Murali Vijay, greatest India opener after Sunil Gavaskar and Virender Sehwag: Ravichandran Ashwin 

image-le5cd6jiMurali Vijay retired from international cricket last month

India's premier off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin has heaped praise on former national and Tamil Nadu teammate Murali Vijay. Vijay retired from international cricket last month after being away from the Indian side since 2018.

Writing for ESPNciricinfo, Ashwin said that Vijay was next only to former Indian openers Sunil Gavaskar and Virender Sehwag.

The 38-year-old played for India between 2008 and 2018 in 61 Tests, scoring 3,982 runs with 12 tons and 15 fifties.

The Chennai-born also played 17 ODIs and nine T20Is.

All of his 12 centuries have come while opening the innings for India and is only behind Gavaskar (33) and Sehwag (22).

Ashwin further added that Vijay along with Cheteshwar Pujara are not 'celebrated enough' given their contribution towards India's success.


Here's what Ashwin wrote

"Murali Vijay, according to me, is the greatest opener for India outside of Sunil Gavaskar and Virender Sehwag. Vijay and Puji are quite similar in that they haven't been celebrated enough. They also had some of the most hilarious arguments. 

"They used to do the most difficult job in Test cricket - play out the new ball in testing conditions, as we tend to need to do whenever we go abroad - so it is par for the course to have a few eccentricities emerge from that kind of partnership."

Both Ashwin and Pujara will next take the field for India in the second Test against Australia in Delhi starting Friday, where the latter will play his 100th red-ball game.