Write Comment     |     E-Mail To a Friend     |     Facebook     |     Twitter     |     Print

Mumbai: Virat Kohli is bracing up for his biggest assignment as India’s limited overs captain as he leads the team at the upcoming ICC Champions Trophy -- the second most important tournament in 50-overs cricket after the World Cup.

Kohli, who was already leading the Test team, was appointed full time India captain in ODIs and T20Is in January this year after Mahendra Singh Dhoni stepped down.

And the first advice captain Kohli has given his side, as they depart for United Kingdom on Wednesday night, is not to get bogged down by the pressure of being the defending champions.

“I think the first challenge is not to think about the fact that we are defending the title. When we went there the last time, we just wanted to enjoy ourselves as a young unit. We ended up winning the tournament and ended up creating a team which has done so well so far,” Kohli said in Mumbai on the eve of team’s departure.

Why is failure in one series a matter of for sub-continent cricketers, he also wondered.

"For me I feel that you improve as a cricketer every series that you play. Sometimes, not in our own heads but the atmosphere around us is built in a way that becomes like a life and death kind of series and especially for sub-continent cricketers, which I don’t understand why," he.

Kohli said that his sole ambition is to win matches for India, irrespective of the conditions or the venue.

"If players don’t do well in India and then go back, there is no hype around it, you don’t do well away from India it is like a knife hanging on your neck, so I don’t believe in those things.

"I would never play for redemption, my only motivation is to keep winning games for my country and doesn’t matter the conditions I am playing in, it might be in sub-continent, it might be England, Australia, South Africa, the aim always is to win games and I am willing to do whatever I can to be able to achieve that for the team."

The batting mainstay then sought to take things easy.

"People might look at it redemption, opportunity or stuff like that but in my head I don’t think of those things at all, for me it’s a game of cricket played anywhere in the world."