Delhi: After losing six consecutive matches, Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) finally registered their second win in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024 on Thursday. In the 41st match played at Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium, Hyderabad, RCB defeated Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) by 35 runs. Starting the innings, batsman Virat Kohli scored 51 runs in 43 balls, after which India's great batsman Sunil Gavaskar strongly criticized the strike rate of the former captain.

Actually, Kohli is not able to bat very fast in T20 cricket. Such allegations against him in this IPL are not new. Kohli scored the slowest century in IPL history against Rajasthan Royals (RR). Now against the team captained by Pat Cummins, he did not hit a single four or six in the last 25 balls.

After watching Virat's 53rd half-century in the IPL, 74-year-old Gavaskar said, “It does not seem that Kohli is in form. I don't remember clearly, but after scoring 31-32, I did not see a single four. Came to open and was out in the 15th over, but Kohli's strike rate is like 118. The team does not expect such an innings from him at all.”

Not only Gavaskar, former Australian cricketer Simon Katich also criticized Kohli's game. Taking the example of Rajat Patidar's innings, he said, “Kohli is not able to play. There is no doubt about it. Patidar played a beautiful innings. Tried to hit big shots throughout the innings. Kohli also needed to play in the same way. A strike rate of less than 120 is not enough against a team like Hyderabad. Bengaluru's score could have been 220 or even more. Because of Kohli they had to stop at 206 runs only.”

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How has Virat Kohli's performance been so far in IPL 2024?

It is noteworthy that till now in the current season of IPL, Kohli is leading in the race for Orange Cap. Till Thursday he had scored 430 runs in 9 matches. During this, one century and three half-centuries are included. Kohli's average is 61.43 and strike rate is 145.76. However, before the T20 World Cup, there are continuous complaints against Kohli about slow batting.

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