‘Isn’t That Impressive’: Sanjay Manjrekar Evaluates Virat Kohli’s IPL Captaincy For RCB

Cricketer turned commentator Sanjay Manjrekar claimed that Virat Kohli’s reputation races him ahead to captain the Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in the IPL 2025. As per Manjrekar, a captain should be appointed on the basis of performance rather than reputation alone.

Virat Kohli was castigated even though he won the orange cap and helped his team secure a fourth-place finish in IPL 2024. The reason behind the criticism was Kohli’s below-average strike rate as he also made the joint-slowest century in IPL history off 67 deliveries. 

“If instead of Virat Kohli, there was someone else. You just remove him from your mind and just look at his performance in the IPL, his batting and captaincy performance. Then you think whether it is the right decision to make him the captain,” Manjrekar said while speaking on ESPNCricinfo.

“Just because he is Virat Kohli, 95% of fans want him to be the captain. But if you just go by his performances, it isn’t that impressive. This is my problem, I do not want to get carried away, because of hero worship, I do not want to get away from the cricket truth,” Manjrekar added.

The Bangalore-based franchise retained Virat Kohli for a whopping Rs 21 crore ahead of the IPL 2025 mega auction. 

“In Tests, Virat Kohli is out of form, but India need him. But in T20s, I don’t think he is as great a player as he was 7-8 years ago,” Manjrekar said.

As of now, Virat Kohli has taken part in 252 IPL games where he smashed 8,004 runs with the help of eight centuries. In the previous edition of the IPL, Kohli collected 741 runs in 15 games with an average of 61.75. In the IPL 2023, the former RCB skipper made 639 runs in 14 matches at an average of 53.25.