Next Virat, We Await The Master

Virat Kohli played cricket as if the world were his oyster, and now it genuinely is. Leading batsman in three formats, soon to be captain in all three.​ It is a good place to be in your 20s. The pupil to teacher phase is over. We await the master.

- Suresh Menon

There are few public figures who actually evolve in public. Politicians usually arrive as miniature versions of their future selves, actors have their personae airbrushed by PR people. Even sportsmen rarely wear their hearts on their sleeve despite the passion for what they do. The growing up takes place off-stage.

But Virat Kohli has gone from brash youngster to mature man of the world before our eyes, sharing with us every twist and turn on the journey. In his teens, a nation rejoiced in the triumph of the captain who led India to an Under-19 world title; in his early 20s he became the bad boy of Indian cricket, and a nation either shared his frustration as performance fell short of promise or turned moral police pointing to his rebellious manner. While you could bring home to your grandmother the preceding generation of the Tendulkars, Dravids, Kumbles and Laxmans, you needed to protect your grandmother from this young communicator who cursed like a sailor.

Then came the centuries in Australia and South Africa, Test captaincy, the ease with which he wore the mantle as the side’s best batsman and all was forgiven. From someone who embarrassed a generation with over-the-top aggression to one who makes the whole nation proud, Kohli has travelled well, taking us along on his route, confiding in us, assuring us that he is that rare creature: a fabulous performer who cares for his sport.

At 27, he is in the middle phase of a career that in some respects promises to be more glittering, more impactful, certainly more talked about than those of his great predecessors of the Sachin Tendulkar era. After Tendulkar had been caught at slip in his last Test innings in his 200th Test, Kohli drove the next delivery from Narsingh Deonarine to the boundary. The symbolism was almost Bollywoodean in its obviousness: the king is dead, long live the king.