He wants to make himself unsackable – Sanjay Manjrekar reflects on Virat Kohli’s decision to quit Test captaincy

Former Indian batter Sanjay Manjrekar reckons Virat Kohli wanted to make himself unsackable in the Test format and thus decided to his quit his Test captaincy duties.

Kohli had earlier given up his T20I captaincy reins after the T20I World Cup but he was sacked as the ODI captain as the selectors didn’t want two different captains for the white-ball game.

In fact, Kohli had earlier revealed that he was told 90 minutes before the Test squad selection for the series against South Africa about his ODI captaincy sacking.

Meanwhile, Kohli took Indian cricket to new heights as a leader in the red-ball version and led from the front after he was given the captaincy reins in 2014. Kohli led India in 68 Test matches in which the team won 40 Test matches, lost 17 while 11 games ended in a draw.

Furthermore, India ended as the number one Test team in the ICC rankings for five consecutive years under Kohli’s reign as a leader.

Sanjay Manjrekar said in a discussion on ESPN Cricinfo: “It’s come one after the other in a very short span of time – giving up the white-ball captaincy and IPL captaincy as well. This also was unexpected, but it is interesting that all these three resignations of important positions have come so quickly one after the other.”

Manjrekar added: “I think, in some way, he wants to make himself unsackable as captain. When he gets that vibe that his captaincy is under threat, he tends to quit.”

Manjrekar added that Kohli was comfortable while working with former head coach Ravi Shastri. It is well known that Kohli didn’t have the best of relationship with former coach Anil Kumble and the talisman would have felt the pressure after Rahul Dravid was given the coaching responsibility.

Manjrekar added, “The landscape is changing, the scenario around Virat Kohli that allowed him to be himself and flourish. Ravi Shastri coming in. He was uncomfortable when Anil Kumble was the coach and once Shastri and the support staff came in, he felt comfortable. The new coach (Rahul Dravid) is no Ravi Shastri. He would have got some inkling of the kind of support he was going to get.”

The former batter observed that Kohli isn’t in his comfort zone and must not be in great space at the moment as he is also not in the best of forms with the bat.

“The regime change in the BCCI also has something to do with all these important announcements that Virat has made. Clearly, a guy who finds himself outside his comfort zone. Individually, his batting is not at its best. All that has just added up. He is not in a great space at the moment. These are all emotional decisions that one can understand.”

India will now face South Africa in three-match ODI series.