Virat Kohli Named Male Cricketer of the Decade: 'Recognition of perseverance, hard work for 10 years'

After being named the ICC Male Cricketer and ODI Cricketer of the Decade, Virat Kohli expressed what the honours meant to him. Kohli was also named the captain of ICC's Test Team of the Decade, while he was also included in ICC's ODI Team of the Decade, which was captained by MS Dhoni.

In the time period recorded by ICC for the award, Kohli accumulated 20,396 runs, across all formats and that was the highest among all the cricketers in the world.

When asked about his best moments of the decade, Kohli picked the Cricket World Cup 2011 victory, 2013 Champions Trophy and India's Test series win in Australia during the 2018-19 tour. Kohli, however, refused to shortlist his personal knocks because that would mean he would have to rate them and he didn't want to do it.

"Firstly, it's a great honour for me to receive this award. The moments I hold closest to my heart in the last decade definitely has to be the World Cup win in 2011, the Champions Trophy win in 2013 and winning the series in Australia in 2018. Apart from that also there have been some very special games for Team India as well in the last decade and for me personally as well. I would not want to mention my personal knocks so much because then I will need to rate them, and I don't like doing that. For me, every game played for India is as important and as crucial," Kohli was quoted by bcci.tv, as saying.

In the category of ICC ODI Player of the Decade, Kohli beat a bunch of cricketers, including Dhoni, under whose captaincy Kohli had made his India debut in 2008.

"I have never strived to be better than everybody else. I have just tried to be the best version of myself. I am just glad. I am proud to receive this award because I know the number of quality players, who played in the last decade and what they bring to international cricket as well. It is not a sense of feeling superior to anyone for me. I feel like this is a recognition of perseverance and the hard work I have put in the last 10 years and will continue to do so in the future as well," Kohli added.

The Indian skipper, who has returned home paternity leave from India's ongoing Down Under tour, also acknowledged his increased responsibilities towards the Indian cricket team.

"Nothing is going to change for me from the time I came into the team and I got the opportunity to play for India. My mindset has always been the same and it will continue to be the same. Now the responsibility is way more than it used to be.

My endeavour is to always make sure that as a team, we are heading in the right direction, set the right culture, not just for this team, but for generations to come so that the standard of Indian Cricket stays high and it is maintained at the highest level. For that, you need proper commitment to play for the team, play hard for the team. You have to work on your fitness, on your skills; it has to be a proper commitment and it that's the culture I hope to instil in the younger guys coming through now and the generations to follow so that Indian Cricket stays at the top for years to come," the 32-year-old added.