Former Indian pacer Ashish Nehra thinks that captain Kohli is still a work in progress. He also mentioned that the Australian team of the early 2000s was better than today’s Indian side in a chat show with former Indian opener Aakash Chopra.
Nehra on Kohli’s captaincy
Ashish Nehra closely worked with Virat Kohli in the Indian Premier League. Nehra was part of the coaching group at Royal Challengers Bangalore, led by Virat Kohli. Speaking on the Indian skipper, on Aakash Chopra’s chat show Aakashvani, Nehra shared his opinion about the player and captain Kohli. He said, “Virat Kohli as a player needs no recognition as his career graph tells the entire story.” He then opined, “Kohli as a player has done amazingly well, in captaincy I still feel he is a work in progress. I can say he is a little bit impulsive captain.”
Nehra further shared his thoughts on Team India’s management and planning. He thinks that the team went through too many changes in the last couple of years which affects the core. “You should keep your players on their toes there is no doubt about that. Sometimes few players tend to take a backseat and it is important to put pressure on them. But there have been too many changes in the playing XI over the past two years,” he said.
Nehra hails Aussies from early 2000
Nehra was part of 2011 ICC World Cup-winning team led by Mahendra Singh Dhoni. The former player rates the Australia team of the first decade of the 2000s was way better than this Indian cricket team. He spoke about numbers to justify his point, “This Indian team is far from the Australia team. You are talking about an Australian team which won 3 consecutive World Cups, reached the final in 1996, won 18-19 Test matches in home and away conditions.”
He concluded that even this team can reach those heights but keeping the core intact is very important. “It’s not like this Indian team can not reach there but I believe the core group is very important. A person gets confused after watching many dishes on the table and so it’s important to have fewer but better dishes.”
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