Michael Vaughan has stated that the teams are going to bring the spinners to stifle Virat Kohli as his strike rate comes down.
After going through a couple of rough seasons, Virat Kohli is back to his original best, piling up runs consistently for Royals Challengers Bangalore in IPL 2023. In the eight innings, the legendary batter has accumulated 333 runs at a terrific average of 47.57 and a strike rate of 142.30 with the willow so far.
However, his strike rate after the conclusion of the powerplay overs has not been as good in almost every game. Virat tends to slow down significantly once the field restrictions end, which has also been a talking point of the season.
Kohli’s constant slowdowns have affected the final score of the RCB while batting first on numerous occasions. While he does start at a brisk rate, Kohli can’t manage to build on that in the middle overs.
The ever-waning expertise against the spinners has been one of the major reasons for those slowdowns. Virat’s limitations against the slow bowlers are lucid, as depicted by his meagre strike rate of 113.76 this season.
Michael Vaughan has stated that the teams are going to bring the spinners to stifle Virat Kohli as his strike rate comes down. The opposition teams are likely to place fielders on the ropes to dismiss him.
“A lot of teams are going to bowl spin against Virat because his strike rate becomes different. I think it’s around 107 against spin. So most teams are going to bowl spin against Virat Kohli, and they are going to put three fielders at the mid-wicket,” exclaimed Vaughan.
However, Michael Vaughan feels Virat Kohli should look for the boundaries against the spinners. According to the former England captain, Virat is good enough to hit sixes off the slow bowlers.
Vaughan added, “I would love him to dance down and wipe one out of the ground. I just think he is that good that he can hit sixes. His mindset in t20 cricket after the powerplay is to almost be there till the 18th over. I don’t think he is thinking about boundaries enough. He’s still got to think boundaries in T20 cricket it’s very important.”
In IPL 2023, Virat Kohli has a balls-per-boundary ratio of 9.90 and has been dismissed as many as four times against the spinners.
