Virat Kohli is India’s best batsman, but is he their best choice for captain?

Virat Kohli’s first innings hundred at Perth is one of the best Test match innings by an Indian batsman overseas. Whether it is in a winning or losing cause is something that will be decided on the fifth day of the Test. As things stand at the end of the fourth day with India needing a further 175 runs and Australia five wickets, the latter is a more likely outcome.

But even if India goes on to lose the match, there is no taking away from the sheer quality of the innings, where Kohli curbed his natural instincts for the sake of his team, and scored his second slowest century. If not for a dubious decision, this innings had the potential to be a much more substantial one.

So, as a batsman, Kohli has shown that he can adapt to different situations, and bat accordingly. But as a captain, can he adapt as well as he does as a batsman? There are enough indications that that may not be the case.

Even when India’s batting used to fail time and time again in South Africa and England, he was inflexible in his five-bowler approach. There is a dominant school of thought that sees this as obstinacy, a quality which is certainly not a captain’s best friend.

The argument in favour of Kohli sticking to a five-bowler approach has been that he plays to win, which is a welcome change from the previous Indian sides’ safety first approach. But when it becomes obvious that for this Indian side, it’s not bowling, but batting which is a problem overseas, even then sticking to a pre-defined set of plans makes little sense.

It may be unfair to blame only Kohli for this obstinacy, as Ravi Shastri and other members of the coaching staff should share some of the blame. But it’s the captain who needs to be held responsible for the decision-making.

Some other aspects of his obstinacy as a captain can be seen from the way he prefers a set of players who have a similar in-your-face attitude as him, but lack half the ability that he has! Again, giving a long rope to some players is fine, provided one is not unfair to others waiting in the wings. Preferring KL Rahul over Mayank Agarwal is just one such example.

His on-field behavior sometimes borders on rude. It is one thing to stand toe-to-toe and look eye-to-eye with your opponent, but it is an altogether different matter when one loses control of one’s emotions, especially when the concerned player happens to be the captain of the team.

There is no doubting the fact that Kohli is not only India’s best batsman, but also their most dependable one, who adapts his game according to the situation. How one wishes the same could be said of his captaincy!