Sunil Gavaskar schools Star Sports over Virat Kohli’s IPL interview

Fans remember when Kohli remarked on his critics complaining about his low strike rate in IPL 2024. It was after the first IPL 2024 game between Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) and Gujarat Titans (GT) on April 28.

“All the people who talk about strike rates and me not playing spin well are the ones who love talking about this stuff. But for me, it’s just about winning the game for the team. And there’s a reason why you do it for 15 years,” Kohli said during a post-match interview after securing a win against GT in Ahmedabad.

“I am not quite sure if you’ve been in that situation yourself to sit and speak about the game from a box. I don’t really think it’s the same thing,” Kohli added while directly referring to commentators critical of his strike rate.

On May 4, when RCB clashed again with GT – this time in Bengaluru, Star Sports played Kinig Kohli’s ‘strike rate’ interview several times. And, Sunny Gavaskar is far from pleased with the network.

The legendary cricketer criticised Star Sports for showing the interview during the RCB vs GT game “half a dozen times”.

“Star Sports needs to understand they’ve shown it enough times. Everybody got the message,” Gavaskar said.

“I’ll be very disappointed if Star Sports shows it once more. That’ll be questioning all of us commentators, not just these two (Matthew Hayden and I), those in the box, those earlier on. You’re questioning their knowledge, their expertise,” he said.

Sunil Gavaskar on Virat Kohli

At the same time, Gavaskar slammed Virat for reacting to commentators’ remarsk about his strike rate.

“Commentators questioned only when the strike rate was… if you have a strike of 118 and then you get out in the 14th or the 15th with a strike rate of 118… if you want applause for that, that’s a little bit different,” Gavaskar said.

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Published: 05 May 2024, 10:14 AM IST