KL Rahul reveals conversation with Kohli during IND vs BAN game
Star India batter Virat Kohli notched up his 48th ODI hundred as he helped India win by seven wickets in their fourth fixture of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2023 on Thursday, October 19. However, reaching the milestone was quite a task for the chase master as Kohli was batting on 73* (77) after 38 overs with India needing just 28 runs to win.
The star batter decided to score all the remaining runs by himself and got good support from KL Rahul who denied him a single on several occasions. Opening up about the conversation between the duo in the middle, Rahul revealed that Kohli asked him to run singles or else people would think that he was playing for his milestone. However, the wicketkeeper batter backed him to reach the landmark since India were winning the game easily.
“I denied single to Virat Kohli, he said it would be bad if you won’t take singles, people will think I’m playing for personal milestone. But I said we are comfortably winning, you complete your century,” Rahul revealed to Star Sports in a post-match interview.
Kohli went on to complete his hundred with a six against Nasum Ahmed as he remained unbeaten on 103 off 97 balls smashing six fours and four sixes. Courtesy of his knock, India chased down the target of 257 in 41.3 overs and registered their fourth consecutive win in the tournament.
The former India captain was deservedly awarded Player of the Match for his sensational hundred. The star batter is just one more century away from levelling Sachin Tendulkar’s record for most hundreds in ODIs (49).
Earlier in the day, Bangladesh stand-in captain Najmul Hossain Shanto won the toss and elected to bat first. They got off to a great start as openers Tanzid Hasan (51 off 43) and Litton Das (66 off 82) added 93 runs for the first wicket off 88 balls.
Ravindra Jadeja starred with the ball for India
However, following their dismissals, no other batter could play a big innings and Bangladesh could only score 256/8 in their allotted 50 overs. Ravindra Jadeja was the pick of the bowlers for India as he registered figures of 2/38 in ten overs while Jasprit Bumrah (2/41) and Mohammad Siraj (2/60) also picked up two wickets each.
