India v New Zealand, 2nd Test, Kolkata: Virat Kohli generates crowd support

KOLKATA: Virat Kohli is known to wear his emotions on the sleeves. As a captain he likes to lead from the front and loves to get in to thick of actions. The fourth day of the second Test match against New Zealand at the

Eden Gardens

brought out some of those characters of Kohli.

With the New Zealand openers putting up a good resistance, the whole India team was getting impatient looking for another victory. Left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja was warned by the umpire for running on to the pitch while appealing against Tom Latham. Kohli was quickly beside his boy starting a conversation with the umpire.

Such backing no doubt lifts a player's spirit and pushes him to give more than 100 per cent.

However, as the day progressed and the Kiwis raised their level of resilience, Kohli decided to take help of the Eden crowd. The skipper was seen gesturing to the people in the stands to raise their voice and back their local boy Mohammad Shami

Later in a press conference, he mentioned the issue too. "Crowd support makes a massive difference. It creates a lot of energy. We experience that when we go to Australia, England or South Africa. As a batsman you get nervous by a noisy crowd. So I just try to think as a batsman," he said.

However he felt "the crowd also loves it when you engage them for the betterment of the team. A tired Shami would have bowled three overs but he got charged up and bowled 12 more balls for the team and got another wicket," he added.

The Delhi boy also knows how to connect with the people too. As India opted for the second new ball in Kiwi second innings, he just took the ball to show it to all the people just like the umpire do to the official scorers. No wonder, the field umpire was not amused by this.