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If Virat Kohli was in the Pakistani batting line-up, could he have tamed the rampaging Herath?

Suleiman

Suleiman

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It's always interesting to see how after our failure in any given match, all the blame is put on 1 player as being the causation for the failure. This time it was blamed on Shafiq / Shan (well earned ofc, but there were other reasons too..)

I want to see how people think of the reverse. What if you swapped one of those out for King Kohli. Could he have averted this disaster and weathered the Herath storm?
 
TBH,Wouldn't make much of a difference.You can't win Test Matches by relying on 1 or 2 players.
Also Kohli isn't even best test Batsman in Indian team,Rahane is better IMO.
 
Benchwarmer said:
TBH,Wouldn't make much of a difference.You can't win Test Matches by relying on 1 or 2 players.
Also Kohli isn't even best test Batsman in Indian team,Rahane is better IMO.
Click to expand...

Against spin ,its Virat is better than him,Pujara probably better than both.
 
Hard to say .... but having just played them, ( although Herath did not play against Indians, I think ), he could have helped and carry the Team over the line !!!
 
Sadevdesai said:
Hard to say .... but having just played them, ( although Herath did not play against Indians, I think ), he could have helped and carry the Team over the line !!!
Click to expand...
He did play against us, was rested for the last test IIRC due to a minor injury also to save him for Pak :D
 
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Sadevdesai said:
Hard to say .... but having just played them, ( although Herath did not play against Indians, I think ), he could have helped and carry the Team over the line !!!
Click to expand...

Herath played against India but wasn't effective. He was though injured and missed the last test I guess. Virat kohli I don't think would have made a huge difference to yesterday's chase. He might have been more positive than some Pakistan batters but hard to say if he would have taken Pakistan over the line.
 
Kohli alone may not have, but the Indian batting lineup has been quite resilient the last few years.

After losing the first Test to Australia, and then all out for 189 in the first day of the second Test, people were ready to write off Indian batting. But they came back and beat Australia 2-1 in the series with significant batting contributions from a whole bunch of players, Pujara, Rahul, Kohli, Rahane, Jadeja and Saha. Only batsmen to fail were Nair and Vijay.

Basically the Indian batting unit together is pretty formidable, and it is hard to get all of them out cheaply.
 
He may have helped ease the nerves.

PAK batsmen tend to start looking at each other. Kohli doesn't bat with that mindset and never has.
 
The only person in the Indian batting line up who could have saved you in that scenario was Pujara. Kohli did face a similar scenario in SL in 2015, albeit facing a bit of a higher target (176), going against Herath on a vicious subcontinental turning pitch in the 4th Innings.

Result - 3 (10).
 
He didn't have to tame anybody. A simple 30 would have gotten the job done. Had one other batsman scored a 25-30 we would have won. Haris looked as comfortable as you can expect any batsman to be in the conditions and he only managed a 33 that is as much as can be expected and was exactly what was needed. Had the other 6 batsmen combined contributed 20 runs more we would have won this match.
 
Suleiman said:
It's always interesting to see how after our failure in any given match, all the blame is put on 1 player as being the causation for the failure. This time it was blamed on Shafiq / Shan (well earned ofc, but there were other reasons too..)

I want to see how people think of the reverse. What if you swapped one of those out for King Kohli. Could he have averted this disaster and weathered the Herath storm?
Click to expand...

Cheteswar Pujara says hi..!!!He won't have let a collapse happen there and then maybe Sarfaraz would have finished off with a slightly aggressive cameo with the bat.
 
Pujara is a better player of spin. And anyway Pakistan should get their left handed batsmen to hit him out of the attack . Dhawan literally bullied him in the last series and ruined his figures. On a turning 5th day pitch, herath is a nightmare for right handed batsmen
 
Suleiman said:
It's always interesting to see how after our failure in any given match, all the blame is put on 1 player as being the causation for the failure. This time it was blamed on Shafiq / Shan (well earned ofc, but there were other reasons too..)

I want to see how people think of the reverse. What if you swapped one of those out for King Kohli. Could he have averted this disaster and weathered the Herath storm?
Click to expand...


Square turners are extremely difficult for batting so the trick is to never get into these situations to begin with .... India would have piled on a huge amount of 1st inngs runs on the same surface and most likely would never have allowed SL to get more than 300 in their 1st inngs. This is how India won 2 Tests against England despite batting second and conceding 400+ runs in the 1st inngs to a much stronger English batting unit. It takes epic levels of batting to overhaul such large totals and pull of dramatic wins.


Mumbai (Eng made 400 and lost by an inngs)
http://www.espncricinfo.com/series/...ngland-4th-Test-england-in-india-test-series/

Mumbai (Eng made 477 and still lost by an inngs)
http://www.espncricinfo.com/series/...ngland-5th-Test-england-in-india-test-series/
 
Why Kohli? Had Younis still been in the team, Pakistan would have won that match. Kohli isn't great at playing lateral movement of any kind as was shown during India's home series against South Africa and Australia.
 
Bilal7 said:
Why Kohli? Had Younis still been in the team, Pakistan would have won that match. Kohli isn't great at playing lateral movement of any kind as was shown during India's home series against South Africa and Australia.
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How many good innings had Younis played on rank turners.
 
Azhar Ali is a better Test batsman than Virat Kohli and he failed, so Virat too would have failed.
 
Kohli is just an above average test batsmen. He won't have done anything special rather than getting out at a cheap score.
 
Chasing 130 ??? Why will you wonder about one batsman? 30-40 runs from some one would have taken it over the line. Just needed to play positively.
 
Bilal7 said:
Too many for this sort of question to be considered a joke.
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As you have only took series where kohli didnt perform good like australia in india series or kohli in england, while you didnt mention any other series where he scored a lot because those matches wont be considered
So should i help you where younis hasnt performed ?? i am sure there wud be alot of series where Younis didnt score runs and that series would only be the criteria to be judged.
 
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Not sure about Kohli taming Herath. But Indian batting would have chased this with 3 or 4 down.
 
didnt the Indian batsman totally blunt Herath in the tour in SL that just passed. Kohli has improved his game against spin a lot and that Abu Dhabi track wouldnt even be classed as a turner by Indian standards. Playing on raging bunsens would help you negotiate lesser turning tracks like Abu Dhabi. i think he would have done better than our top 5 did but thats not really saying much at all.
 
People miss one point most often.

One man CAN change the fate.

Usually a team is centered around a few players.

Kohli could take the center role and make others calm. Dhoni is another person who does it in consistent basis in ODIs.

Alone a player cannot do anything.

But if he could bring this approach to the table, then it becomes a different story.
 
Abdul said:
Both of them are equally mediocre but at least Shafiq has performed before.

On the other hand...

A huge difference there is between the averages 25.94 and 39.21.
Click to expand...

One's been playing for seven years, the other, one.
 
Chief Destroyer said:
One's been playing for seven years, the other, one.
Click to expand...

And despite having played for one year only he's hailed as some sort of messiah by his fans - unfortunately, his record says completely something else!

I'll be laughing as his career goes down the drain just like his cousins.
 
Kohli especially in a leadership role would have a Mickey Arthur type effect in the team. He would demand nothing less than excellence from the team mates and anyone who wouldn't meet his standards would get the boot. I am pretty sure he would give someone like Asad Shafiq a kick in the behind to man up or get out.
 
Abdul said:
And despite having played for one year only he's hailed as some sort of messiah by his fans - unfortunately, his record says completely something else!

I'll be laughing as his career goes down the drain just like his cousins.
Click to expand...

You'll be laughing? He's a Pakistani player, no?
 
Indian batting line up does not rely on one individual batsman. If needed, even lower order batsmen score runs in the Indian batting line up.

Herath bowled twice against India and conceded more than 150 on each occasion against India. So it was Indian batting that was on a rampage and not Herath.

In the first test at Galle, Kohli scored only 3, but India scored 600 and Herath claimed one for 159. India won by 304 runs.

In the second test at SSC, Colombo, Kohli failed yet again,scoring only 13, but India scored 622. Herath took 4 for 154. India won by an innings.

These were the two innings where Herath bowled.

So, Indians tamed Herath and scored 600 totals on both occasions without any significant contribution from Kohli.
 
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So, if Kohli batted for Pakistan , he would have failed. Unlike other Indian batsmen, who make up for his failures, Pakistan would lose, because other batsmen too would fail. :yasir
 
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