Australia’s great fast bowler Glenn McGrath has called Virat Kohli an “emotional” character and urged Australia to “go hard at him” during the upcoming edition of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
McGrath feels that the former India captain is “under pressure” and “if he has a couple of low scores” at the start of the series then it can have a detrimental effect on his game.
“If they (Australia) go hard at him, if he gets in the fight with emotions, there’s a bit of chat out there, who knows he might sort of lift,” Fox Cricket quoted McGrath as saying on ‘CODE Sports’.
“But I think he’s probably under pressure a little bit, and if he has a couple of low scores to start with, he could really feel it.
“I think he’s quite an emotional player. When he’s up, he’s up, and when he’s down, he sort of struggles a little bit.”
McGrath also encouraged Australia to apply relentless pressure on Team India right from the outset to check how prepared they are for the eagerly-anticipated contest down under.
“Without a doubt, especially after coming off a 3-0 loss against New Zealand, you’ve got plenty of ammunition to back yourself up,” McGrath added.
“So put the pressure on them and see if they’re up for it.”
India are second on the ICC World Test Championship (WTC) points table with total points percentage (PCT) of 58.33%. They need to win the series 4-0 to qualify for the finals of the WTC 2023-25 cycle.
On the other hand, Australia are at the top of the tree with a PCT of 62.50 and are the front-runners to make it to the WTC final for the second consecutive time.
