Virat Kohli failed to continue the momentum of his century in Perth as he was bowled out cheaply in the first innings of the second Border-Gavaskar Trophy Test match in Adelaide. Kohli was unsure whether to defend or go and ultimately failed to do both as he got ahead of Mitchell Starc and Steven Smith finished the game on the spot.

It also recalled his dismissal in the first innings of the Perth Test and reminded Indian fans of his recent difficulties tracking deliveries outside the off-stump. Although he didn’t play an expansive shot on this occasion, he did fish a bit with a wider shot and paid the price.

Former Indian cricketer and pundit Sanjay Manjrekar was not happy with Kohli falling for such a performance once again and brought up that this was a recurring theme in the latter part of Kohli’s career and that the star Indian batsman failed to make it have to fight against it.

Manjrekar wrote in his post on “But more importantly is his determination not to try any other way to address the problem.”

Kohli played a good cover drive in his short innings and while these drives are one of his strengths, they also proved to be his downfall at times. Manjrekar had also previously commented on Kohli’s newfound struggle against shorter length deliveries, pointing to an early front-foot press that had left him out of shape when dealing with deliveries coming his way.

India are in trouble after losing 4 runs for 16 runs

Kohli’s dismissal came in the middle of a pre-tea period in which Australia won 3-12 in just 4 overs, leading to a top-order collapse as KL Rahul, Kohli and Shubman Gill fell in quick succession after Yashasvi Jaiswal was caught at first ball of the game against Starc in the preliminary game.

Rohit Sharma ended up further down the order but was also caught lbw, this time by Scott Boland, to leave India on 87-5, having previously been in a strong position at 69-1. India’s lower middle order will now look to rebuild and salvage the innings in what are probably the best batting conditions at the start of the Test.