'He thinks he’s the best bowler in the team' - veteran teammate explains Kohli's mindset as bowler

Not long after Indian skipper Rohit Sharma joked we might see him and his legendary teammate Virat Kohli bowl at the forthcoming Asia Cup and the 2023 World Cup, veteran teammate Bhuvneshwar Kumar explained the thought process with which Kohli operates in the nets and on rare occasions he bowls in the middle. 

Bhuvneshwar amusingly said he gets the impression Kohli believes he is also the "best bowler in the team" when he undergoes his uniquely built action, which often leaves him wrong-footed at the point of delivery stride and catches batters by surprise. 

There is a story which Kohli famously recalled during his interview with Gaurav Kapoor on 'Breakfast with Champions'. In an IPL game, he gave both Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) wicketkeeper Mark Boucher and Punjab Kings (PBKS) batter Ravi Bopara the shock of their lives by falling over and yet finding excess bounce off the surface that saw Bopara duck for cover and Boucher jump up to collect the ball. 

A clip from India's 2021 tour of England is also viral with the Indian batting great generating prodigious inswing in a match simulation drill while bowling to KL Rahul. Kohli almost got the Indian opener out LBW with his peach of a delivery. 

Bhuvneshwar on Kohli the part-time seamer 

Speaking at an event in Mumbai, Bhuvneshwar, however, said there tends to be a sense of worry within the camp whenever Virat Kohli decides to roll his arms as they don't want him to exert too much energy into his secondary skill and risk him getting injured with that unorthodox bowling action of his. 

"Virat Kohli thinks he’s the best bowler in the team," the experienced seamer said candidly. "We’re always scared when he bowls as he could get injured due to his bowling action."

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Over time, Kohli's bowling workload has declined sharply, with the Indian batting great focusing most of his energies on successfully adhering to his responsibilities with bat in hand and scoring a truckload of runs. 

He used to bowl a lot more frequently in the first half of his career, especially in the days of MS Dhoni's captaincy. The unorthodox right-arm medium pacer has bowled a total of 968 legal deliveries at the international stage and even has four scalps each in ODIs and T20Is for India.