• Home
  • Player Stories
  • Watch When Virat Kohli Went After Dean Elgar And Played Mind Games With Him

[Watch] When Virat Kohli Went After Dean Elgar And Played Mind-Games With Him

image-lqq3rownWhen Virat Kohli went after Dean Elgar (Twitter)

Apart from his successful leadership, Virat Kohli's India captaincy tenure is remembered for the man fighting fire with fire against the opposition. Kohli minced no words on the cricket field and gave it back in equal measure as he received. 

On one such occasion, he went after his then South African counterpart Dean Elgar in an act of counter-sledging during the final innings of the deciding Test of the 2021-22 series in Cape Town. As the Test hung on a knife's edge, Kohli took it upon himself to ruffle the Proteas' stoic opening batter.

The modern-day great's words suggested he was responding to Elgar's own jeering act earlier in the Test match when he tried to get under the Indian captain's skin in the all-crucial encounter at the Newlands Stadium. 

When Kohli Sledged Dean Elgar 

With India defending a modest 212, Kohli tried to create the theatrics and the pressure around Elgar, who was finding it difficult to initially negotiate India's ace speedster Jasprit Bumrah.

Kohli used Bumrah's class and the trouble caused to the opener as a reference point in his sledging and went as far back as Elgar's concussion act during the 2018 Test in Johannesburg. 

"Unbelievable. That's after a 'Player of the Match' performance in the last game. Running from Jasprit," Kohli could be heard saying on live broadcast via the stump mic.

"Come on lads, come on boys. You're chirping for 13 years, Dean, you think you're going to keep me quiet? Eh?"

"We all know who wanted the match called off in Jo'burg 2018. We all know that."

Kohli recalled the 2018 Test, when on a treacherous surface, Elgar got hit on the head by the Indian seamers multiple times and the match had to hit a pause for the umpires to determine if the surface was ripe to continue playing. 

While India ultimately won the fixture, the visitors could sense the hosts wanted to run away from the very track they designed for them to try and pull off an easy win in the final Test. Given the challenge at hand, it is regarded as one of India's finest-ever overseas wins.