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'Virat Kohli, Wonderful Player Of...': Pietersen After Joe Root Gets Stumped Off Nathan Lyon

image-lj4414vmPietersen has lauded Kohli's skills against spin [AP Photos]

No cricketing conversation or debate is complete without namedropping India's Virat Kohli. Kohli, who is undoubtedly one of the legends of the game, and an inspiration for many aspiring cricketers, has set batting benchmarks for current and future players.

Former England player Kevin Pietersen, who played with Kohli during the latter's formative days in the Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) franchise, called the batting maestro a wonderful player of spin, while commentary during the ongoing first Ashes 2023 Test at Edgbaston on Day 4.

The praise came after Pietersen learned that much-like Joe Root got stumped for the first time in his red-ball career off Lyon on Day 4, Kohli, too, has only been stumped once in his 109*-Test career.

Here's what Pietersen said

“He [Virat Kohli] is a wonderful player of spin, and you sort of understand it because they play spin off the back foot and have such beautiful wrists. You hardly ever see Virat running down, charging, and going all guns blazing, and he certainly doesn’t sweep, reverse sweep. I mean, you can watch him bat. Mentally, you can see him batting there, so you can sort of understand that.”

Kohli got stumped for the first time in his Test career during the Border Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) 2023, against debutant Todd Murphy.

Former Sri Lanka captain Kumar Sangakkara also lauded Kohli for playing proper cricket, and not jumping out of the crease much to enforce runs.