Srinagar: Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma announced their retirements from T20Is following India’s seven-run victory against South Africa in the final of the 2024 Men’s T20 World Cup.
Kohli announced it after he was awarded the Player of the Match for his 59-ball 76 in his last T20I which helped India lift its second World T20 title while Rohit Sharma confirmed his decision in the press conference afterwards.
“This was my last [T20I] game as well. No better time to say goodbye to this format. I’ve loved every moment of this. I started my India career playing this format. This is what I wanted, I wanted to win the cup,” said Rohit Sharma. “I wanted this badly. Very hard to put in words. It was a very emotional moment for me. I was very desperate for this title in my life. Happy that we eventually crossed the line.”
Rohit, who made his T20I debut in the inaugural T20 World Cup, against England in Durban in 2007, played 159 matches for India, scoring 4231 runs to end his career as the highest run-getter in the format for his country. He scored five hundreds, including a career-best 121 not out against Afghanistan earlier this year, to go with his 32 half-centuries. He also ended his career as the most successful T20I captain, with 50 wins (including Super Over/bowl-out victories), two more than Pakistan’s Babar Azam.
Earlier, speaking to the official broadcaster after winning the player of the match award, Kohli said: “This was my last T20 World Cup, this is exactly what we wanted to achieve. One day you feel like you can’t get a run and this happens, God is great. Just the occasion, now or never kind of situation. This was my last T20 game playing for India. We wanted to lift that cup.
“Yes I have [announced my retirement from T20Is], this was an open secret. It was not something that I wasn’t going to announce even if we had lost. It’s time for the next generation to take the T20 game forward. It’s been a long wait for us, waiting to win an ICC tournament. You look at someone like Rohit [Sharma], he’s played nine T20 World Cups and this is my sixth. He deserves it.”
Kohli, who made his T20I debut in June 2010, featured in 125 games for India in the format and scored 4188 runs, which included one century and 38 half-centuries. He won two Player of the Tournament awards in the T20 World Cups of 2014 and 2016. Kohli finished as the second-highest run-getter in T20Is, behind Rohit Sharma. (Cricbuzz)
