The legendary South African cricketer AB de Villiers was all praises for the Indian skipper Virat Kohli and his leadership skills. Ever since he took over the reins from MS Dhoni, Kohli has been quite successful as a captain. Mr. 360 also asserted that Kohli has dominance as a cricketer as the latter has performed in every part of the world in all formats. The Proteas great also mentioned that he enjoyed his time as a player under Kohli’s leadership and has closely seen him evolve as a batsman and as a leader.
There has been a lot of criticism about Virat’s role as a captain, especially because of his habit of not continuing with the winning XI which doesn’t give players time to settle into the XI. However, De Villiers backed his Royal Challengers Bangalore teammate, saying ‘he leads by example and his teammates follow him’.
Speaking at an event in New Delhi, AB de Villiers said, “Virat is a fantastic captain. We’re friends, I have seen him grow from strength to strength in the last few years and there’s no doubt that he’s a great captain. I really enjoyed playing under him, he leads by example and his teammates follow him. So, I’m expecting a lot of success for him and his team in the next few years.”
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Despite the fact that the Indian batting line-up failed to deliver in England, ABD has extreme confidence in them. Barring Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara, the other Indian batsmen struggled in the five-match Test series which led them to a humiliating series loss of 1-4. But AB said the scoreline didn’t reflect the reality of India’s performance and went on to back their batting line-up, saying it consists of a bunch of match-winners.
As quoted in India Today, AB said, “There is nothing wrong with the Indian batting line-up, believe me. They are all match-winners, they are incredibly talented, gifted players. Whether they are backed by people above them or by the media, that’s a different beast but there’s no doubt they can all be no.1 players in the world.”
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There have always been talks about the friendship of Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers, which the latter touched upon briefly during the event. He said, “I have a very healthy friendship with Virat. We don’t talk about it but there’s a really good competitiveness between us where both of us want to be better than each other and that helps. It is certainly a lifelong friendship and there have been some great moments between us on the field.”
On Sunday, Virat Kohli scored his 36th ODI century against the Windies in the first of the five-match series. He is currently 81 away from breaking into the select club of batsmen with more than 10,000 ODI runs, he will become the fastest batsman (in terms of innings) to reach the landmark.
