Virat Kohli doesn’t need ‘gyaan’: Ashish Nehra
NEW DELHI : Ashish Nehra, Team India’s left-arm pacer will feature in his final international match on Wednesday against New Zealand in the first T20-I of the three-match series at his home ground Feroz Shah Kotla in Delhi. A few weeks back he announced an end to his 18-year old International career. Nehra made his ODI debut against Zimbabwe in Harare in 2001.
He played 144 ODIs for the Men in Blue, picking up 157 wickets with 6/23 against England being his best bowling figures which came in 2003 World Cup in South Africa. Nehra has also been impressive in the shortest format of the game as he played 131 T20 matches and picked up 162 wickets in his career.
For Team India he played 26 T20Is and grabbed 34 wickets with 3 for 19 is his best bowling figures. When asked about who impressed him the most with his cricketing acumen, Nehra told PTI, “For me, Ajay Jadeja and Mahendra Singh Dhoni are the two shrewdest cricketing brains I have ever interacted with.”
The 38-year-old has played with many generations of Indian cricket under four different coaches namely John Wright, Greg Chappell, Gary Kirsten and now Ravi Shastri. “I didn’t play much under Greg Chappell save two series in 2005 (in Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe). Mujhe pahle series se hi maloom thaa yeh biryani, khichdi bannewali hain Greg ke under (I knew biryani would turn into Khichdi under Greg).
“That’s where Gary (Kirsten) was such a superb coach. He discussed strategies with MS (Dhoni) but on the field, he never interfered with MS’ style of functioning. But I still believe Chappell could have been a terrific coach for juniors,” Nehra observed. Nehra feels India’s current head coach Ravi Shastri is the ideal foil for aggressive skipper Virat Kohli.
“Look Virat’s career and captaincy are on auto-pilot mode right now. He knows what he is doing and leads by example. He doesn’t need gyaan (sermons) but support which Ravi gives him in abundance,” he said. “You know the best part about Ravi. If a player is going through a rough patch, he is the man. Even if the player is not able to the middle a single ball in the nets, Ravi would make him believe that he is as good as Brain Lara! Now that might sound ludicrous to an outsider but those who understand cricket know that this is man-management,” he said.(Zeenewws).
