Sachin Tendulkar and Indian men’s cricket team captain Virat Kohli have found a spot in former Australia captain Michael Clarke’s list of seven greatest batsmen he has played alongside or against during his career.
Clarke, who appeared on Big Sports Breakfast, had Brian Lara, AB de Villiers, Jacques Kallis, Ricky Ponting and Kumar Sangakkara as the other five greatest batsmen he has seen in his playing days.
The 2015 World Cup-winning skipper was seen speaking about Tendulkar and said that the Indian maestro was technically the best batsman that he ever saw.
“The hardest batsman to get out. I think Sachin, technically, didn’t have a weakness. Part of you hoped that he made a mistake,” said Clarke who played 115 Tests, 245 ODIs and 34 T20Is.
About Kohli, the Australian legend believed he was the best batsmen across all three formats at present. “His ODI and T20 records are phenomenal and he’s also found a way to dominate Test cricket. What Kohli and Tendulkar have in common is they love making big hundreds,” he said.
Also, peaking further about Kohli’s dominance, Clarke felt that his aura has had a huge impact on Australian cricket. He said the Australian players were scared to “sledge” the Indian captain and “sucked up” to him to protect their IPL deals.
“Everybody knows how powerful India are in regards to the financial part of the game, internationally or domestically with the IPL.
“I feel that Australian cricket, and probably every other team over a little period, went the opposite and actually sucked up to India. They were too scared to sledge Kohli or the other Indian players because they had to play with them in April,” he said.