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Indian cricket team stars often have to pay a heavy price for their popularity. Just like they are adored by fans after a good performance, a bad show often sees them getting trolled. What's worse is that the attack is not limited to just the player as often his or her family members also get dragged in between. The same happened after Virat Kohli had a forgettable Tour of Australia. In the 2024-25 Border Gavaskar Trophy, Virat Kohli scored 190 runs in nine innings at an average of 23.75. His faltering show in the top order was seen by many experts as a reason behind India's 1-3 loss.
After the performance, while Kohli got criticised, quite a few social media users dragged his wife and actor Anushka Sharma's name too. Former India opener Navjot Singh Sidhu was critical of those fans. He also urged Kohli to keep his head down and focus on performance.
"You know, someone's bad form has come, for two months. You can't delete it. The services he's been performing for so long, I know that you cannot rest on your laurels. You have to refresh them with new ones. But you have to give allowance. Mark Taylor kept failing for one and a half years. Persistent. Azharuddin kept failing. Ganguly failed eight innings. And he said, I can fail in 8 innings, but it takes just one innings for me to come back," said Sidhu on Sports Tak.
"Six months ago, you both won the World Cup. Right? And now, all the cricket is one-day cricket. Rohit Sharma won the World Cup. Virat Kohli won the World Cup. You will only have faith in both of them. And the rest... Tell me. The other five were the top players who played Kookaburra Red Ball. Right? Who showed consistency? It's a team game. Blaming is the easiest thing. It's easy to hit stones. But some people make their homes from the stones that the world hits."
Sidhu also criticised the people who were bringing in the cricketers' family to troll the stars.
"These are such people. This is not the first time that Virat Kohli has been in crisis. This is not the first time that his wife is dragged in between. Right? This is wrong. We must learn to respect our heroes. Have some patience. And, I mean, you will understand. Look, the darker the night, the brighter the star. So I think that these were three eras. And in these eras too, everyone had a bad time," Sidhu said.