Sanjay Manjrekar Slams Virat Kohli After Poor Knock vs Bangladesh In Champions Trophy 2025

The former Indian batter, Sanjay Manjrekar, has made a surprising observation on Virat Kohli’s struggling knock of 22 runs in 38 deliveries against Bangladesh at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) during the blue brigade’s opening game of the Champions Trophy 2025.

India chased down the score of 229 runs quite easily with six wickets in hand, shouldering on Shubman Gill’s unbeaten century and the 47 undefeated runs from KL Rahul. It came after Axar Patel enjoyed two wickets on successive deliveries while Mohammed Shami celebrated five wickets in the inning.

Virat Kohli struggled on Dubai’s slow and low surface

Virat Kohli, who is nearing 14000 ODI runs, has fallen to the leg-spinners in all of his last five 50-over encounters. Last year, Wanindu Hasaranga and Jeffrey Vandersay dismissed him in Sri Lanka, while Adil Rashid got the better of the veteran twice in the home England series.

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Kohli came into the middle on the tenth over and never looked settled in the crease, as he found it hard to hit the spinners to the boundary line. The heat of the afternoon slowed the pitch down as the Bangladesh spinners were changing their pace quite beautifully to get full help off the surface.

The Delhi batter’s first and only boundary of the innings came against Miraz, as the batter pulled the short ball between backward square-leg and short fine-leg region. Since 2024, he has faced 51 deliveries against the leg-spinners to grab 31 runs at an average of 6.20 and a strike rate of 60.78, including five dismissals.

Sanjay Manjrekar opines on Virat Kohli’s low confidence in the Bangladesh fixture.

India’s former batter, Sanjay Manjrekar, has stated that the 36-year-old was low on confidence as he was trying to show that he was up for the fight. Kohli came into the ICC event with a half-century against England at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad.

“He's in a tight corner. Virat Kohli's confidence is down. He wants to still show that he's up there for a fight. And I'm starting to see that maybe there is a little bit of bravado as well, but why not? You know, you can't be revealing what's inside you. Rohit Sharma still has the big game.” Sanjay Manjrekar expressed on ESPNcricinfo after the game.

“He can step out and hit a guy in, you know, over extra cover or play short on pull and willing to, you know, take chances. Virat Kohli doesn't have the big game anymore. You've seen him occasionally play the big shot, but he can't act.” The Mumbai-born highlighted.

That was Virat’s first ODI game in Dubai, as he played a few T20Is for India at the venue during the 2021 T20 World Cup and a significant number of IPL games in the past for the Royal Challengers Bengaluru.

Sanjay Manjrekar claims Virat Kohli’s requirement for flat surfaces

Sanjay Manjrekar suggested that Kohli is the odd one in the batting lineup as Rohit, Gill, and Rahul have found the boundary cushion quite comfortably.

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“He's just trying to find some way that he can get a move on to the inning. And what you see there is, when he comes into bat, the spinners come on. And once the spinners know that you won't be hitting them for three sixes straight down the pitch or, you know, over midwicket.” India’s former batter shed light.

“Rohit can still do it. KL Rahul can do it, Gill can do it. So he's cornered in a way. What he needed in this tournament were flat pitches like the one that we have in Pakistan, more pace into him.” Sanjay Manjrekar concluded.

Kohli will hope to get back his lost form against arch-rivals Pakistan on February 23 at the same venue.