Steve Waugh placed Kohli in the same league with greats like Brian Lara and Sachin Tendulkar.
Former Australian captain Steve Waugh has praised Virat Kohli for his runs of consistent performances. Talking about India's current captain, Waugh placed Kohli in the same league with greats like Brian Lara and Sachin Tendulkar.
"He is a great player and he loves these big moments. He is like Tendulkar and Lara. They wait for these and that's where they want to show their best." he said to ESPNCricinfo.
Virat has been peforming at the top level consistently for the last few years.
He has added more than 1000 runs in both Test and ODI cricket this year. This is the third successive year that Kohli has achieved this feat in Test cricket which is more than any other Indian batsman in history.
Virat Kohli recently became the fastest batsman to reach 10,000 one-day international runs in his 205th innings against West Indies, eclipsing compatriot Sachin Tendulkar's previous record by an astounding 54 innings. Kohli has scored 1202 runs at an average of 133.55 in 14 innings this year – a staggering achievement and nothing short of Bradmanesque. It gets better.
In ODIs, Virat's average has dipped below 40 only twice in his ODI career. Once was in his debut year in 2008 when he played just five innings amassing 159 runs, and again in 2015.
Waugh said that Kohli will be the main danger for Australia's bowling attack when India tour down under later this year. He added that India have some other good batsmen too.
"He (Kohli) will be the dangerman straightaway but they have some pretty good batsmen," Waugh said.
"Actually, India have quite a rounded team and they will see this as a significant chance. They would have prepared for this tour for a long time. I think it is going to be really close series," he added.
However, despite his praise for Kohli and co, Waugh picked Australia as favourites for the upcoming series. The former skipper said that Australia would be hard to beat in their own den despite recent problems.
"Australia will be hard to beat in Australia. We have a bowling attack as good as any team in world cricket and we can take wickets. It's our batting if we score 350 runs in first innings, I think we will be very hard to beat. And someone will always come and do well and that's the nature of the sport."
"I am still pretty confident that we can win in Australia but it's going to be a close series though," Waugh said about the Test series starting December 6.
Waugh also added that he was "not sure" if the current Indian team led by Virat Kohli is any better than some of the sides that he played against during his international career. Waugh spoke in reference to India coach Ravi Shastri's comments that this is "the best Indian side in the last 15 years".
(With Agency Inputs)
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