Most Selfish IPL Innings Ever | Kohli, KL Rahul & Manish Pandey Controversial Knocks
Cricket is a team game. No matter how big a player is, playing for personal milestones can never take a team to victory. Recently, even Gautam Gambhir emphasized that a batter should always play according to the team's needs rather than chasing personal records.
The same principle applies in the Indian Premier League. In modern T20 cricket, if the team needs boundaries, the batter must go for boundaries instead of slowing the game down just to reach a personal fifty or hundred.
However, IPL history has witnessed several controversial innings where even superstar players played knocks that ultimately hurt their own team. In this video, we analyze three such debated innings where individual milestones became bigger talking points than team success.
The first case is the controversial century by Virat Kohli on 6 April 2024 at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium. On paper, his unbeaten 113 off 72 balls looks like a brilliant innings. But it turned out to be one of the slowest centuries in IPL history, taking 67 balls to reach the milestone. In an era where 200+ scores are common and the Impact Player rule has made the game even faster, this innings sparked a massive debate among fans and analysts.
Despite a 125-run opening partnership with Faf du Plessis, Kohli consumed 72 of the team’s 120 deliveries and RCB managed only 183/3. Critics argued that the innings slowed down dramatically during the middle and death overs, leaving power hitters like Glenn Maxwell and Dinesh Karthik with too little time to accelerate. When Rajasthan Royals chased the target comfortably with Jos Buttler’s century, the debate around the innings became even stronger.
The second example comes from the IPL 2022 Eliminator between Lucknow Super Giants and Royal Challengers Bangalore. KL Rahul scored 79 runs off 58 balls while chasing a massive target of 208. While the innings looked decent statistically, the strike rate and lack of acceleration in the middle overs created huge pressure on the team.
During overs 7 to 13, Rahul scored only 22 runs from 25 balls with just one boundary. As the required run rate climbed rapidly, the chase slipped away from Lucknow’s hands. Former India coach Ravi Shastri openly criticized the approach, stating that Rahul needed to attack earlier rather than waiting for the death overs.
The third example is Manish Pandey’s innings against Royal Challengers Bangalore on 14 April 2021 at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai. Sunrisers Hyderabad were chasing a modest target of 150 and were comfortably placed at 96/2.
David Warner had already scored a quick 54 off 37 balls and the match seemed under control. However, Manish Pandey’s slow knock of 38 runs from 39 balls created immense pressure on the team. With a strike rate below 100, the innings completely stalled the chase and SRH eventually lost the match by 6 runs.
Former players like Ashish Nehra and Parthiv Patel heavily criticized the approach, pointing out that modern T20 cricket requires adaptability and aggressive intent, especially during crucial moments.
These three innings sparked major debates among cricket fans and experts about the balance between individual milestones and team success in T20 cricket.
Do you think these innings were selfish or simply misunderstood match situations?
Share your opinion in the comments.
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