Thread by @BishOnTheRockx

[THREAD]

I found Kohli's second guessing skill quite fascinating in the 29th over of the IND vs PAK match.
It's about how he brings his bat-tap into his game and abandons it within this over.
Might delete the thread later as it might create copyright issues. So here it is:

1/

So, Shaheen has got mid-on and mid-off up in the ring. And he is bowling from around the wicket. I was going through this recent piece by Danyal Rasool on Shaheen for Cricinfo and it does talk about Shaheen bowling from this angle once the swing dissipates.

2/

See, how it talks about bringing stumps into play more ?So with mid-off and mid-on up here's a chance to take a calculated risk and chip it straight down the ground ? It's as if Kohli could read the length even before it's bowled and he dances down the track with a bat-tap.

3/

Shaheen tries one more time on the 2nd ball from around the wicket. Again it's predictably full. But another dancing down the track might be one shot too many for Kohli. But observe how he doesn't abandon the bat-tap for this length. It's still there.

4/

Now, Shaheen has to react to this situation. Because this isn't working. So he shifted to over the wicket. Now Kohli's realizes no way this is gonna be full. He could read what's coming. Now you see the bat-tap is abandoned for 3rd ball. He doesn't need it for that length.

5/

5th ball, Shaheen is back to around the wicket. Steyn doing commentary could guess it's going to be short. Kohli sticks with his bat-tap theory for this one too. It's banged in but Kohli doesn't need to not rush for this because even though it's short, it's actually pace-off.

6/

Here's the cutter's grip. The speed also dropped to mid 120's

7/

Now that pace-off shorter length didn't work either may be it's time for fuller length and pace-on again? Kohli reads it. A charge is a safe and aggressive option. Kohli charges. And so remains the bat-tap for this around the wicket ball.

END/

PS: I often write threads on cricket (mostly based on my observations). All the threads that I have written on this platform are under my pinned tweet. If you have loved reading 'em, may be you can share my posts/follow me and help this account on cricket twitter to grow. Thanks.

correction on 6th post: Kohli doesn't need to rush for this*