England fast bowling great James Anderson enjoyed his battles against Indian stalwarts Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kohli over the course of his 21-year long career but he found bowling to the latter a tad tougher.
Anderson, who made his Test debut in 2003, retired only last season to cap off a special career. The Lancastrian got success both against Tendulkar and Kohli, dismissing the Indian superstars nine and seven times respectively.
“I had some success early against Kohli the first time he came to England (2014). I really exploited, he had a weakness outside off stump, really exploited that and then the next time I played against him (in 2018) he’d obviously gone away and worked on that and it was like bowling at a different player,” Anderson told talkSport.
However, it is worth mentioning that Tendulkar and Kohli were at different stages of their careers when they faced the challenge from Anderson, who continues to play county cricket at 42.
“He’d (Kohli) really taken his game to a different level made it very difficult for not just me but for the bowlers in general and I think I got him out maybe four or five times the first series and then didn’t get him out in the next series I played against him.
“Against Sachin for example I didn’t feel like there was that sort of shift in dominance with Kohli, there was definitely a shift and yeah I found him a really difficult player to bowl at because he also had that sort of steely mindset.” He referred to Tendulkar as a ‘God like’ figure while Kohli was an in your face character.
“Kohli wanted to get into a battle. He wanted you to know (that). He’s very competitive and after that initial success it was pretty difficult to go up against him.
“With someone like Kohli he was a slightly different character to Sachin who was very mild-mannered, very calm at the crease and Virat was more expressive with his emotions and and wore his emotions on his sleeve and you could kind of see it with his captaincy when he celebrated wickets and stuff like that,” added Anderson.
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