Coming on the heels of Sachin Tendulkar,Virat Kohli is the latest addition to the galaxy of outstanding batsmen that the sub-continent has produced after 1947. Time was when Hanif Mohammad was a household name in the cricket loving families of India and Pakistan.He was followed by Sunil Gavaskar who in turn preceded Sachin Tendulkar.The common feature in these three cricket supremos was that they were short-statured persons whom the cricket analysts billed as little masters in their respective times.It is no co-incidence that Gavaskar considered Hanif as his role model while Tendulkar grew up watching Gavaskar and treated him as his role model.
After Tendulkar hanged his gloves Virat Kohli who had watched him bat from a close angle started picking up as a very reliable batsman and today he leads the Indian cricket team from the front as a one-down batsman as well as its skipper.It would be interesting to point out that another common feature which the three little masters referred to above shared was that they opened the innings for their countries and had proved their mettle as outstanding opening batsmen whose defence was as solid as a rock.
A lot of water has gone under the Attock bridge since cricket was introduced in the sub-continent by the Britishers.From the womb of test cricket has born the ODIs and the Twenty20s.If the shorter version of the game on one hand has pulled big crowds to the cricket grounds it has also tarnished the image of this game which once used to be called as a gentleman’s game.Ball tampering ,spot and match fixing have brought bad name to it besides finishing prematurely the cricket career of many outstanding cricketers who couldn’t resist the temptation of becoming millionaires overnight.
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