Virat Kohli recalls India's 2007 T20 World Cup win, says it gave him 'extra motivation'

After leading the Royal Challengers Bangalore to the playoffs in the ongoing IPL 2021, Virat Kohli would be shifting his focus to the upcoming  ICC T20 World Cup 2021 as Team India hopes to end their eight-year ICC title drought.

A week before the tournament hosts begin their campaign, Kohli has gone back in time and recalled how the MS Dhoni-led Indian team's triumph in the inaugural edition of the World T20 in 2007 inspired him.

Virat Kohli recalls Team India's T20 World Cup triumph

"It had a huge impact. I would not say that was unexpected (referring to India winning the tournament) but no one really knew a lot about the T20 format back in the day. After the T20 World Cup win, the emergence of IPL was something that changed the game completely. It was a remarkable achievement by a young leader leading an even younger team", said Virat Kohli during a pre-tournament media interaction on Saturday, October 16.

"For a young team to achieve what they did was very special, it was inspirational. We saw a lot of guys taking the field and making impact performances and what it did for a youngster like me was give me extra motivation and belief I could also perform at the highest level at such a young age," the Indian skipper added

Meanwhile, MS Dhoni, who had led Team India to their first and only T20 World Cup triumph in 2007 with a thrilling five-run win over arch-rivals Pakistan was appointed as the national cricket team's mentor by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) last month. 

Apart from winning the T20 World Cup, MS Dhoni had also led the Indian team to the finals of the 2014 edition where they lost to Sri Lanka. India finished as the semi-finalists of the previous edition in 2016 after going down to the eventual champions West Indies.

Virat Kohli & Co. will be playing both their warm-up matches in Dubai. They will meet the 2016 edition's runners-up England on Monday and Australia on Wednesday. The 2007 T20 world champions kickstart their campaign against the Babar Azam-led Pakistan coming Sunday, October 24 at Dubai International Stadium.