Virat Kohli on why IPL 2016 final loss was heartbreaking

Virat Kohli has been associated with the Royal Challengers Bangalore ever since the inception of the Indian Premier League (IPL) in 2008 and has also led them for nine seasons from 2013 to 2021. Under his captaincy, RCB had made the playoffs thrice and a final appearance as well. The Bengaluru-based franchise had qualified for their third final in the 2016 season where they went down to southern rivals Sunrisers Hyderabad.

Recalling that final, Kohli has said that the current Indian limited-overs vice-captain KL Rahul who was a member of the squad back then sends screenshots from the highlights package of the match which still hurts him to date. The batting megastar was in the form of his life in the 2016 edition having amassed 973 runs which is still an individual batting record in the tournament history and while he went on to win the Orange Cap, the biggest prize eluded him that year.

The 2016 IPL final loss still hurts to this date, says Virat Kohli

“I felt like it was written. How can the final be in Bangalore and we play a season like that, we play that kind of a game where we are 100-something without a wicket in 9 overs and then” (we collapse), said Kohli while speaking on the RCB Podcast.

“To this date, when there is a highlight package coming on Star of that game, KL takes screenshots from that game and says it still hurts. And it does. You’d think about the game every now and then and how there were dejected faces in that amazing setup we had done for the post-victory celebration. It was such a huge setup and we were sat there thinking we gave our everything,” he added.

Coming back to the contest, Sunrisers Hyderabad skipper David Warner won a crucial toss and elected to bat first. The skipper himself led from the front with a quickfire 38-ball 69 and with some vital contributions from the middle-order batters Yuvraj Singh (38) and Ben Cutting (39*), SRH posted a mammoth total of 208/7 from their 20 overs.

In reply, openers Kohli and Chris Gayle did not let the scoreboard pressure distract them as they took the Hyderabad bowlers to the cleaners with some delightful strokes and added 114 for the first wicket before the latter was dismissed. The former skipper kept his team in the hunt but, when he was castled by left-arm pacer Barinder Sran for 54, RCB suffered a middle-order collapse and ended up just nine runs short of the target.