Cricket’s Biggest Star Virat Kohli Desperate For Elusive Indian Premier League Title

Virat Kohli once again will line up for Royal Challengers Bengaluru (Photo by IDREES MOHAMMED/AFP ... [+] via Getty Images) AFP via Getty Images

The Indian Premier League, perhaps even the whole sport of cricket, might have a problem that is bedevilling the NBA right now. Who is its next transcendent player? The player that moves the needle, who you just have to drop everything to watch, and stirs crazy emotion from fans.

There has been a lot of discussion by the talking heads in the U.S over who - or if anyone - can take the place of LeBron James and Steph Curry, who remain the most popular and influential players in the NBA despite their advancing ages.

It’s a similar issue in cricket with Virat Kohli, cricket’s biggest star who has also featured in Forbes’ list of wealthiest athletes in the past. His every move is monitored closely and anything he says is aggregated all over the world, especially in India where he is arguably the country’s most famous figure.

He is also married to Bollywood star Anushka Sharma, with the high-profile celebrity couple treated as something like royalty by their compatriots.

Virat Kohli is a cricket legend (Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images) Getty Images

But Kohli is almost 37 years old and very much in the twilight of his legendary career despite his famed fitness. His Test career looks on the rocks after such an inept Test tour of Australia

There is no successor to Kohli’s throne right now. Basically cricket’s transcendent star has to be from mighty money-spinning India, the heartland of the British bat and ball sport these days.

Kohli took the baton seamlessly from Sachin Tendulkar, who was the first cricketer from India to become the biggest star in the world. There is an endless amount of talent in India’s team as underlined by their recent triumph in the Champions Trophy. But no one has the heft of Kohli and it’s a shadow that looms large over Indian cricket, the international game and the multi-billion IPL.

But Kohli is not done with just yet and remains the dominant figure ahead of the upcoming IPL, which effectively shuts down international cricket for the next two months with the world’s best players lured by million-dollar pay cheques.

It’s also that annual time of the year when Kohli’s credentials will be picked apart with the IPL a major sore spot for him. Kohli is probably the IPL’s greatest ever batter and his 2016 season is the GOAT, when he batted at a godly level that has never been matched before in T20 cricket.

Virat Kohli holds up the Champions Trophy (Photo by Alex Davidson-ICC/ICC via Getty Images) ICC via Getty Images

But he somehow has never won an IPL title having gone to the well since 2008 and coming up continually short. He has played his entire career with Royal Challengers Bengaluru, who are the glamour franchise in the IPL something like the Lakers and Yankees in America. The drought is a source of mockery towards RCB, with opposition fans unmerciful in their scorn towards them and particularly Kohli.

Indian cricket fans might fanatically follow their team - they even resort to bizarre measures to overcome their team’s secret training sessions - but make no mistake the IPL has become the No.1 obsession in the world’s most populous country. It’s overtaken all forms of international cricket, with interest magnified due to fantasy gaming and betting.

And no player will continue to be scrutinized quite like Kohli, who maybe isn’t the same force of nature he once was but - like James and Curry - he can take over big moments as he showed in the Champions Trophy.

Once again, as one suspects will continue to be the case until he retires, Virat Kohli will suck a lot of the oxygen out of cricket’s biggest annual tournament.

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