Former India captain Virat Kohli is leaving no stone unturned in his preparations for the second Test against Australia starting on Friday. Kohli reached the Ferozeshah Kotla ground half an hour before the rest of his team and went straight to the dressing room. After a few minutes he came out of the dressing room and went for net practice. He wanted extra time in batting practice, so reached the stadium before other players of the team. After practicing ‘throwdowns’, Kohli batted against medium pacers.
He then went to the second net where the pitch was rough and said ‘call the spin bowlers’. He inspected the roughness of the practice pitch and then made it rougher by rubbing it with his foot. Meanwhile, batting coach Vikram Rathour also reached the ground and he also gave some suggestions to Kohli about playing spin bowling. Kohli wanted to practice situations where the ball could spin in any direction on its own.
The left-arm bowling of Uttar Pradesh’s Saurabh Kumar, a regular in the India A team, troubled him. Kohli was having more trouble on such balls which were not taking much bounce after eating the tappa. He also practiced on the off-spin bowling of Pulkit Narang and Hrithik Shokin. During this, Kohli did not appear in the kind of rhythm for which he is known.
The pitch at the Kotla ground is also expected to be slow like the first Test match played in Nagpur. Kohli was dismissed by off-spinner Todd Murphy in the Nagpur Test. There is some grass on the Kotla pitch, but experts say that this grass is only to bind the soil of the pitch. Due to the cold weather, there will be some moisture in the pitch during the day, which will benefit the bowlers.
