Kohli hails the team, calls the victory "best by far"

Virat Kohli praised the performance of his team and said that this series victory has been the most satisfying in his two-years of captaincy so far.

Kohli said he was pleased by the way team fought back from pressure situations.

Over the last eighteen months, Virat Kohli’s India has beaten Sri Lanka in Sri Lanka, decimated South Africa at home, mauled West Indies in the Caribbean, whitewashed New Zealand at home and now have attained unassailable lead versus England in a rare five-match series for India. For Kohli, the captain, the victory against England is the “best by far” in his two-year captaincy stint so far.

“Out of the five that we’ve won, this is the best by far,” Kohli said, soon after leading India to a victory lap at the Wankhede Stadium following a victory by an innings and 36 runs. “Because of the quality of the opposition, and the kind of cricket that we’ve played as well. We’re very proud of that, and for me as a captain, this is definitely on top.”

The 3-0 scoreline leading into the final Test in Chennai may suggest India has had it easy in the series. However, Kohli and Co. had to survive the last session to draw the opener in Rajkot and were put under pressure in Mohali and Mumbai. Kohli stressed on his team’s ability to gape out of a hole frequently.

“I don’t think it’s been easy. We have been put under pressure many times. I would give my team a lot of credit for bouncing back from those tough situations. We haven’t got anything on the platter,” he said.

“We have had to work hard for it; and it’s been a result of constant pressure that we have forced the opposition to make mistakes. With the bat as well have shown really good character to come back into the game, showing enough patience, more than the opposition, so I would credit my team than calling it an easy series. No series win is easy, especially not this one, we know England is a quality Test side and we knew that they will try to bounce back.

“Even in this game after being 2-0 down, they put 400 runs in the first innings. this is not a team that will throw in the towel. They will fight, and we saw another example of it. We were tested but we came out on top. This is what test cricket is all about. If you are a champion team, you have to play like a champion team to win series and that’s what we did.”

While Kohli revelled in his team’s success, his England counterpart Alastair Cook rued “missed opportunities”. “We missed three good chances to take wickets and they made us pay. That is credit to India. Most teams who scores runs give chances at some stage and it is about a side being good enough to take them. Missing Kohli, missing (Murali) Vijay and (Jayant) Yadav cost us dearly,” he said.

“It is just frustrating. To beat India in these conditions, you have to play the perfect game and we haven’t managed to do that. If you have to take 14 wickets against these batters in these conditions it puts you behind a bit.”