Former Australian leg-spinner Shane Warne has once again labelled Indian captain Virat Kohli as the best batsman of the current generation. The Australian also claimed that Kohli is giving a serious challenge to Viv Richards, who he believes is the greatest ODI batsman to have ever played the game.

“Virat Kohli is a terrific player. We all know that Don Bradman was the best player of all time the greatest batsman we know that. So, it’s debatable who is the next best in any era. To me, Viv Richards was the best batsman I ever saw. I don’t think I saw anyone better than Viv Richards,” Warne was quoted as saying by IndiaTV.

“Watching Virat, I mean I bowled to Virat when he first sort of started... I don’t know if I got him out... not sure. But to me, Virat Kohli, at the moment, is challenging Viv Richards for the greatest ever one-day player. Viv was unbelievable but Virat’s records, especially chasing, I think he has got 24 or 25 hundreds chasing in one-day cricket and won most of those,” Warne added.

Despite India’s series loss against Australia, Virat Kohli continued to peel off runs - the skipper now has 41 ODI centuries to his name and remains India’s biggest hope leading into the World Cup. He was India’s highest scorer with 310 runs in five innings at an average of over 60 and a strike rate of 107.64 against Australia.

First Published: Mar 14, 2019 21:37 IST