Former Australia cricket team skipper Michael Clarke said the Indian cricket team skipper Virat Kohli is respected by fans and cricketers alike Down Under<\/p>\n
Former Australia cricket team captain Michael Clarke has admitted that although his country\u2019s media may not write positive things about India skipper Virat Kohli, it wouldn\u2019t be right to assume that the swashbuckling cricketer doesn\u2019t have enough fans Down Under.<\/p>\n
\u201cI disagree that Virat doesn\u2019t have too many fans in Australia. I think Virat has a lot of Australian spirit in him,\u201d Clarke, who in India, was quoted as saying by Cricbuzz.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo be honest, he plays the game really tough and is really competitive on the field, but he is a nice guy off the field,\u201d added Clarke. \u201cSo when people get to know Virat, they realize that what they see on the field is just his competitive spirit. I can\u2019t think of any Australian cricketer who wasn\u2019t like that every time we walked out on the field. I certainly think there is respect for Virat in Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kohli has been involved in quite a few controversies with the Australian media over the past few years. From being pitted against a puppy, a kitten and a panda to be voted as the \u2018Vettel of the Week\u2019 on Fox Sports to being nominated as the \u2018biggest sports jerk of the week\u2019 by news.com.au, things have touched new lows every single time the two nations had faced each other.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou probably are not going to read the positive stuff (about Virat) in the Australian media though,\u201d said Clarke. \u201cThey all want to write a negative story. But I have a great relation with him and I think he is respectful.\u201d<\/p>\n
Australia will be visiting India in September and October this year for limited-overs series that will feature five ODIs and three T20Is.<\/p>\n
Tough to beat India at home<\/p>\n
Clarke said that India will be difficult to beat at home but also said that Kohli and Co. should prove themselves abroad to earn their place as one of the greatest sides of all time.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Indian team right now is full of confidence and the upcoming tour for Australia is going to be tough, said Clarke on NDTV. \u201cThis tour will be a great challenge for Australia as India, at the moment, are playing very well. Obviously the Australian supporters expect their team to be best in the world. But, India are ticking all the right boxes under the captaincy of Virat Kohli.\u201d<\/p>\n
Clarke added that if Kohli\u2019s team does well in the upcoming away tours against the top teams — South Africa in January, Australia in 2018 and England in 2019 — no one will question its No. 1 status.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf India can beat South Africa, Australia and England at away conditions, there will be no doubt that India is the number one team in the world,\u201d Clarke said.<\/p>\n
The former skipper, who has turned to commentary now, was relieved that the rift between Cricket Australia and the players\u2019 association came to an end.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Former Australia cricket team skipper Michael Clarke said the Indian cricket team skipper Virat Kohli is respected by fans and cricketers alike Down Under Former Australia cricket team captain Michael Clarke has admitted that although his country\u2019s media may not write positive things about India skipper Virat Kohli, it wouldn\u2019t be right to assume that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2393,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[122],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2392"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2392\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2394,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2392\/revisions\/2394"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}