ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2024 ambassador Yuvraj Singh has hailed Virat Kohli as the best batter of this generation across formats and identified what sets him apart from the rest.
Kohli’s career hit new heights at the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023, where he topped the run charts with a record tally of runs. The stalwart batter walked away with the Player of the Tournament award despite coming into the event with his best years seemingly past him, and after an extended period where his frequency of making triple-digit scores reduced.
Kohli has set his eyes on the coveted trophy at the upcoming ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2024 and will be featuring for the sixth time in the tournament. His first-ever appearance at the T20 World Cup was in 2012, five years after India achieved their only title win in the format.
Yuvraj said that Kohli deserved another World Cup medal after 2011, where he was part of the title-winning Cricket World Cup campaign.
“He has definitely broken all the records in this era,” Yuvraj said in a chat with ICC.
“The best batter of this generation, I feel, in all formats. And I think he is also someone who needs a World Cup Medal. He has one. I’m sure he is not satisfied with one. I think he surely deserves that medal as well.”
Kohli’s penchant for big knocks under pressure is well known and the T20 World Cup has witnessed some of his most impactful knocks, most notably two years back at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, where he awed over 90,000 spectators with a finish like none other against arch-rivals Pakistan.
But the tournament has witnessed Kohli at his peak way earlier. In the 2016 edition of the tournament, Australia bore the brunt of Kohli’s ravishing form when he put on an exhibition at chasing targets down. An unbeaten 82 off 51 balls in a run-chase of 161 put India in the semi-finals of the tournament.
“I think he understands his game really well,” Yuvraj said.
“He knows if he’s there till the end, he is going to win the game for India and he has done that on some big occasions – against Australia in Mohali as well.
“Once he had the confidence of chasing and knowing the situation, he knows how to bat in these situations, knows which bowlers to attack, which bowlers to take singles off, when to attack again, handle the pressure and knows when to change his game.”