“But as captain he was lost”: Shoaib Akhtar uses Sachin Tendulkar’s example to praise Virat Kohli

The comparison of modern-day master Virat Kohli with legendary Sachin Tendulkar is not new. Pakistan’s veteran fast bowler Shoaib Akhtar also did something similar in an interview where he lauded Virat and opined that he regards Sachin as the best batter in the world, but at the same time admitted that the ‘Master Blaster’ looked lost as a captain to him.

In a discussion on Suno News, Akhtar revealed the reason behind his constant praise of Virat and compared the latter to Sachin to justify his point. The 47-year-old veteran pacer said that the 34-year-old former India captain had been both a great skipper and batter, while Sachin looked lost as a leader of the Indian side.

“See, I believe Sachin Tendulkar is the best batsman in the world. But as a captain, he was lost. He left the captaincy himself. I was talking to one of my friends about Virat Kohli, and we were discussing the same thing. He was lost, and when he works on his mind, he will perform. When his mind became free, he ruled the T20 World Cup,” said Akhtar

The Rawalpindi express further praised Kohli for his batting and added: “You also need to look that almost 40 centuries from Kohli came in run chases. Log kehte hain tum Virat ki bohot tareef karte ho, main kehta hu kaise naa karu? (People tell me that you praise Virat Kohli a lot. I just say, why shouldn’t I do that?) During one stage, India used to win because of Virat’s hundreds.”

Notably, Tendulkar captained India in 98 matches and led the team to victory in 27 of them, while Kohli won 64 matches out of 140 as India’s skipper with a win percentage of 45.71. As far as the batting record is concerned, the Delhi cricketer recently entered the elite list of most international runs, which the 49-year-old former Mumbai cricketer owns.

Virat will next be seen in action in the fourth and final Test of the Border Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) 2023, starting on Thursday, March 9.

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March 06, 2023 at 11:19AM