Team India Test skipper Virat Kohli, who is often termed as ‘run machine’, is going through a run drought as he ended the year 2021 without scoring a century in international cricket. Notably, in 2020 also Kohli had failed to reach the triple-figure mark. The Indian Test skipper had last scored a ton in the day-night Test against Bangladesh at Eden Gardens on November 22, 2019.
He is undergoing a century jinx in the last 22 innings, spanning 768 days.
Meanwhile, Australia swashbuckling opener David Warner has backed under-fire Kohli saying that we have to understand the situation from his point of view and people like him, who are so good, should be allowed to fail sometimes.
“We have to understand Kohli’s situation too. The guy has been playing under a bubble for a long time. He has just become a father and rarely gets to see his daughter and wife. All these factors affect performance of the players. Even the best fail to cope up with tough situations sometimes,” Warner said in an interview with Indian journalist Boria Majumdar.
Notably, since 2019, Kohli is averaging 37.17 in international cricket which is lower than Australian pacer Mitchell Starc’s 38.63, and the same was highlighted by Australian media channel 7Cricket as they took a dig at the Team India batter for his poor form.
7 Cricket posted a tweet comparing the average of Kohli and Starc since the start of 2019 with the caption reading: “stat of the day.”
Your stat of the day...
(h/t @triplemcricket) #Ashes pic.twitter.com/CCtu3EyHud
— 7Cricket (@7Cricket) January 6, 2022
However, the Tweet didn’t go down well with former India batter Wasim Jaffer as he came up with a befitting reply and compared ODI career batting average of Australia star batter Steve Smith with India pacer Navdeep Saini.
“ODI Career batting average: Navdeep Saini: 53.50, Steve Smith: 43.34," Jaffer tweeted.
ODI Career batting average:
Navdeep Saini: 53.50
Steve Smith: 43.34 https://t.co/1PrcZ0HkDf— Wasim Jaffer (@WasimJaffer14) January 6, 2022
Interestingly, Saini’s ODI average is actually better than Smith. In five ODI innings, Saini has scored 107 runs with a highest score of 45 against New Zealand. Also, the pacer has remained not out three times, escalating his average to over 50.
On the other hand, Smith has played 128 ODIs and scored over 4300 runs at an average of 43.34.
