Gary Kirsten believes Virat Kohli will benefit from the county stint

Virat Kohli recently signed up with Surrey for the ongoing Specsavers County Championship. He is scheduled to take part in three four-day games against Hampshire, Somerset and Yorkshire respectively. The Indian batsman has resorted to the move in a bid to get himself prepared for India’s upcoming tour of England which starts in July.

Meanwhile, he might play in the One-Day Championship matches as well against Kent, Middlesex and Glamorgan. Gary Kirsten, the former South African cricketer who is at present with the Royal Challengers Bangalore team acting as the batting consultant in the IPL also feels that Kohli’s decision to play for the county will do a world of good to his confidence, which will benefit the national team as well, heading into a tough challenge.

Great opportunity

“Playing domestic cricket season in UK is a great opportunity and every player in the world aspires to play there. If Kohli is playing the season ahead of the tour, it’s going to be helpful for him to familiarise with the conditions and will be helpful for the Indian team too,” Kirsten was quoted as saying in Hindustan Times.

The 2011 World Cup-winning coach also hailed the current bunch of Indian cricketers and sounded confident when talking about the expectations from their upcoming tour of England.

“I haven’t watched the Indian team’s performance lately, but India have always been a strong team with so many strong players. So I don’t have any doubts about their performance on the tour of England,” the former Indian coach added.

Team India had a horrendous outing last time around when they were beaten black and blue by the might of the hosts in the Test series. The Indians will definitely want to make amends and put up an impressive show. Apart from Kohli, the likes of Ishant Sharma and Cheteshwar Pujara are also playing county cricket for Yorkshire and Sussex respectively.

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