5 underrated knocks of Virat Kohli in ODIs

3) 54 against Sri Lanka in Colombo in 2008

Virat Kohli scored his first fifty in ODIs against Sri Lanka

In one of India’s memorable ODI series triumphs outside the country, especially because of all the hoopla surrounding the mystery spinner Ajantha Mendis who literally toyed with the famed Indian batting line-up before this particular series, Virat Kohli had an important contribution.

Playing in his debut ODI series and only his 4th international game, Kohli came to open the bat when the ball was new and swinging and the likes of Chaminda Vaas and Nuwan Kulasekara could have wreaked havoc.

However, soothing the nerves of the dressing room, he played an important knock of 54 which set the platform for India to put on a challenging total on the board.

Kohli stayed till the 18th over and showed a lot of character to nullify the threat of the opening bowlers and lay the foundation for his team.

India went on to score 258 in that game and that proved to be a little too much for the Sri Lankans as they succumbed to a 46-run defeat and thus squandered the series as well.