Royal Challengers Bangalore’s worst season ever in the 10-year history of the Indian Premier League has “hurt” Virat Kohli but at the same time the skipper is excited about the challenges in the coming years.
“The kind of season we have had needs no explanation,” Kohli said at a promotional event here on Wednesday. “It’s for everyone to see how it’s gone. It certainly hurts us the most as players. We certainly tried everything to turn things around for us but it just didn’t happen. Sometimes in sport, these things happen. You have to accept them and move forward. Actually it makes us more excited for the challenges in the coming years and what we can achieve as a franchise and as a team in the coming years of the IPL. We are looking at it as a positive opportunity to start fresh, think of things we need to do and move forward as a team. Last year was great for us, this year has been the total opposite. We got to accept both sides of this wonderful game,” he elaborated.
With just two wins and a washout in 13 games, RCB are confirmed the wooden spoon, their worst finish ever in the tournament. From a series of injuries to several of their key players to lack of performance from their big guns, it’s been a forgettable year, where little has gone right for the Bengaluru team.
“It has been tough but it has been a great learning opportunity,” said the India skipper. “We have all learnt a lot from this season and I am sure the guys realise a lot about themselves, their games and we are only going to get better from here on. It can’t get any worse. We probably had our worst season in the IPL in ten years and as I said, it is an opportunity to start fresh. It is how you perceive the situation in front of you and we are certainly looking at positives right now and trying to improve things next year,” he offered.
It can be tough to keep oneself motivated in the face of number of such defeats but Kohli said it was actually “pretty easy.”
“If you play the sport for so long, you have to accept that these kinds of days will come,” he stressed. “It’s important to have a set routine in your life that you can follow, not necessarily relying on the results that you get on the field and then things become easier to cope with. Even when you are doing well you do the same things. And when you are not, you follow the same routines. So that’s how I keep myself motivated to go out there and do my best in every game I play and the team plays. But it doesn’t happen every time and you have to accept it,” he explained.
Published 10 May 2017, 19:27 IST