Virender Sehwag feels Virat Kohli can emulate Sourav Ganguly as a captain

Former Swashbuckling opener Virender Sehwag was very impressed with Virat Kohli’s captaincy skills and was confident that the current crop, under the leadership of Kohli has the ability to win outside the Indian sub-continent just like Sourav Ganguly’s invincible side during 2000-2004.

Team India has performed exceptionally well under Kohli so far winning the Test series in Sri Lanka and West indies besides drubbing South Africa and New Zealand by 3-0 margins at home and is also on a roll against England in the Test series which they are currently leading 2-0.

“I believe this team under Virat has the quality and capability of winning Test matches outside the sub-continent. They can definitely emulate the performances of the team that played under Sourav Ganguly and won Test matches in England and Australia,” Sehwag told PTI during an interaction.

He feels that it was the pace brigade of the current Indian team which sets them apart from the rest. The competition is so intense that someone as experienced as Ishant Sharma has been forced to sit in the dugout.

“The potential of the batting unit with Virat as the leader, we have all seen. You need a good bowling attack to take wickets. We have a brilliant bowler like Mohammed Shami. We have Umesh Yadav and someone like Ishant Sharma, who can also win India matches.

“There is no reason why they can’t replicate their performances at home in overseas conditions,” said Sehwag,

Sehwag who is the brand ambassador of world’s biggest ever tennis ball cricket tournament 10PL also spoke about the young sensation Rishabh Pant who has had a prolific Ranji season scoring well over 1000 runs.

“Rishabh’s future is very bright. He will certainly play for India. In my career, I have not seen cases where people have performed consistently and yet did not get a chance at the highest level,” said Sehwag who was a nightmare to bowlers around the world during his playing days.

“There is a process in place for everything. Rishabh has to maintain this consistency and before one plays for India, there is India A. He will certainly get his chance to play for India A. He has to utilise that and I believe no one can then stop him from playing for India,” said the “Nawab of Najafgarh”.

Currently in UAE to promote 10PL, Sehwag spoke about his teenage days in Najafgarh and also shared his memories on playing various tennis ball cricket tournaments.

“There wasn’t use to be individual payments at that point of time in mid and late 90’s in Delhi’s tennis ball tournaments. The tournaments I played had the winning team getting a purse of Rs 2100, Rs 3100 which would be divided among 11 players.

“I, in fact, played a tennis ball tournament after playing for India. Post 2000, tennis ball cricket also became a career for a lot of players with prize money shooting up to Rs 51,000. But 250,000 Dirham for tennis ball event is unheard of,” said Sehwag.

Speaking about his chances of playing a tennis ball cricket tournament in the recent future, Sehwag said he would love to play in such a tournament where he could be seen hitting fours and gigantic sixes.

“Why not? I would love to play such a tournament. People throng to the grounds to see a Dhoni, Tendulkar or a Sehwag hit sixes and fours. Tennis ball is a different pressure. People won’t be happy for anything less than sixes and fours,” Sehwag concluded.