“Drive in full consciousness, or you can get out on 0 like Virat Kohli” - Uttarakhand Police’s tweet on safe driving
Virat Kohli’s duck against England on Friday has found its way to Uttarakhand Police’s safe driving campaign.
The Indian skipper was dismissed without scoring for the third time in his last five innings across formats as the hosts went down to England by eight wickets in the first T20I in Ahmedabad.
Taking to its official Twitter account, Uttarakhand Police asked motorists to drive with full consciousness or else they might end up failing like Virat Kohli against England.
The tweet, posted in Hindi, translates to:
“A helmet is not enough. It is necessary to drive in full consciousness, or else you can get out on zero, just like Kohli.”
The Indian captain was dismissed for a five-ball duck when he backed away and tried to loft Adil Rashid over the in-field. However, all he managed was a simple catch to mid-off; Virat Kohli’s wicket left India reeling at 3 for 2.
Virat Kohli’s duck on Friday was the latest in his growing list of low scores. Kohli’s scores in his last five international innings are as follows - 0, 62, 27, 0 and 0.
To add to India’s woes, the rest of the Indian batting, barring Shreyas Iyer (67), also struggled as the hosts managed a paltry score of 124 for 7 after batting first.
Shreyas Iyer showed how to use the depth of the crease: Virat Kohli
Speaking at the post-match press conference, Virat Kohli admitted that most Indian batsmen did not spend enough time in the middle to assess the conditions. He praised Shreyas Iyer for showing the way, though. Analysing India’s defeat, Virat Kohli said:
"We just weren't aware enough about what we had to do on that pitch; lack of execution on our shots is something we have to address as batsmen. Accept your faults, come back with more intent, clarity of plans on the areas you want to hit. It was a strange kind of a start for us. Wicket didn't allow you to hit the shots we wanted to. Shreyas showed how to use the depth of the crease and ride the bounce because there was variable bounce on that pitch. It was just a below-par batting performance, and England made us pay for it."
He also conceded that, given the conditions, the batsmen might have gone overboard with their strokeplay.
"We looked to try a few things, but having said that, you have to accept the conditions that are in front of you. If the pitch allows you to, you can be aggressive from ball one. But we got ahead of ourselves a little bit. We didn't spend enough time assessing it; Shreyas did, but we had lost too many wickets to get to 150-160," Kohli observed.
India will look to square the five-match series when they face England in the second T20I on Sunday.