Tom Moody said that Pat Cummins can pose a hurdle for Virat Kohli in the World Test Championship (WTC) final if the Australian pacer is at the top of his game as well. However, India and Australia will play against each other in the summit clash at The Oval in London from Wednesday, June 7. While Indian batting is expected to revolve around Virat Kohli, Cummins is likely to be one of the biggest threats for India as well.
While speaking on the Star Sports show ‘Follow the Blues’, Moody said: “In any conditions, he (Cummins) has been a handful for any batter in the world and like all the bowlers, he is going to relish the conditions. That’s a really good matchup from Australia’s perspective – Pat Cummins against Virat Kohli. He can get the ball to go away from Kohli to challenge the outside edge. But he has also got that really good off-cutter which he has used effectively, particularly in England. He has knocked over Joe Root a couple of times with it. If he is bowling in that type of form, I think Pat Cummins is certainly going to be a handful for Virat Kohli.”
ALSO READ: Viacom18 bags WIPL Media Rights for 5 years
However, Virat Kohli has been dismissed five times by Pat Cummins and averages a paltry 16.4 against him in the longer format. The Aussie captain has scalped 29 wickets which came at an excellent average of 19.62 in the five Tests he has played on English soil as well. Meanwhile, Virat Kohli and Steve Smith are considered two of the modern batting greats as well. They both have mastered the English conditions lately as well.
READ MORE: ‘Could have gone deeper’ – Shubman Gill on his knock
“It’s going to be intriguing to see the Kohli-Smith battle – two modern-day greats, two players who have an enormous amount of runs in Test match cricket, and two players that have cracked the code in England. Smith has got a remarkable record in Ashes cricket in England. Virat Kohli, after a slow start in England, has come back very well in the last series that he played there. So two greats will definitely be trying to go run-for-run against each other,” Tom Moody added.
Speaking to ESPNcricinfo, Moody named Rohit Sharma a world-class batter, backing him to succeed despite having a modest IPL 2023 season. Notably, Rohit scored 332 runs in 16 matches for Mumbai Indians in IPL 2023 as well.
“It’s going to be an interesting one. Rohit Sharma is coming out of a modest IPL season for his standards. But international cricket and Test cricket is a very different playground. We know the world-class batter that Rohit Sharma is. I think just the timing of this particular Test match in England – early June, where the bowlers tend to get some assistance with overhead conditions and also the pitch being a little bit more livelier than the end of the summer – I am sort of tipping the bowlers to have the edge over the batters. So, in this case, I think Starc’s going to win the battle,” Tom Moody concluded.
