While recalling his first Test tour of Australia in 2011-12, the Indian skipper Virat Kohli said he was never the “perfect mold of typical, old school cricketer” and that the mistakes he committed early on in his career have now become the most important lessons for him.

Frustrated by a hostile crowd during the Sydney Test in January 2012, Kohli ended up showing them his middle finger and the act could’ve blown into a big controversy. He was called by the match referee. He apologized for his behavior and escaped any punishment.

Kohli’s second Test tour of Australia in 2014 and that turned out to be an unforgettable one when he scored 692 runs to finish as the second highest run-scorer of the four-match series. He also assumed India’s Test captaincy during that tour after MS Dhoni announced his retirement midway through the series.

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Reflecting on his journey during an interview with Australia legend Adam Gilchrist, as quoted in Fox SportsKohli said, “The one thing is that I’ve always been myself, I’ve never tried to be someone else because of the opinion. Hence, I learn from my own mistakes, I realize my own mistakes myself and just kept correcting them through the journey.”

Kohli, 30, is now regarded as the best batsman across formats and says he’s a massively changed man from his previous two tours Down Under. “But (I’m) massively different from the last two tours, especially the first one, I was so bad. I didn’t have a good understanding of where to draw the line and stuff like that. Those are things that I, I wouldn’t say I regret, but those definitely I look at them as mistakes. But mistakes that were important for me to commit so I can learn from them. I was never a perfect mold of typical, old school cricketer, I always just wanted to find my own way and I guess those things were a part of that journey.”