‘I came back and spoke to Sachin paaji’: How Tendulkar helped Virat Kohli after 2014 England debacle

Tendulkar helped Kohli with a few technical adjustments which worked wonders as in the next tour – India’s Test series against Australia – Kohli burned up the charts with 692 runs.

India captain Virat Kohli has revealed how Sachin Tendulkar helped him correct his game after the disastrous tour of England in 2014. In five Tests, Kohli scored 134 runs from 10 innings at an average of 13.40, statistically the worst series of his career. Kohli explained how he felt his hip position wasn’t proper during the series, which made him vulnerable to the swinging ball.

Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kohli chat during a practice session. (Getty Images)

“My hip position was an issue on that England tour. It was a thing of not adjusting to the conditions and wanting to do what I wanted to and being rigid about it. So, I think being rigid about it doesn’t get you anywhere and I realised that pretty quickly. It was a long and painful realisation but I realised it,” Kohli told his India teammate Mayank Agarwal in a video chat uploaded by BCCI.tv.

“The one thing that stood out was my right hip. When our right hip opens as a batsman, or closes too much as a batsman, we know we are in trouble. So keeping that hip position nice and side on and balance in a way that you can play through the off-side and through the leg-side with equal control is very, very important. So, I think that is one thing that went off.”

The Test tour of 2014 was a personal low for Kohli the batsman as he went there with a great reputation but managed scores of 1, 8, 25, 0, 38, 28, 0, 7, 6 and 20 as India went on to lose the series 1-3. Kohli, who admitted he didn’t know what to do, approached the great Tendulkar after the series, and picked his brains. Tendulkar helped Kohli with a few technical adjustments which worked wonders as in the next tour – India’s Test series against Australia – Kohli burned up the charts with 692 runs.

“I came back [and] I spoke to Sachin paaji [Tendulkar] as well in Mumbai. I did a few sessions with him. So, I told him I’m working on my hip position but he made me realise the importance of the big stride, the forward press against fast bowlers as well,” he said. “So the moment I started doing that with my hip alignment, things started ironing out pretty nicely for me and then I became more and more confident with following that pattern and eventually that Australia tour [2014/15] happened.”