Former India skipper Sourav Ganguly believes Virat Kohli will not be judged on the amount of runs he scores in the upcoming Test series against England.
The current India skipper has not enjoyed the best of times in his previous visit to England in 2014 where he could only muster 134 runs from 10 innings at a dismal average of 13.40.
Ganguly, in a chat with Harsha Bhogle on Cricbuzz Unplugged, stated that Kohli’s captaincy legacy will be decided by a whole set of other factors rather than the number of runs he scores.
“Virat Kohli will not be judged just by the runs he scores. That’ll remain, he will keep scoring runs till the time he plays because he’s a very good player. But for me, Virat Kohli will be judged by how he takes Indian cricket with him. And that’s very, very important. Hope he has the right people around him, to guide him and make sure that life becomes a little easy for him. Because it’s going to get harder,” Ganguly said.
Kohli struggled during India’s previous tour of England in 2014.
“With overseas trips, the longer he spends as captain, his form – up and down – so it’s only going to get harder. So hopefully he has people around him who help him and guide him. And that will be his legacy – where he leaves Indian cricket as a captain,” he added.
Kohli and his men are currently participating in a three-day warm-up game against Essex at Chelmsford before they take on the hosts in the first Test which gets underway on August 1 at Edgbaston.
The Indian captain put in a solid showing with the bat in India’s first-innings total of 395 in the warm-up game with a fluent knock of 68.