Albie Morkel, the South African all-rounder, said that he had no idea why RCB bowled Kohli in the penultimate over of a match against Chennai Super Kings.
Speaking to sports presenter Rupha Ramani in a YouTube chat, the former CSK player recalled the Kohli over in which he scored 28 runs.
In a 2012 IPL match between the two teams at Chennai, CSK was chasing 206 after half-centuries from Kohli and Chris Gayle. It was a match that went all the way down to the last over.
CSK needed 43 off the last two overs when Kohli was brought in to bowl by Daniel Vettori. Albie Morkel took him to cleaners as he smashed 28 runs in that over with three sixes and two fours. The men-in- yellow went on to chase the target as they scored 15 runs in the last over.
Remembering that knock, Morkel said that Chennai has always found a way to win matches from improbable situations.”Look, that’s one of those evenings… once again we were out of the game. RCB had the game in their bag… I had no idea why they bowled Virat. All respect to him, he shouldn’t have bowled that over anyway. We lost a wicket in the last ball of the 18th over.”
Morkel said that as he saw Virat bowling he thought if he could connect a few they can get close.
“I think I edged the 1st one for 4 that just missed my stumps and I edge another one just went over the short third man. I started hitting it straight and we eventually got 28 and ended up winning the match with Bravo hitting a couple in the next over. We somehow find ways to beat them like that. We will be out of the game completely and come from nowhere to beat them. It’s a very special game to be part of.” He said that the moment lasted just 15 minutes and it was magical to look back at it.
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He also recalled Dhoni’s knock in a must-win game against Kings XI Punjab at Dharamshala in the 2010 edition. Morkel was at the other end when Dhoni scored a match-winning half-century to take CSK to the semifinals.
“Myself and MS [Dhoni] got together, got a partnership going, got a few boundaries going. It was quite a big total. I remember… Irfan Pathan was bowling the last over. I remember MS hit the second-last ball out of the stadium and we won the game. We went into the finals and we won that year.”
Morkel said that he learnt how to play calmly in pressure situations by playing with Dhoni. “To play with a guy like MS not only his leadership, the way he approaches when he plays, it’s well documented, how calm he stays. That’s what I learnt by batting with him. Most of the way I sort of played later in my career is play as calmly as possible,” he said
