ABU DHABI, Sep 21: Virat Kohli’s decision to quit Royal Challengers Bangalore captaincy after the ongoing season had no impact on the team’s performance against Kolkata Knight Riders, asserted head coach Mike Hesson.
RCB were handed a nine-wicket loss by by KKR, a day after skipper Kohli announced he will step down as captain of the IPL team at the end of the ongoing season.
Hesson believes it was important to make the announcement as early as possible.
“No, I (don’t) think so. It was actually important to get any form of distraction out of the way early. So, we sort of talked about making that announcement as soon as possible really, so all the players were aware of it,” Hesson said at the post-match press conference.
“But it really hasn’t had any impact on today’s performance. We weren’t certainly sharp as we needed to be with the bat, we didn’t adapt to conditions, we lost wickets in clubs, everything we can’t do as a batting group.
“But I’m still confident of this group, we will turn around pretty quickly,” added Hesson. Kohli’s RCB announcement had come two days after he decided to quit national T20 captaincy following next month’s World Cup.
Hesson lamented that the batsmen were not as sharp as they needed to be but refused to blame the team’s composition for the loss.
Hesson said they did not want to risk AB de Villiers by handing him wicket-keeping duties and thus had to make changes to the playing XI. (PTI)
