Inzamam-ul-Haq stands with Virat Kohli questions Anderson’s effectiveness on Indian wickets

Indian Test skipper Virat Kohli has found support from unexpected quarters as Pakistan chief selector Inzamam-ul-Haq criticized England pacer James Anderson for his comments on Virat’s batting technique. Anderson had said that it was because of the wickets in India that he was able to score despite flaws in his batting. “It is surprising to me that Anderson should question Kohli’s runs and ability because I haven’t seen him take too many wickets in India,” Inzamam said while talking on the Geo Super sports.

“Does Anderson mean to say that if you get runs in England you get some sort of certificate that makes you a quality batsman? Don’t the English and Australian players struggle when they play in the sub-continent? Does that mean they are bad players or weak teams. To me it does not matter where you get runs because in Test matches runs are runs,” the former Pakistan national skipper said.

Inzi said in his view it is important that a batsman contributes to the team’s cause, not the number of runs but it’s utility for the team matters. ”I always judge a batsman by seeing how many times the runs he scores leads to his team winning matches. In my opinion if a batsman scores 80 and it helps his team win, it matters more to me than someone scoring 150 and his team still losing. He is a quality player and when he is getting runs his team does well. That is important to judge or classify a batsman’s value. There is hunger in him for runs,” Inzamam said.

He also said that the fans and media need to grow over questioning the team for every performance and start backing them instead. ”If they don’t do well there we start questioning the ability of our teams and players ourselves. We must not forget Australia lost 3-0 in Sri Lanka, we beat England 3-0 in the past in the UAE.”

When asked about a player he thought was the most dangerous while he led Pakistan, he said it was the former Indian opener Virender Sehwag. ”Sehwag was a dangerous player because if he scored 80 odd runs it meant his team would end up scoring 300 or more in a Test or ODI. The more time he spent time at the crease the more he dented the morale of the bowlers, which was worrying for me as captain,” Inzi said.

India and Pakistan aren’t playing any bilateral series and there seem to be no chances of that happening any time soon either given the political and border tension between the two countries. Inzamam felt that not playing bilateral series against India has hurt Pakistan a lot. ”Overall it is not good for cricket and for both countries not to play bilateral series. But from a Pakistani perspective it has done us more damage as already foreign teams are also not touring Pakistan and our young players are not getting chances to play matches against international sides before playing for the senior team.

“People want to see Indo-Pak matches but there is nothing one can do about it until things are normal at the government level. Personally I always enjoyed the challenge of playing against India and it made a better player. To me a Indo-Pak series has always been even bigger than the Ashes,” he concluded saying.