File image of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma.© AFP
Former Pakistan cricketer Basit Ali has predicted that stalwart batter Virat Kohli will score some "big centuries" in India's upcoming Test series against Bangladesh and New Zealand. Virat will return to Test format for the first time since featuring for India during the South Africa tour in January this year. He missed out on India's home Test series against England due to the birth of his son Akaay. Since then, he has gone through an underwhelming T20 World Cup and Sri Lanka tour and will be keen to return to find his rich vein of form. Basit believes fans will witness Virat hitting the three-digit mark against Bangladesh and New Zealand.
"In the England series, Virat wasn't there. He didn't perform well in the Sri Lanka series. But in the Bangladesh and the New Zealand series, you will see big centuries (from Virat). Not 110 or 115, you may see a 200-run knock from him," Basit said on his YouTube channel.
During India's successful unbeaten run in the T20 World Cup, Virat finished the tournament with 151 runs in eight matches at an average of 18.87.
During India's surprising 2-0 ODI away series defeat against Sri Lanka, Virat just like the rest of the batters was exposed in front of spinners. In three ODIS Virat could garner a mere 58 runs at an average of 19.33.
The two-match series against Bangladesh will begin on September 19 in Chennai, and the second Test will kick off on September 27 in Kanpur.
India announced the squad for the first Test against Bangladesh on Sunday. Skipper Rohit Sharma, young top-order batters Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shubman Gill and Virat will form a formidable batting pair for India.
KL Rahul made his return to the Test set-up after missing out on the bulk of the England Test series due to an injury. Dynamic wicketkeeper-batter Rishabh Pant has returned to Test cricket for the first time since his life-threatening accident in December 2022.
The spin quartet of Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, and Kuldeep Yadav will provide the team with both the bat and ball. Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj and Yash Dayal will make India's pace line-up.
Basit named his playing XI for the first Test and chose Kuldeep over Axar due to Bangladesh's line-up featuring a good number of left-handed batters.
"Rohit, Jaiswal, Gill, Kohli, Rahul, Pant, Jadeja, Ashwin, Kuldeep, Bumrah, Siraj," Basit named his playing XI.