Published: Jan 03, 2015, 11:12 AM (IST)
Edited: Jan 03, 2015, 11:12 AM (IST)
Australia’s legendary cricketer Neil Harvey, who was a member of Sir Don Bradman’s invincible, hopes that the Indian captaincy will calm down Virat Kohli.
As reported by MiD-Day, Harvey said, “I think Kohli is full of his own importance really. Somebody has to teach him a lesson and maybe captaincy will help him a bit. That (responsibility) can do him a world of good, but we shall see.”
The 86-year-old, however doesn’t mind Kohli getting “under the Australian’s skins”, as he added, “I would like to see Kohli behave himself better. He seems to be over-impressed by his ability. I think he’s a bit big-headed. He gets under the Australians’ skin. I don’t mind him doing that because they get under a lot of people’s skin and now they are getting a bit of it back.”
Harvey made his debut against India in the Adelaide Test of the 1947-48 series and will witness three days of the Sydney Test next week. With all the criticism on ‘behaviour’ intact, the Australian legend admitted that he is an admirer of the new Indian Test captain.
“Kohli performed very well on India’s last tour here (2011-12). I recognised him as an up-and-coming star and he has really lived up to that. He’s a fine player, his technique is superb, plays straight all the time and can defend when he has to. He has got everything going for him and he’ll only get better.”
“You’ve got three to four good players, but the second half of the batting is pretty awful. Vijay is good, Kohli is excellent, Rahane is good too but from there on, it is pretty ordinary,” said Harvey, who played 79 Tests, scoring 6149 runs at an average of 48.41.
The left-hander then went on to criticize the track at Melbourne calling it, “The deadest cricket wicket I’ve ever seen.” He said, “They (curators, administrators) must do something for the bowlers. There is too much going for the batsmen today.”
