IND v AUS: Virat Kohli is 'one of the greatest players of all-time,' says Aaron Finch ahead of 1st T20I
Virat Kohli recently recorded his maiden T20I century
Australia skipper Aaron Finch has hailed Virat Kohli, calling the Indian batsman "one of the greatest players of all time."
Finch's comments came in a pre-match conference on Monday ahead of the first T20I between India and Australia in Mohali. After failing to score an international century for nearly three years, Kohli ended the drought in the recently concluded Asia Cup. He scored an unbeaten 122 against Afghanistan, which was also his maiden T20I hundred.
Finch also said that it would take a very brave man to write Kohli off on any given day considering what the Indian star has achieved in the last 15 years.
''It would be a very brave man to write Virat Kohli off. At any stage, he has shown for 15 years now that he is one of the greatest players of all time,'' Finch told reporters ahead of the first T20I against India.
''Particularly in T20 cricket, he's someone who has developed and grown his game over such a long period that you always plan and prepare the best when you're coming up against him. He is super and has 71 international centuries. That's just ridiculous,'' added Finch in the same conference.
Finch, who has been struggling with the bat for some time now, recently announced retirement from ODIs. Australia's three-match ODI series against New Zealand at home was Finch's final in the 50-over format for Australia. While the hosts clinched the series 3-0, Finch managed just 10 runs, including a duck in the second game.
"Over a long period of time, you get pretty comfortable with criticism, but in T20 cricket, I feel my form has been really good for quite a while now. I think if you separate the ODI form and the T20 form, then they're totally different, they're two different formats of the game. 'Every decision that we make, I think, has one eye towards the World Cup and seeing the wicket yesterday, it looked like there was quite a bit of grass on it.
''And we know in Mohali, the ball can swing around and it can carry through quite a bit, so I think we will be mindful of not being too narrow-minded in terms of our focus. 'What we've tried to do over the last sort of six-eight-ten months is make sure that everything that we're doing in the T20 space ties back into the World Cup and, for us, it's about making sure that once we get there that we've had plenty of different combinations of teams that we can play,'' added Finch.
In the lead-up to the T20 World Cup, which is scheduled to begin on Oct. 16 in Australia, Finch and Co have toured India for a three-match T20I series. The matches will be played in Mohali (Sept. 20), Nagpur (Sept. 23), and Hyderabad (Sept. 25).