Despite a Golden Duck, How Virat Kohli Made a Telling Impact With His Fielding vs Afghanistan

Team India registered an emphatic win over Afghanistan to complete a 3-0 whitewash of the visitors at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium on Wednesday. The third and final game of the T20I series proved to be a nail-biter as the winner had to be decided after 2 Super Overs after the scores of the teams were level at the end of the regular 20 overs and the first Super Over tiebreaker also ended in a draw.

However, India piped the Afghan side in the second Super Over as skipper Rohit Sharma led from the front.

Another star Virat Kohli, who failed to deliver with the bat on the day, played his part on the field as he produced a stunning acrobatic effort near the boundary line to save what would have been a certain six.

Kohli was also instrumental in the field on other occasions in the game as he picked a brilliant high catch to get rid of Najibullah Zadran off Avesh Khan’s over to get rid of the Afghan player in the 19th over.

Kohli’s presence on the field also came in use yet again as he was responsible for a run out in the first Super Over as the 35-year-old dismissed Gulbadin Naib on the opening ball of the tiebreaker.

Chasing a target of 213, Afghanistan were on par at 165 for the loss of 4 wickets when Karim Janat lofted a Washington Sundar delivery over the top. As it seemed like clearing the ropes, Kohli came up with an incredible effort to prevent the ball from crossing the rope, stopping a certain maximum, which ultimately made a difference as the game went into the tiebreakers.

Afghanistan managed to level India’s score and take the game into a Super Over, in which both sides managed to score the same number of runs and thus another tiebreaker was required to determine the winner.

India pulled clear on the second time of asking as Rohit continued his fine touch into the tiebreaker to help India make 11 runs before he was run out. Rinku Singh was then caught off Fareed Ahmad’s over to bring an end to the Indian batting.

Team Indian spinner Ravi Bishnoi, came up big as he managed to bundle out the Afghan unit, who had battled hard up until this point, in the second super over.

Bishnoi scalped Mohammed Nabi in the first ball of the Super over, before Janat rotated strike to Rahmanullah Gurbaz with a single off the second delivery. But, Bishnoi wrapped things up in the third ball of the second super over as he dismissed Gurbaz to help India seal the win.