Virat Kohli played an instrumental innings of 76 runs off just 59 balls which helped India to a respectable total of 176 runs in the course of 20 overs. India got off to a flying start scoring 23 runs in just 1.3 overs but two successive wickets of skipper Rohit(9) and Rishabh Pant(0) put India on backfoot and SuryaKumar Yadav just scored 3 runs as India were tumbling at 34/3 at one stage in 4.3 overs.
Virat Kohli put value for his wicket and stitched two crucial partnership with Axar Patel and Shivam Dube to take India’s total forward. The former India skipper was failing to time the ball before his half century but the flow of runs started after reaching a well made half ton off 48 balls. He was eventually declared the man of the match for his well made 76 runs which proved the difference as India finally won an ICC trophy after 2013 champions trophy heroics. India restricted South Africa for 169 runs to win the T20 world cup 2024 by 7 runs and they snatched the win from the jaws of defeat when at one stage Heinrich Klaasen was thrashing the Indian bowlers to all corners of the stadium.
Virat Kohli announces his retirement
Virat Kohli announced his retirement after getting adjudged the man of the match for his heroic innings of 76 runs in the world cup final.
“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. Wanted to Yes I have, this was an open secret.
“Not something that I wasn’t going to announce even if we had lost. 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, he’s played 9 T20 World Cups and this is my sixth. He deserves it,” Kohli said in the post-match chat.
Kohli finished his T20I career as the highest run-scorer in T20 World Cups (1292) and the second-highest T20I run-getter (4188), only behind his teammate and captain Rohit Sharma.