With no cricketing actions taking place for more than two months now, a lot of former and current cricketers have been busy interviewing each other and interacting with fans on social media. While their discussions involved everything and anything around cricket and beyond, one question featured in almost every interaction \u2013 Who is the best batsman in world cricket right now? Virat Kohli or Steve Smith? The answers varied but the Indian captain appeared to have edged the Australian batsman as an all-format batsman. But what do these two modern-day greats think about each other? When Smith was asked about Virat Kohli, he used words such as \u2018amazing\u2019, \u2018incredible\u2019, \u2018fit\u2019, and \u2018powerful\u2019.<\/p>\n
Smith feels Kohli\u2019s willingness to improve as a cricketer and his passion for the game has changed Indian cricket for the good.<\/p>\n
\u201cI admire Virat (Kohli) a lot, he is an amazing player. You look at his record now\u2026 simply incredible. He has done so much for India in cricket. You know the way they play the game now and the sheer passion he has got for Indian cricket,\u201d Smith said during a live interaction on Sony Ten Pit Stop show on their Facebook page.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis willingness to improve and get better. His body seems to have transformed over time and he looks so fit and powerful.<\/p>\n
But if Smith had to pick one thing that he admires the most about the Indian captain then he would pick his ability to chase down totals.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe one thing I admire about him is the way he chases in white-ball cricket. You look at his average in winning chases in ODIs and it is simply phenomenal,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Smith and Kohli currently hold the top two positions respectively in ICC Test rankings and have been consistent across formats for a while now. The two stalwarts of modern-day cricket will collide once again when India touchdown in Australia later this year. The four Tests of the series will be played at Gabba, Adelaide Oval, MCG and the SCG respectively starting December 3.<\/p>\n
Smith feels that India are well equipped in all departments and will pose a big threat for them in the series. The last time India toured the country, they won their first-ever Test series in Australia, who were without the services of Smith and David Warner at the time.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlenty of challenges I think because India are an incredible team. Their batting line-up is so strong. Virat\u2026 (Cheteshwar) Pujara last time here was immovable\u2026 (Ajinkya) Rahane a quality Test player. Then they have got KL Rahul and Rohit Sharma. They have got batters everywhere,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey have got a great batting line-up to go with a strong bowling line-up. They have got (Mohammad) Shami and (Jasprit) Bumrah\u2026Ishant Sharma has been here plenty of times as well. So a well rounded team and it is going to be a terrific series this summer that\u2019s for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Steve Smith and Virat Kohli currently hold the top two positions respectively in ICC Test rankings and have been consistent across formats for a while now. The two stalwarts of modern-day cricket will collide once again when India touchdown in Australia later this year<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":23669,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-530","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cricket"],"reading_time":"3 min read","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=530"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23669"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}