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The foolproof mechanics of a Kohli chase
The 34-year-old's mastery and almost mundane consistency can sometimes mislead us into not fully appreciating the skills that go into the conquering of a chase
In Virat Kohli’s path to sustained greatness across formats and batting roles, the earliest coronation came as a chaser in one-day cricket. In the space of 20 days across February and March in 2012 -- he was just 23 and his stubble was yet to grow into a fuzzy beard -- he first made Lasith Malinga look listless by slamming an unbeaten 133 in a chase of 321 in 36.4 overs in Hobart. And then tamed a Pakistan attack involving Saeed Ajmal by hitting 183 in a chase of 330 in Mirpur.
In the decade that’s passed, Kohli has continued piling on a stack of runs to entrench himself among the pantheon of great one-day chasers.
MS Dhoni and Michael Bevan also merit prominent place in this pantheon, but let’s consider these numbers. Nobody has more centuries than Kohli’s 27 batting second in ODI cricket. The second best is Sachin Tendulkar with 17 tons. Kohli has 7794 runs in 152 innings, second only to Tendulkar’s 8720 runs in 232 innings at an average of 42.33. Kohli’s average is 65.49, comfortably higher than anyone else. Among those with a minimum of 4500 runs, Dhoni is next best with an average of 51.04.
While a comparison with Dhoni may be particularly tempting, their records are also dictated by their very different roles. And they benefitted immensely from each other’s extraordinary chasing skills.
Where Kohli is yet to thrive like Dhoni is perhaps in a clutch chase on the biggest of occasions. With a semi-final berth for India looking assured by virtue of five straight wins in the preliminary phase, don’t put it past Kohli to correct the only blemish in his distinguished ODI career though.
So composed and in control has Kohli looked in India’s last two run chases that the opposition couldn’t harbour any serious hope of victory till he was around. Bangladesh couldn’t dislodge Kohli as he finished unbeaten on 103. By the time he was dismissed against New Zealand on Sunday – only because of his eagerness to reach the three-figure mark that would level his tally with Sachin Tendulkar’s 49 – India had all but sealed victory.
After the game, Mohammed Siraj summed up the mood in the dressing room when Kohli was batting. “Jab pitch pe King Kohli rahega, toh kahaan pe tense rahenge hum? (When King Kohli is on the pitch, how will we be tense?)” he asked rhetorically in his endearing Hyderabadi dialect. “Everyone trusts each other. There was no need to be tense.”
Kohli’s mastery and almost mundane consistency in these situations can sometimes mislead us into not fully appreciating the skills that go into the conquering of a chase. There’s certainly the advantage of knowing exactly what tempo to go at with a target in front, but to keep up with the pressure of the asking rate and execute time and again requires incredible talent and ice-cool temperament.
How does he go about it? The innings on Sunday, which allowed India to chase down 274 with four wickets in hand, was a Kohli classic that provided some insights.
He was off the mark off his third ball with a superbly-timed square drive against Lockie Ferguson for four. But his next 14 deliveries produced only five more runs, all in singles. The asking rate was always in control, but even a steeper requirement doesn’t usually result in a drastic alteration of approach. It was for Shreyas Iyer to take the more aggressive route during their partnership, which he did with a 29-ball 33.
Where others may feel the need to match their batting partner, Kohli is extremely comfortable in his skin. Even when someone younger is attracting the applause of the audience with crisp cuts and gorgeous drives, Kohli sticks assiduously to his template. That template is essentially about giving himself time at the beginning to assess the conditions, the shots that are productive on a particular surface and the sternest threats in the opposition.
Data by CricViz bears testimony. In his first nine deliveries, his strike rate on average is 65.02. It goes up to 96.33 in balls 40-49, but the persistent acceleration begins once he's 50 balls into an innings. His strike rate reaches 100.41 at this stage and never dips below 100 thereafter. Ones and twos form the backbone of Kohli’s best knocks. Over 40% of his runs come in this fashion at any phase. His expertise at finding vacant spaces means he's also rare in the current generation that he can hit fours all along the ground. Not the most effortless of six-hitters, his focus shifts towards clearing the boundary when he’s faced more than 60 balls on average. The template is similar even when he’s batting first.
Chases below 300 allow Kohli to stay in his comfort zone. “The required rate was never above 6. We managed to chip a few out, but Kohli is the master of those kind of chases and showed it again tonight,” New Zealand spinner Mitchell Santner said.
But as his early years establishing himself as a great one-day chaser show, he has the range to shift gears in accordance with the target. In chases of 300-plus, he averages 61.58 and strikes at 106.29. When the target is between 250-300, he averages 67.63 at a strike rate of 92.51. A target below 250 sees Kohli’s strike rate dip to 87.67 while his average rises to 69.33.
All these numbers reinforce what was true even a decade ago. That Kohli is a calm and cunning chase master with a foolproof playbook for one-day cricket.
