“Superstar culture is gone. What a relief.”
“Told you guys during Border Gavskar Trophy that this was his last Test series.”
“The selectors must have told him your time is up.”
“Finally the Ajit Agarkar-Rohit Sharma-Virat Kohli holy trinity is broken. Test cricket is in safe hands.”
The whole cricketing world was in a state of shock and disbelief yesterday when Virat Kohli decided to retire from red-ball cricket, the format he considered the purest and the finest. My colleagues at Revsportz Bangla, Rohan, Rahul, Debasish Sen got into a huddle quickly and went live on the YouTube channel. Me and my colleague Trisha joined a couple of minutes later only to be stunned by these comments. On a day when the nation should have felt proud of their poster boy, they decided to let him down. And everything, of course, came down to social media.
What exactly happened on social media? Not only in our lives, I went and studied multiple posts and their comments’ section regarding Virat Kohli’s retirement from Test cricket. Social media had conjured a startling parallel narrative in a parallel universe and people were gobbling it up. Much like what we had seen when India-Pakistan tensions were going on a few days back. Narratives such as the current head coach of Indian team Gautam Gambhir had forced Kohli out, Kohli should have hung up his boots long back, India finally getting rid of the superstar culture and an overseas walking wicket were being dished out and people kept lapping them up.
What have we become? Gossip peddlers? Social media bullies and abusers? Ungrateful, fickle-minded fans? Or have we completely become uneducated all of a sudden? Are we proud and happy to live in this bubble? Here is one of the greatest Test cricketers calling it a day and look at us. Tributes are pouring in from all across the world ranging from former British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to former Australian captain Greg Chappell and here, we just went on a social media spree to satisfy parallel narratives.
EXCLUSIVE
Less than six months after @ashwinravi99 brought the curtain down on his Test career, @imVkohli has followed suit. Ashwin assesses his teammate’s career, and talks of how ‘the Test fuel’ and ‘energy’ will be missed.@BoriaMajumdar✍️#ViratKohlihttps://t.co/wWzyhx7PjM— RevSportz Global (@RevSportzGlobal) May 13, 2025
Shock, disbelief, agony and anger crippled my mind when I finally decided I had enough social media for the day. My mind kept wandering, though. I remembered the time when a video was made of Kohli’s hotel room and released on social media without Kohli having a clue, when Kohli had to ask one of the Australian reporters at one of the Australian airports to stop photographing his daughter without his permission.
And not only the Aussie journalists, even now he has to ask the Indian photographers not to click his daughter’s photos. Little does he know that in this world of social media likes, shares and comments, personal life and private moments are myths.
We, the so-called ‘Indian cricket fans’ have two extremes. One, we just put the player up on a pedestal and start worshipping or two, we simply throw them into the gutter and forget about them.
There is always a mid path. The path which is the hardest, the path which the players, coaches and the selectors walk on. Can’t we appreciate the fact that Virat Kohli played Test cricket for India? Can’t we acknowledge the fact that he was our greatest overseas Test batter and captain of the decade by quite some distance? Don’t we feel humbled and privileged to have witnessed the Adelaide, Centurion, Edgbaston masterclasses? Don’t we get goosebumps when we hear ‘for sixty overs they should feel like hell out there?’ Shouldn’t we, for once, pause, think and maybe, maybe doff our hat once to one of Test cricket’s greatest ambassadors? And what is this ‘getting rid of superstar culture and all?’
Unlike the great he succeeded, Virat Kohli isn’t leaving behind much promise in India’s middle order. He shouldered the burden post-Tendulkar. Now, there’s hardly anyone in sight.@atreyom writes #ViratKohli #TestRetirementhttps://t.co/aGDtEJvRcV
— RevSportz Global (@RevSportzGlobal) May 12, 2025
Kohli has displayed batting and leadership of the highest calibre for years and in turn, people have looked up to him. It is the same for movies and cricket. Personalities like Shah Rukh Khan and Virat Kohli have become “superstars” because of all the adulation and love from the masses. No personal PR can make you a crowd favourite. Performance matters and stays at the end of the day. Simple as that.
Honestly, social media is a hoax. I have said this time and again, despite gaining popularity because of the medium. Here people can say anything to anybody at any time and get away with it. The underlying causes of these are way deeper and need to be researched and studied further. And fact of the matter is, none of the players care about social media perceptions.
Their job is to go out on the field and represent their countries to the best of their abilities. Kohli has done it for years and years, raising the bar of excellence and perfection for himself and his team. All these trolls and abuses had only egged him on for so many years. Now maybe, he will take a break from all of these and read Greg Chappell’s tribute to him which outweighs all these bullies and abuses fair and square –‘He was polarising, yes. But so is every revolutionary.’
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