3 reasons why Virat Kohli stepping down as Test captain is a good move

A day after India’s shock series loss to an inexperienced South African outfit, Virat Kohli has stepped down as the team’s Test captain. The three-match series was billed by many as India’s best chance to win a Test series in South Africa. They began on a high, clinching the first Test of the series in Centurion. However, the Proteas fought back strongly and India had no answer.

Taking to his official social media handles on Saturday, Kohli wrote that “Everything has to come to a halt at some stage, and for me as Test captain of India, it's now.” The 33-year-old's decision to resign as Test captain brings an end to his reign as leader in Indian cricket. He had earlier resigned from the T20I captaincy, after which he was sacked as the one-day skipper.

Kohli finishes his stint as India’s most successful Test captain. He led India 68 times in the longer format, with India winning 40 of those matches.

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Virat Kohli quits as Test skipper: The right move

In the wake of Kohli’s resignation as Test captain, we observe three reasons why the decision and its timing make a lot of sense.

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#1 There was too much controversy surrounding him

Virat Kohli has been embroiled in one controversy after other of late. Pic: Getty Images

Ever since his tell-all press conference ahead of the South African tour, controversy has been following Kohli everywhere. There was too much off-field distraction created by his frank statements on being sacked as captain. And it's possible to be certain from the outside, this factor might just have played a role in India’s defeat.

Even if the fans and media tried to focus on the game, there was too much suspicion around what was going on in the Indian dressing room, considering all that had transpired prior to the tour.

Kohli’s absence from media interactions until the eve of the final Test was conspicuous. Eyebrows were also raised when the star batter was declared unfit for the 2nd Test due to back spasms. Until KL Rahul stepped out for the toss, no one had an inkling that the skipper was unavailable.

Apart from the loss itself, Kohli’s shocking conduct in Cape Town over a contentious DRS decision was the proverbial last nail in the coffin. The 33-year-old arguably had no right to continue as leader of a national team after his stump-mic antics. Sadly, instead of regretting his actions, he brushed off the controversy with a bizarre defense at the post-match conference. Definitely time to move on from captain Kohli, then.

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#2 India cannot afford to lose the Kohli the batter

The former captain needs to rediscover his batting touch. Pic: Getty Images

Kohli might have launched yet another strong defense of Cheteshwar Pujara and Ajinkya Rahane after their failures in South Africa. However, the bitter truth is that the man himself needs to get his act in place as a batter. To be fair to the 33-year-old, he did a decent job in the two Tests he played in the Rainbow Nation. However, Kohli is far from his best.

Over the last couple of seasons, the responsibility of leading the side has undoubtedly affected Kohli’s batting. He has more often than not gone out to bat with one willow in his hand but multiple questions in his head. And this has been amply evident in the way that he has batted. Barring the half-century in the first innings of the Adelaide Test in 2020, he has never looked his fluent self.

Pujara and Rahane struggling has only compounded his woes. The fact has been that Kohli has produced similar numbers to the other two senior batters in the Test format over the last year or so. How much India will miss Kohli the captain is debatable. What is not is that, at this stage, the team cannot afford to lose Kohli the batter.

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#3 His captaincy style looked jaded

Kohli congratulates Temba Bavuma after the Cape Town Test. Pic: Getty Images

Statistically, Kohli may be India’s most successful Test skipper. However, as current coach Rahul Dravid famously said after stepping down from captaincy in 2007, “there is a shelf life to captaincy in India” as it “takes a lot out of you”. The same holds true for Kohli as well. Seven years in the job and leading in all three formats for a majority of time is bound to take a toll, especially when you are the captain of the Indian cricket team.

When Kohli took over as leader, his captaincy style was seen as refreshing and his aggression won him a lot of admirers. Of course, it helped that India were winning a lot of matches under him. However, once the sheen wore off, the star cricketer was found wanting in a number of areas as leader. His constant argument that the team doesn’t bother about ‘outside noise’, even if they came from respected voices in the game, was viewed by many as sheer arrogance.

His constant backing of Rahane and Pujara got so monotonous that by the time the South Africa series ended one could almost predict the words Kohli was going to use to defend the struggling duo. On the field as well, he seemed to have lost control. The way the final Test ended, with India looking completely disinterested, was symptomatic of Kohli’s jaded captaincy style. He’s had his run, like his predecessors, and now it’s time to move on to a new era.