his concentration levels and his will to keep batting. So I also got inspired by that to keep batting for the team for as long as possible. Now I only think of how I can play more for the team and then you know, you don’t feel the tiredness and anything else and keep carrying on looking at the situation,” he added.
Over the years, the talismanic right-hander has emerged to be one of the key performers for India across all formats and when asked as to what keeps him going, he said, “We know as professional cricketers, we don’t have many years. So, we have to make the most of it and I try to stay as fit as possible, take care of my diet, take care of my training and it’s paid off well till now. In the later half of my career, as we all know it’s going to get more difficult so I’m trying to put in as much as possible in training now and later on, I can still manage to keep the same kind of intensity. But I think we all are training so hard now and it’s showing on the field and I am just trying to do the same.”
India’s number three in Tests, Pujara then went on to enquire as to how this entire transformation began to which Kolhi said, ” “It started in 2012 IPL when I had a very bad season and I was expecting a lot from that season because I had scored Test hundred in Australia and then I scored 180 against Pakistan in Asia Cup so I thought IPL was one tournament where all Indian players love playing so I thought I want to dominate this IPL but it didn’t end up happening and I was quite disappointed. I was quite low because of that. In IPL when you don’t have form, it can really come together because there are 14 games very quickly and then I could not come out of that, my mental state was very bad. I was eating very bad, my habits were not good at all,” he said.
He also added, “So I went home afterwards and I saw myself in the mirror after coming out of the shower and I thought I can’t look like this if I want to be an international cricketer. So, from the next day onwards, I changed everything about my diet and training and everything so I was in the gym everyday for about an hour and a half to two hours and I just completely changed my diet.”
After having scored consecutive double hundreds, the Indian captain rates his ton in Adelaide as his personal best.
“My favourite hundred would be Adelaide second innings,” he said.