When Virat Kohli was going through difficult times over a run drought last year, his former teammate and skipper M.S. Dhoni was the only person to reach out to him and express support — not once but twice.
Dhoni’s gesture and concern towards Kohli’s well-being is an indicator of the bond the two players shared during their time as members of the national cricket team. So, what makes the relationship tick, on and off the field?
Kohli has shared some insights into the working points of his kinship with Dhoni while speaking on the RCB Podcast Season 2, the first of the 10 episodes ahead of the next edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023 season.
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“I have experienced a different kind of phase in my career currently. It’s been a while since I felt (this) free in the sense how I felt all these years of playing at any level of cricket,” Kohli was quoted as saying by his IPL franchise Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB).
Kohli has played 106 Tests, 271 ODIs, and 115 T20Is for India in a career spanning 15 years scoring over 25000 international runs.
“What is interesting is that throughout this phase apart from Anushka, who has been the biggest source of strength for me because she has been with me throughout this whole time and she has seen me very closely as to how have I felt, things that I have gone through, the kind of things that have happened the only person who, apart from my childhood coach and family genuinely reached out to me has been MS Dhoni.
Kohli shared the dressing room with Dhoni for 11 years during their stint with Team India between 2008 and 2019.
“He (Dhoni) reached out to me and you can rarely get in touch with him. If I call him on any random day, 99 percent he will not pick up (the phone), because he just does not look at the phone. So, for him to reach out to me twice has happened now and one of the things that he’d mentioned in the message while reaching out to me was that: when you are expected to be strong and looked at as a strong individual people forget to ask how are you doing?’
Kohli further added, “So, it (Dhoni’s words) hit home for me because I have always been looked at as someone who is very confident, mentally very strong, who can endure any circumstances and find a way and show us the way. Sometimes, what you realize is that at any given point in time in life as a human being, you need to take a couple of steps backward, understand how you are doing, and how your well-being is placed.
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