At Eden, a Virat Kohli moment before the commotion

Virat Kohli didn’t simply lose a match when he last appeared at Eden Gardens. He became agitated. Harshit Rana’s high full toss, a return catch, a heated argument with the umpires about the height of that delivery, and ultimately a dissenting sanction. The season appeared to be nearing its end at the midway point when Royal Challengers Bengaluru lost by one run, their sixth straight loss.

The scene at Eden felt familiar, nearly a year after that night and two days before the IPL 2025 season began. But the energy was very different. The man in the centre was not quite reached by the confusion of two squads training on either side of the Eden Gardens. Although he was present, Kohli wasn’t really giving it his all in the nets. He wasn’t even the typical centre of attention for all things funny. Rather, he sat by himself, cross-legged, with his kit bag, and ran his hands over a pair of bats that weren’t sponsored.

He was working on a more subdued project in preparation for a busy season. Selecting the appropriate bat, using it to knock the ball around, and assessing your balance. He taped the bottom, peeled and applied a new MRF label on the bat he liked better than the other, then gave it a few light taps in the outfield to test it out. A ball is now bounced on it by him. The cheers from the few hundreds get louder as the ball rises. He then approaches the nets.

Something didn’t feel right when he had to make his first delivery. Not with his new bat, but with something that’s coming up. In order to face the gathering of children who were applauding him, he changed ends and walked to the opposite side of the practice pitch. A pair of consecutive smashes that would have been PowerPlay boundaries over mid-off were given to them by Virat Kohli. It was like a match night at Eden when he smacked them.

Virat Kohli moment stood out amid raindrops, hectic practice sessions and opening ceremony preparations.

At a location where he was on par with Sachin Tendulkar, it was just a youngster and his bat, sifting through the clamour and taking it all in beneath the floodlights.

It was a moving image. An individual who is no longer a T20 international player. who is no longer the captain of the RCB. He still holds his own in a league that has only become louder and younger. Kohli remains relevant and plays a key role in his team’s season in a sport that rarely allows players to mature gracefully. He still obsesses over the smallest details, like whether a piece of cellotape is sticking out from the toe end of his bat or how the sticker is positioned on it.

RCB will be hoping that the new bat will help him perform as well as he did the previous season, when he won the Orange Cap and the team pulled off an incredible comeback because to his better game against spin. With Kohli’s strike-rate against spin increasing by around 15 points from the first half of the season, they went from having a 1-7 record to qualifying for the playoffs. Throughout the rest of the season, he effectively employed the slog sweep, a shot he had long shunned.

Perhaps the most comprehensive analysis of that evolution starts this year. Over the last three seasons, KKR, the side he plays against in the season opener, has bowled the most spin in the IPL (47.1%). That figure is frequently even greater at Eden, even on a flat pitch. In addition to being good spinners, Sunil Narine and Varun Chakaravarthy are one of the few players who have managed to compete in a format that is getting increasingly difficult for their kind. And they’ve done it at a place that used to be slow and low but is now anything but.

Since 2023, Chakaravarthy has claimed the most IPL wickets. Previously a bowler who mostly used side spin, he now uses over-spin and enters the season fresh off of impressive Champions Trophy results. Meanwhile, Narine has changed from being a mystery spinner to someone else. The atmosphere has subsided, the action has changed, and bowling may no longer be his main responsibility for the team. He yet manages to have an influence.

Therefore, it will be a test of relevance for Virat Kohli as much as it will be a test of his ability to play spin creatively. Unfortunately, that’s the way things work at age 36. The league has evolved. The value of strike rotation has been diminished. Younger hitters are persevering because they were raised in the IPL system. Nevertheless, he is still developing today. Although he is no longer part of India’s T20 plans, he still finds ways to help. Although he hasn’t led RCB in a few years, he was close to Faf du Plessis and will undoubtedly mentor the new captain, Rajat Patidar, in his own unique manner.

This explains why it’s so wonderful to see Virat Kohli just be at RCB. Not in a nostalgic sense. Not because he wants to leave a legacy. But because he provides a calm comfort of consistency. The league is constantly changing: there are now 10 clubs, the uniforms are changed annually, there are up to five new captains this season, and there are new regulations, but Virat Kohli is still there. As usual, he was familiar, concentrated, and slipping into a new season.

Perhaps reinvention isn’t the reason for his continuous presence. Not to salvation. Perhaps it’s love, the quiet sort that lurks in little rituals: a recently applied sticker, a perfectly smoothed piece of tape, the calm that somehow creates sound exclusively for him.

He appeared prepared at Eden. Not to blow up as he did at Eden. But to start over.