Virat Kohli has been the centre of attention ahead of the upcoming five-match Test series between England and India.
The India skipper’s poor returns in his previous tour of England in 2014 has been under the scanner with all eyes on whether Kohli can conquer his ‘final frontier’ in regards to overseas Test cricket.
The 29-year-old has scored only 140 runs in his previous ten Test innings on English shores at a measly average of just 14.
Kohli’s former India team-mate Gautam Gambhir, however, believes that the batsman does not have anything extra to prove in England.
“Someone like Ricky Ponting! He has only had one international hundred in India and people still call him a legend. You can’t define someone if he has had just one bad tour. He (Kohli) has already proved himself in different conditions, so he should not be thinking on the lines that he has to prove something on the English tour,” Gambhir stated in his analysis of the upcoming series for Cricbuzz.
“He has to be himself, not because he is the captain but because he is a world class batter and at the same time he is someone India expect a lot of runs from.
“He can’t put additional pressure on himself thinking that the last tour of England wasn’t great. Important thing is that he has already proved himself to the world and is probably one of the top three batters in the world.”
Kohli’s individual battle with Anderson is an eagerly anticipated one.
Kohli’s battle with James Anderson promises to be a blockbuster with the England pace spearhead having dismissed the Indian five times already so far in the format.
The India skipper has commented in the past that it does not matter if he scores runs or not as long as the side keeps performing. When those comments were put forward to Anderson during the Roses clash between Lancashire and Yorkshire, the pacer jested that Kohli is lying.
“It doesn’t matter if he gets runs or not? I think he is telling lies there. For India to win here, of course it matters. Virat will be desperate to score runs for his team, as you would expect from the captain and one of the best players in the world,” Anderson was quoted as saying by the PTI.
Anderson and Kohli will go head-to-head in the first Test between the two sides which gets underway to Edgbaston on August 1.
