DUBAI: Former Indian captain and top-ranked batter Virat Kohli opened up on his mental issues and revealed that he did not touch his bat for a month for the first time in 10 years.
Virat, who is going through a rough patch in his career, made a shocking revelation regarding his mental conditions and asserted that he did not touch his bat for a month after being rested for the West Indies and Zimbabwe tour.
The right-handed batter, who previously ruled the rankings across all formats, has only one fifty-plus score in his last 22 innings including Indian Premier League (IPL) and international cricket and has spent more than a thousand days without scoring an international century.
Famous for his aggression on the field, the former Indian captain also revealed and acknowledged that he was faking his intensity in the game.
“For the first time in 10 years, I didn’t touch my bat for a month. I came to [the] realisation that I was trying to fake my intensity a bit recently. I was convincing myself that no, you had the intensity. But your body was telling you to stop. The mind was telling me to take a break and step back,” Virat shared in a video posted by Star Sports.
“I’m looked at as a guy who is mentally very strong and I am. But everyone has a limit and you need to recognize that limit, otherwise, things can get unhealthy for you.
“This period taught me a lot of things that I wasn’t allowing to come to surface. When they eventually came up, I embraced it.”
It's @imVkohli like you've never seen him before as he opens up to his fans in a special episode of Virat: Heart To Heart.
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— Star Sports (@StarSportsIndia) August 27, 2022
The star Indian batter also revealed that he felt ‘mentally down’ and further opined about the taboo surrounding mental health.
“I’m not shy to admit that I was feeling mentally down. This is a very normal thing to feel, but we don’t speak because we are hesitant. We don’t want to be looked at as mentally weak. Trust me, faking to be strong is far worse than admitting to be weak,” Virat concluded.
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