Former off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin thinks that despite retiring from Test and Twenty20 International forms, Virat Kohli is still able to “walk the talk” with his unparalleled enthusiasm and passion.
In the opening match of the 2026 season on Saturday, defending champions Royal Challengers Bengaluru defeated Sunrisers Hyderabad by six wickets thanks to Kohli’s 28th IPL half-century (69 not out off 38 balls), marking his return to T20 cricket for the first time since the IPL final on June 3.
“He walks the talk. It’s almost like he’s putting on a show for people to see how the game should be played, play it hard and play it the way it’s meant to be played. That stood out for me with respect to what Virat did,” Ashwin said on a JioHotstar show.
Having finished as India’s top run scorer in the January ODI series against New Zealand with scores of 93, 23, and 124, Kohli was already in superb form going into the IPL. In the last series against South Africa in December, the 37-year-old also led the rankings with 302 runs, including two hundreds.
In order to demonstrate how his energy is still exceptional despite his age and expertise, Ashwin also provided an example of his running between the wickets.
“I find him quite bizarre at this age. I tell him this during our chats now and then. He was batting on 40-odd, there was a partnership going on, and RCB were coasting. He ran through for the first single, stopped there, and the other batter hadn’t even reached halfway, but he was already looking for a second. That was a 57-metre boundary on the leg side, and it shows the enthusiasm he still brings to the game,” added Ashwin.
The top Indian off-spinner who is now a commentator also praised Jacob Duffy’s performance, which improved after a terrible showing in the just concluded T20 World Cup.
Duffy made a spectacular IPL debut for RCB, tearing through the Sunrisers Hyderabad top order with figures of 3/22, following a difficult performance in the T20 World Cup in which he conceded over 10 runs per over and managed just three wickets.
He dismissed Nitish Kumar Reddy and the dangerous opening pair of Abhishek Sharma and Travis Head, which led to an early collapse as SRH faltered early on before rallying to 201/9, a score that was below average at the Chinnaswamy.
“When Jacob Duffy was picked at the auction, I was probably the first one to say it was an amazing pick to replace Josh Hazlewood. At that time, he was the No.1 T20 bowler. He had also taken a six-wicket haul in a Test match and is right in the prime of his career.
“He has bowled a lot in New Zealand and knows exactly what he is doing. What really stood out is that he can swing the ball both ways, but he didn’t try to do that against Abhishek Sharma. The first time he bowled full to Travis Head, he got pumped down the ground, a good lesson learned. After that, he stayed away from that length and bowled very good areas.
“Tactically, RCB were superior and he executed those plans beautifully. He was probably the reason the scoring was kept in check. With around 400 runs in the day, it was still a low-scoring game by Chinnaswamy standards,” added Ashwin.
