"There's not a series that you would play India and you not talk about Virat Kohli" - Travis Head opens up on India's ace batter ahead of 2024/25 BGT
Australia batter Travis Head acknowledged the hype surrounding Virat Kohli ahead of the highly anticipated five-Test series against India, starting in Perth on November 22. Yet, the ace Indian batter enters the series on the back of a dismal three Tests against New Zealand at home.
Kohli averaged under 16 in the series as India suffered an embarrassing 0-3 whitewash to surrender the top spot in the latest World Test Championship (WTC) standings. The 36-year-old has struggled in the red-ball format over the past five years, scoring only two centuries in 34 outings.
Talking to reporters in the build-up to the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, Head backed Kohli to have his share of great moments in the series but hoped Australia would restrict the damage he does over the five Tests.
"There's not a series that you would play India and you not talk about Virat Kohli. No doubt that we'll go through all the players and we've started this morning and just prepare the same way as we always do. We want to start well against him come the first morning, but he's going to have his moments in the series and hopefully not too many of them," said Head (via India Today).
He added:
"He's a world class player and over 5 Tests at some stage he's probably gonna play well, we understand that, we respect that, and, yeah, we just try our best to, to nullify that. We hope we'll have some guys on our team that also have really good great moments over 5 Tests."
Kohli has historically produced his best in Tests Down Under, evidenced by a sensational average of 54.08 in 13 outings. However, he averages a sub-par 22.72 in six Tests this year.
"My best knock in Australia is definitely my hundred at Perth, 2018-19 series that we played" - Virat Kohli
Virat Kohli ranked his century at Perth in the 2018/19 tour of Australia as his best knock Down Under.
The champion batter has scored six out of his 29 Test centuries in Australia with the 123 in Perth being the last one. With India ahead 1-0 in the four-Test series, Kohli was the lone-ranger with his brilliant century in India's 146-run defeat.
"My best knock in Australia is definitely my hundred at Perth, 2018-19 series that we played. I thought that’s the toughest pitch that I’ve played on in Test cricket, it was great to have a hundred on that one," said Kohli in a video shared by BCCI.
Despite the loss at Perth, India bounced back to win the series 2-1, as Kohli became the first Indian captain to win a Test series in Australia.