Virat Kohli takes a dig at media again, 'we don't play for headlines'

India skipper Virat Kohli has never shied away from hitting out at media for what he considers unfair criticism. In the latest chapter of his bitter-sweet relationship with the Indian media, Virat Kohli brushed aside praise as deftly as he has deflected criticism in the past.

Kohli had received a lot of criticism during the Test series as India lost the first two Tests before coming back to win the final Test and now the ODI series. 

On Friday, when a journalist asked Kohli to analyse his 35th ODI century because according to him "you do this so often that we (journalists) run out of words sometimes" the India captain was ready with a reply. 

Kohli responded, “Look, I am not going to give in to this. I know for a fact that 90% of the people did not give us a chance after the two Tests. I was sitting in the same room giving a press conference. So we understand where we have come from."

"I am not going to live in a dreamland right now and accept all the praise and sit here and feel good about this, because it does not matter to me, honestly it doesn’t. It didn’t matter when we were 2-0 down and it doesn’t matter when we are 5-1 up because what matters is the change room."

It was a sense of deja vu for the skipper, who had a slight altercation with the media at this very venue after the team lost the Test series.

When asked if the ODI series win was his biggest victory on foreign soil, Kohli replied with unmistakble sarcasm, “It is something you people can tell because till a month back we were a very bad team. Now such questions are being asked. We have not changed our mindset, we were focussing only on our cricket and I don’t want to flow in this – whether this is the biggest win or not. Our job is to play, work hard and perform, try to win every match." 

India captain is not in a mood to "compete with anyone" for any specific "tag" such as the best batsman in world cricket.

“Whether this is the biggest win or not, whoever is going to analyse and write, he will. For us as a team, there is only one motive – give 120% effort, work hard in practice and on every day of the tour keep our mindset good and keep our preparation at a level where we can win. And that is what we have achieved in this series and we are very happy about it. Our jobs is not (to) get any tags or create headlines, our job is to play cricket and that is what we have done perfectly in this series.”

Kohli was again at the forefront scoring a staggering 558 runs (including three hundreds) in his team's 5-1 ODI series win against South Africa but made it clear that he has never ever played cricket to be a "headline grabber".

"At this stage, I don't feel like competing with anyone. It's all about how I prepare before the game and what my work ethics are and how I am feeling on game day. My only motivation is to get into that frame of mind. I am not competing with anyone at all," Kohli said at the post-match press conference.

Asked if he can now be termed as the best batsman in world cricket, the straight-talking skipper said: "As I said, I don't want any tags. I don't want any headlines. I just go out there and do my job, it is up to the people to write what they write, I don't want to be called anything.

"It's my job, I am supposed to do what I am doing and I am not doing anyone a favour, so just want to be in this zone of working as hard as I can and trying to do the best for the team," the skipper added in a matter-of-fact manner.

The skipper again sounded a bit irritated when asked about South Africa being laid low by injuries to senior players.

"Whether the team was what it was supposed to be was not in our hands. It's none of our concern. We want to take the best team as far as we can on the field and have the best mindset to perform on every given day that we represent our country. That remains our mind set regardless of what happens."