Australians love to hate Virat Kohli, but they love to watch him hit like cricket fans – Tim Paine. | Photo credit: AP
Key points
- Australian test skipper Tim Paine spoke about his rivalry with Indian captain Virat Kohli ahead of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy
- Tim Paine said Australians love to hate Virat Kohli, but they also love to watch him hit.
- Virat Kohli will play only the first Test against the Australians before returning home for the birth of their first child.
Revenge will be on Australia’s mind when they host Team India in the long-awaited Border Gavaskar Trophy starting on December 27 with the first of four events scheduled to take place in Adelaide. The India tour of Australia will begin on November 27 with the three-game ODI series followed by as many T20Is and the Test series. Before the test series, Australian test skipper Tim Paine spoke about his rivalry with Indian captain Virat Kohli.
India had surprised Australia 2-1 by winning their first test series on Australian soil last year on their previous tour of Down Under. The Australian without David Warner and Steve Smith were outscored by the India team in the four-game series. The series saw many heated moments between Kohli and Paine, who did not shy away from facing each other and kept the intensity levels high throughout the four test matches.
Tempers flared between the two captains and they even had to be separated by the referees on the field on a couple of occasions. In an interview leading up to the 2020-21 Border-Gavaskar Trophy, Paine said Australians love to hate Kohli but admire him when it comes to hitting. He also insisted that the Indian skipper was just another player for him despite being questioned a lot about Kohli.
“They ask me a lot of questions about Virat Kohli, he’s just another player for me, it doesn’t really bother me. There really isn’t a relationship with him to be fair, I see him in the draw and I play against him and that’s it,” he said. Paine to ABC Sport.
“With Virat, it’s fun, we love to hate him, but we also love to see him hit as cricket fans. He’s certainly polarizing in that kind of scenario. We love to see him hit, but we don’t like to see him. He scores too many runs.”
Speaking of the intense rivalry between India and Australia, Paine said that it is always a heated affair when the two teams meet. He compared his battles on the field with Kohli to players like Joe Root and Ben Stokes, stating that there is always more tension when a player is as good as the Indian pattern and can take the game away from opponents quite easily.
“Australia and India, it’s a heated competition and obviously he’s a competitive person and so am I, so year there were a few times we had words, but that wasn’t because he was the captain and I was the captain, he could have done it. “. “It was anyone,” said the captain of the Australian test.
“There is always a little more tension when a player is as good as he is, it’s the same when you play England, it’s Joe Root or Ben Stokes. Often the best player is the one your team goes up a bit. A little bit, the intensity goes up when the best players in the world come out to the fold, “he added.
