Virat Kohli denies any rift in the team

Amidst speculations and reports almost confirming that skipper Virat Kohli and coach Anil Kumble stand at a sword’s the man who has been termed the culprit for creating a rift Kohli has stated that there is no problem whatsoever and shot it down just as speculation by the media.

The Indian team takes on Pakistan in their opening encounter of Champions Trophy 2017 where they are defending their title. But before the on-field performance could garner them any attention the cricketing universe has been fed with a lot of unconfirmed information about the problems between the senior members of the team and the coach.

“There are no issues whatsoever team is totally focused on the Champions Trophy and I don’t even know, people try to tell me about this but I don’t even want to know anything of this sort because in a tournament that is in focus so much and it is at such a big stage lot of people like to find rumours especially before the start,” Virat said in the pre-match press conference answering questions from the journalists about the reported power tussle in the team.

“They are doing their job, they are trying to create some nice livelihood and that’s all we can say. We are focused on our livelihood which is on the field and that’s all that we want to focus on. Unless someone is a part of something they should not sit at a distance and speculate, give judgments on what’s happening,” he stated.

Once he denied it, he was asked how he handles such a situation where the entire focus has been on internal matters of the team than the cricket ahead of such a crucial game. “How to handle this? Don’t have to handle it if I don’t think about it. Not thinking about this controversy,” the Indian skipper who will make his Champions Trophy captaincy debut said.

Experience with Kumble as coach

He also added that it has been a pleasant experience for him working with the former Indian captain and the bowling great Anil Kumble as the coach for the last one year. Virat also added that the process for the appointment of the new coach has been initiated and he isn’t the right person to comment about it.

“It’s been really good. The journey in the last one year has been good,” he said.

Speculators have no courage

Kohli also expressly stated that he doesn’t deny disagreements but that is a very normal case and happens even in the family and till the decisions made are in the favour of the team it doesn’t bother him. “Disagreement are pretty normal. The problem is that people lack patience and they talk about things without having any knowledge about it. But the worst part is that if what they say comes out to be wrong, they don’t have the courage to own it up. A lot of people write when they have no idea about the situation.”

“Even at our homes, we don’t agree with all the things but that doesn’t mean there is a problem in the family,” Virat said.