Hours after talking about being open to a break, Virat Kohli smashed a 33-ball 50 against the Gujarat Titans at the Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai on Thursday. He and Royal Challengers Bangalore captain Faf du Plessis in the 12th over, giving the team a big platform to chase down 168 runs. 

With RCB’s playoff hopes depending on the result vs the Gujarat Titans, their biggest gun fired. Kohli was unbeaten at 65 off 49 balls in the 15th over when his partner Du Plessis was dismissed off Rashid Khan. The duo stitched a 115-run stand for the first wicket. 

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The former RCB skipper finished with 73 runs off 54 balls. 

Opening with his skipper, Kohli hit eight boundaries and two maximums. The innings included two consecutive fours off GT captain Hardik Pandya in the fourth over. The first one was a french cut to fine leg. He was dropped by Rashid Khan at square leg on the second. 

Incidentally, Virat Kohli’s only other half-century in IPL 2022 (58 off 53 balls) came against the Gujarat Titans when the two sides locked horns earlier this season. 

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During his innings, the 33-year-old reached the 7000-run mark for the Royal Challengers Bangalore, a side he has played for since the start of the IPL in 2008. He has scored the most number of runs for single side in T20s. Suresh Raina with 5529 for Chennai Super Kings and Rohit Sharma’s 4980 for the Mumbai Indians are next on the list. 

Ahead of the match, Kohli had explained how he is coping with his lean patch in IPL 2022. 

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“My experiences are sacred to me. Whatever I have experienced in this phase or in the past as well, one thing I can vouch for is that I have never valued myself more as a person. Because I’m experiencing now that there is a big sense of the identity that’s created by the world for you, which is far more different and so far away from the reality of you as a human being. So, what I’m experiencing now is that I am valuing myself and I care for my own well-being way more I would have in the past,” he said.