On a day when batting maestro Virat Kohli made a blockbuster return to the limited-overs domestic cricket with a century, playing for Delhi against Andhra during the opening round of the Vijay Hazare Trophy 2025-26 match on Wednesday in Bengaluru, former cricketers Harbhajan Singh, Tom Moody and AB de Villiers looked back at Kohli’s stint as a captain of the Indian national team.
Former Australian cricketer Tom Moody stated that Kohli’s captaincy tenure began with high expectations, but the results were rather underwhelming.
“The Virat Kohli era was an era of high expectation, but ultimately, disappointment,” Moody, who was also the head coach when Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) defeated Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) to win the IPL in 2016, said on JioHotstar’s Rise of Champions.
Veteran Indian spinner Harbhajan Singh said that Team India could have won three to four ICC trophies, but underachieved under Virat Kohli.
“The kind of team Virat had, they could have won three or four trophies. Nahi jeete kuch to karan honge, but I still feel like unke paas acchi team thi (if they did not win, there must have been reasons, but I still think they had a strong team),” said Harbhajan.
Kohli took charge as India’s Test captain in December 2014 against Australia Down Under before becoming the all-format skipper in January 2017. He eventually stepped down as T20I skipper after the 2021 T20 World Cup before being removed from ODI captaincy. On January 15, 2022, Kohli relinquished Test captaincy.
India lost the finals of the 2017 Champions Trophy and the 2021 World Test Championship while enduring a gut-wrenching loss in the semifinals of the 2019 ODI World Cup against New Zealand, all under Kohli.
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Among these criticisms, former South African skipper AB de Villiers has come to Kohl’s aide, defending his former Royal Challengers Bangalore teammate.
“Frankly, it irritates me that people always judge a captain solely on whether they have won a World Cup. Saying ‘that guy is useless because he has not won a World Cup’ is unfair,” said de Villiers.
