Virat Kohli opens up about criticism behind his approach on record 49th ODI ton

Team India’s star batsman Virat Kohli scored a world record-equalling 49th ODI century during a league match of the ICC ODI World Cup 2023 on Sunday. Kohli took 121 balls to score 101 runs to equal Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar’s record.

However, several fans and many former cricketers slammed Kohli for his sluggish knock. Some of them even accused the Indian batter for batting for personal records and went to the extent of saying the master chaser as ‘selfish’.

However, reacting to the criticism, Kohli defended the approach behind his batting.

“It was a wicket that was tricky to bat on, we got a great start from Rohit and Shubman, my job was to keep it going on. The ball started gripping and turning after the 10th over, it slowed down and then my role was to bat deep with the others playing around me. That was what was communicated to me by the team management,” said Kohli.

“We don’t have Hardik Pandya in the team. So we knew a wicket or two could cost us, we had to dig deep and take the match deep,” he added.