NEW DELHI: India’s Virat Kohli has relinquished the captaincy of the Test side following their 2-1 series defeat by South Africa, the right-handed batter announced on Saturday.
“It’s been seven years of hard work, toil and relentless perseverance everyday to take the team in the right direction. I’ve done the job with absolute honesty and left nothing out there,” Kohli wrote on Twitter.
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— Virat Kohli (@imVkohli) January 15, 2022
He continued, “Everything has come to a halt at some stage and for me as Test captain of India, it’s now. There have been many ups and also some downs along the journey, but never has there been a lack of effort or lack of belief.”
Kohli gave up the Twenty20 captaincy in September and he was replaced as One-Day International skipper in December, with opener Rohit Sharma taking over in both formats.
He steps down as India’s most successful Test captain of all time, having led the team to 40 wins from 68 matches with an impressive win percentage of 58.82.
This is most by any skipper with more than 10 Tests as captain, way ahead of MS Dhoni, Sourav Ganguly and Mohammed Azharuddin, who captained India in 60, 49 and 47 Tests respectively.
Kohli’s first Test as captain was against Australia in Adelaide during the 2014/15 series, where he led gallantly in the absence of Dhoni, who had missed out due to a finger injury. India came close to a historic Test win Down Under before a final-innings batting collapse saw them go down by 48 runs.
Kohli’s biggest achievement as captain would remain leading India to their first Test series win in Australia in 71 years. In the Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2018/19., Kohli’s India beat Australia 2-1 to achieve an accolade which no Indian team had before.
