Steve Waugh sees elements of himself and Ricky Ponting in Virat Kohli

Former Australian captain and legendary batsman Steve Waugh has compared Indian captain Virat Kohli with himself and Ricky Ponting. Waugh went on to say that Kohli represents the ‘new face of India’.

The Delhi-born batsman has been the talk of town recently with his aggressive style of captaincy, something which has taken the Australians with surprise. Tackling the team from down under with their own formula, Kohli has attracted praise and criticism alike. Australian media has even compared him to President of the United States Donald Trump, something which was questioned by former Australian captain Michael Clarke as well.

Now Waugh has come out and said that Kohli has a positive body language and he passes that onto his teammates as well. He feels that the current Indian side has all the traits that his sides had.

“He’s obviously a very aggressive captain, he encourages a lot of talk amongst his troops and he’s got positive body language. And they’re all the traits that I liked in my sides. I always believed the way you carry yourself is important, that you give off positive vibes to each other and the opposition sort of sense that ‘this is a team that’s really together’,” Waugh said.

The World Cup winning captain went on to add that he can see Kohli’s players playing for the captain, which is a great sign. Waugh went one step further and even said that Ponting was a similar type of character, who led by example.

“Virat Kohli certainly does that. His players play for him, which is a great sign for a captain. “Ricky Ponting was a similar type of player; he’d roll his sleeves up, get stuck in, he’d go into bat pad if he needed to and led by example. And Virat Kohli certainly does that.”

Such words coming from a rival team’s legend certainly means that Kohli has gained quite a few admirers with his fearless and attacking brand of captaincy.

The on-going test series between the perennial rivals has reached an interesting stage and the fourth and last test match to be played at Dharamsala is virtually the decider. While Australia outplayed India in the first match in Pune, the Indians came back strong in the next one at Bangalore.

The visitors somehow managed to save the third test which was played at Ranchi and ensure they go into the last match with a 50 percent chance of winning the series.