India's star batter Virat Kohli is following the Board of Control for Cricket in India's (BCCI) diktat to play domestic cricket. After a long gap of over 12 years, Kohli is making a return to Ranji Trophy. There is much excitement among fans as Kohli returns to his homeground to play for Delhi against Railways. While the DDCA has allowed free entry to fans who want to watch Kohli in action, unfortunately, there is no live streaming or live telecast available.
The reason behind no broadcast is that the roster is prepared well in advance for Ranji Trophy. In the ongoing season, only one match of Delhi against Tamil Nadu was live streamed. Until and unless there are any last-minute changes given the amount of eyeballs Kohli brings to a game, the Delhi versus Railways clash will not be available for fans to watch on TV or livestream on the device of their choice.
Pant's return wasn't livestreamed either
Similarly, Rishabh Pant's return to Ranji Trophy was not televised either. Pant who registered scores of 1 and 17 against Saurashtra will not play against Services. It is yet to be learned whether Pant will join the pre-ODI series camp in Nagpur alongwith skipper Rohit Sharma, Shreyas Iyer and others.
Kohli works on his game
Kohli did not play alongside Pant in the previous match due to a neck sprain. Recently, we worked on his back foot game to explore options to score square of the wicket. He trained with former India batting coach Sanjay Bangar to fine-tune his skills after a lacklustre tour of Australia barring the century in Perth.
What happened when Kohli last played a Ranji Trophy game
Kohli's previous Ranji Trophy appearance was in Ghaziabad against Uttar Pradesh. He was yet to hit his peak but was taking giant strides. The 24-year-old who was still new to Test cricket played under the captaincy of Virender Sehwag. The team boasted of big names including current head coach Gautam Gambhir, Ashish Nehra and Ishant Sharma.
A young Kohli was dismissed by his current Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) teammate Bhuvneshwar Kumar in the first innings. He was caught by Mohammad Kaif after scoring 14 runs from 19 balls. In the second innings, Kohli got off to a good start and shared a 70-run partnership with Gambhir. He scored 43 runs from 65 balls. Once again, Bhuvneshwar dismissed him. He edged one to wicketkeeper Amir Khan. After setting a target of 155, Delhi lost the match by six wickets to Suresh Raina-led side.