Reacting to Virat’s record-breaking spree, a former India coach made a very interesting comparison between Kohli and Sachin Tendulkar as to how the two appear very similar when it comes to performing on the big stage.
After the retirement of Sachin Tendulkar, Virat Kohli quickly emerged as the greatest batter in Indian cricket. Kohli’s legacy, records and the superstardom are very similar to what Tendulkar had during his heyday. MS Dhoni was another such star who could match up to the legacy of Tendulkar but from a pure batting standpoint, after Tendulkar, it’s Kohli for Indian cricket. Which is why the Tendulkar vs Kohli debate has been going on for as long as one can remember. Kohli is the only Indian batter who could come close to achieving most of Tendulkar’s long list of batting accolades, if not all. Every now and then, parallels are drawn between two of India’s biggest cricketers of all time and their equally glorious careers.
Over the last couple of years, Kohli has equalled a few batting records that once belonged to Tendulkar, and on Wednesday, against Bangladesh, Virat surpassed Sachin for another impressive landmark by becoming the all-time leading run-getter for India in Australia. It is rather fitting that Kohli is back to his free-flowing and run-scoring best in a tournament as crucial as the T20 World Cup and in Australia, a country he just loves batting and where his average is a stunning 55.94 across formats. Reacting to Virat’s record-breaking spree, former India batting coach Sanjay Bangar made a very interesting comparison between Kohli and Tendulkar as to how the two appear very similar when it comes to performing on the big stage.
“All great batsmen look up to these tournaments as the marquee events in the sense that they love the big stage. They love to perform when the eyes of the world are on them. That’s what they train for. It gives them that opportunity to try and raise their game that much more. We saw that when I was playing with Sachin Tendulkar and now with Virat Kohli,” Bangar said during the Byju’s Cricket Live Show on Star Sports.
When Tendulkar’s wait for a World Cup win finally ended in 2011, Kohli had not even completed three years of international cricket. Kohli’s famous ‘He has carried the burden of this nation for 24 years so it is about time we carried him on our shoulders’ for Tendulkar became the stuff of legends. 11 years later, Kohli finds himself in the same spot as Tendulkar, carrying the hopes of an entire country as India look to win the T20 World Cup.
“In his first World Cup, in 2011, he had a role to play but that was not the major one. After that, he is somebody on whom the team has depended quite a bit and can relate to him in terms of how India finishes in major tournaments. He is obviously one who looks forward to the World Cup and if he has played for this long, obviously all the records are going to tumble,” added Bangar.
