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Cricket PlayersVirat said to the cameraman 'Go to him. He is the man today': India youngster says Kohli's gesture gave him 'goosebumps'
IPL 2022: A lot of youngsters have flourished under Virat, and a former RCB batter has narrated how Kohli's selfless gesture floored him on the night he smashed a century.
Virat Kohli knows how and when to give back to the game that has given him everything. Kohli, whose made his India debut under MS Dhoni, couldn’t have asked for a better first captain. He saw first hand how Dhoni made seamlessly made a transition that saw more youngsters rise through the ranks so that when his time is up, the next crop of players is capable enough to usher Indian cricket into the next era. That is exactly what Kohli did. When it was his time to take over as captain, Kohli ensured the next generation of cricketers kept coming through the ranks, to an extent that today, when he is no longer captain, Team India has ample depth to field a second-string XI good enough to beat a quality international team. (Also Follow: 'Hardik Pandya not a bad captain': After getting criticised for shouting at Shami, GT skipper finds backing from legends)
Be in Indian cricket or the IPL, Kohli never shied away from giving young talents the opportunity and platform to prove themselves. While his trust in the up-and-coming youngsters is highly appreciative, Kohli did the same with his IPL franchise Royal Challengers Bangalore. In IPL 2020, Kohli gave Devdutt Padikkal a chance and he proved his captain right by scoring 473 runs becoming only the second batter ever to amass over 400 runs in his maiden IPL season.
Padikkal carried on his sublime form the following year and tallied 411 more in 2021, including a maiden IPL century. With Kohli at the other end, Padikkal smashed Rajasthan Royals en route to an unbeaten 101 as RCB won handsomely by 10 wickets. Looking back at the match, Padikkal recalls being floored by a heartwarming gesture by Kohli.
"The one thing that I remember pretty clearly was when Virat was being followed by a camera and he told the cameraman ‘Go to him (Devdutt). He is the main man today’, and you know that still gives me goosebumps whenever I think about it," Padikkal said on 'Red Bull's Greatness Starts Here', a video of which was shared by CricTracker.
"I pretty much remember everything about that day. All my life I had never imagined that at 20 years old, I will be scoring an IPL hundred. So to be able to do that at the Wankhede Stadium which has so much history to it and in the presence if people like Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers, and cricketers like that, it was just incredible."
Padikkal's stupendous show in back-to-back editions of the IPL saw him getting rewarded with an India cap. In July last year, Padikkal was named in India's limited-overs tour of Sri Lanka and played two T20Is scoring 9 and 29."
"Obviously, playing for India is the biggest achievement I could have asked for. As a child, someone who loved cricket, playing for your country is the ultimate goal so that was definitely the biggest moment in my life and career. Especially, for my parents because when I was 11, we moved from Hyderabad to Bengaluru just so that I could have a real go at cricket," added Padikkal.
