When Virat Kohli gave his all, but India still lost a home T20 World Cup

A dejected Virat Kohli after India's T20 World Cup 2016 defeat [Source: @luckydemon_18/x]

There are instances in a tournament when one player carries the campaign almost on his own, yet the ending goes the wrong way for his team. In cricket, you call it a near-solo act albeit in a losing cause.

That narrative found its sharpest expression when modern-day batting behemoth Virat Kohli carried the burden deep into India’s 2016 T20 World Cup campaign at home a decade ago. 

While Kohli concluded his T20I career on a jubilant note by winning the 2024 edition in the Caribbean, the sting of the 2016 semifinal defeat lingered for a long time, considering the generational run he produced across all formats that year.

2016 – When Virat Kohli enjoyed a generational run

The year 2016 is widely regarded as the defining peak of Virat Kohli’s batting prime. With 2,595 runs in just 41 innings across all formats in the year, the legendary Indian batter averaged a staggering 86.50, marking a remarkably higher average than the year’s second leading run-maker Joe Root (2,570 runs at 50.39).

Out of his 2,595-run tally, Virat Kohli minted 1,215 of those runs in just 18 Test innings at an average of 75.93. He even converted three of his four centuries of the year into match-winning double hundreds. In ODIs, the cricketer held the highest batting average, that of 92.37 by hammering down 739 runs in just 10 innings with three tons and four fifties.

And yet, it was the T20 domain where Virat Kohli excelled the most in 2016. In the year’s two high-profile T20 tournaments, namely the 2016 T20 World Cup and the IPL 2016 season, both in India, the quintessential run-machine fetched ‘Player of the Tournament’ award in each event by finishing at the top of their run-scoring charts.

Another striking similarity across both T20 events, however, was the abrupt ending for Virat Kohli’s teams, as both Team India and the RCB had their dominant campaigns stalled at the knockout stage.

When Team India let prime Virat Kohli down

Virat Kohli started out with a fighting 23-run knock in India’s shock 47-run defeat to New Zealand in Nagpur. He followed it up with an electrifying 55* from 37 balls in a blockbuster Pakistan clash at the Eden Gardens, where he stepped into the crease at a precarious 14-1, soon to be 23-3 in an 18-overs chase of 119.

After sustaining a rare failure against Bangladesh with a run-a-ball 24, Virat Kohli tapped into “God Mode” with a T20 World Cup innings for the ages, smacking serial-trophy winners Australia across all corners of the PCA Stadium in Mohali. 

Chasing 160 in a must-win game, the prolific right-hander smeared 82* from 51 balls with nine fours and two sixes, which included a late surge against James Faulkner in the slog overs.

However, India and Virat Kohli’s day of reckoning arrived on March 31, 2016 in the second semifinal of the tournament against West Indies at the Wankhede Stadium. Asked to bat first, Team India accrued a challenging 192-2 in 20 overs, with Kohli himself top-scoring through his brisk 47-ball 89*.

West Indies responded strongly, with opener Johnson Charles and middle-order batter Lendl Simmons both finding rhythm at the crease despite losing Chris Gayle and Marlon Samuels early. At a time when Team India desperately needed a wicket, it was none other than Virat Kohli who fetched the prized scalp of a well-set Charles off his first ball of the tournament.

Nonetheless, his teammates failed to contain West Indies rampage, as Kohli himself saw Andre Russell blast a huge six off his own bowling to steer the 2012 winners into yet another T20 World Cup final.

India’s all-format great would eventually be named ‘Player of the Tournament’, but it was an honour he would have exchanged without hesitation for a different outcome for his nation.