Indian cricket team captain Virat Kohli was in a completely different ‘avatar’ while addressing the media ahead of the second Test against Sri Lanka. Kohli, who is undoubtedly aggressive by nature on field, brought some of it to to the presser today and slammed Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) by saying that cramped schedule left him with no choice but to seek bouncy tracks in the ongoing series against Sri Lanka to be ready for the challenge ahead. A lot of people may not agree with Kohli or his decision to rant against BCCI in public but the truth is that someone had to speak about it. Moreover, it makes a lot of sense.

After the Indian Premier League got over, the Indian cricket team flew to West Indies for a 17-day tour between June 23 and July 9. Between July 21 and September 6, India was in Sri Lanka for a long tour which means there was a gap of just 11 days for the team to come back to India, reach their homes, get some rest and fly back to another country. Five days after the end of Sri Lankan tour, India was set to play Australia. The series was played between September 12 and October 13.

By this time, New Zealand was already in India, preparing for a ‘useless’ limited-overs tour. Led by Virat Kohli, men in blue faced the Kiwis in three ODIs and three T20Is between October 17 and November 7. And, just three days later, they were playing Sri Lanka in a Test match at Kolkata. The tour is scheduled from November 11 to November 24.

Just two days after this, the team is scheduled to fly to South Africa where it will play the only warm-up match from December 1. This tour will end on February 24. So, if we do a little math here, by the time South Africa tour ends, the Indian cricket team would have been involved in different tours for 219 days out of a possible 247 days. This means that the team is given only 28 days of break in between, which by the way, will also include travelling.

Suddenly the numbers look ridiculous, don’t they? Well, they are and, Virat Kohli isn’t the first man to raise a voice against this insanely busy schedule. It almost ended AB de Villiers’ Test career. The former South African skipper didn’t play the longest format of the game for more than 12 months because of the tight schedule. It is the same reason why so many top players decide to hang their boots in one or the other formats of the game.

What cricketing boards across the world need to understand is that the sport isn’t the same anymore. To play all the three formats along with leagues like IPL, players need to maintain an incredible level of fitness which isn’t easy to achieve.

Along with this, they also have to cope up with the pressure of travelling and maintain mental stability to focus on the game. Especially, if you are playing overseas, adaptability is the key. Take the example of India’s South Africa tour, the team plays only one warm-up match to gear up for a three-month-long tour. Virat Kohli rightly pointed out that the board needs to look into this matter. “As usual cramped for time, which I think we needed to assess in future as well because we very easily assess the team when go abroad but we don’t look at how many days we have got to prepare before we go to a particular place to play,” he said.

The good thing is that instead of getting offended, the board too has responded well, with acting BCCI president CK Khanna saying that the board needs to seriously assess skipper Virat Kohli’s view on “cramped schedule”.

“Virat is the Indian captain and his view point on cricketing matters should be taken with utmost seriousness. We are proud how the team is performing but if players are feeling fatigued, we need to have a broader view on the issue,” Khanna said.

As surprising as it may sound, Virat Kohli is the only Indian player (Shikhar Dhawan has missed a lot of matches in the recent past due to personal reasons) who has a guaranteed spot in the playing XI across all formats. And if he, despite being the fittest cricketer around, is failing to cope up with the busy schedule, this is a matter to look into – urgently.