Virat Kohli and MS Dhoni
Veteran Indian all-rounder Irfan Pathan differed with his former teammate Gautam Gambhir on his recent opinion where he said that MS Dhoni would have broken many more records and would have been the most exciting player in world cricket had he batted at No.3 in the Indian team and had he not been the captain of the Men in Blue. Irfan, however, feels that present Indian skipper Virat Kohli has a better batting technique for the No.3 position than Dhoni.
Gambhir, speaking to Star Sports' Cricket Connected, reckoned that Dhoni would have been the most exciting player in world cricket had not been burdened by captaincy responsibility and batted at No.3, given the quality of bowling attack and flat pitches across the world.
Pathan said that Dhoni did have the option of taking the No.3 spot in the batting lineup, but he didn't. Moreover, when asked to compare the two stalwarts, Pathan picked Kohli for the No.3 spot.
"But MS had all the chance to bat at No. 3, he didn’t. Look, I really believe that if you compare Virat and Mahendra Singh Dhoni batting at No. 3, I still feel Virat has a better technique," Pathan said on Star Sports show 'Cricket Connected'.
In his 16-year-long career, Dhoni has scored 10,773 runs in the ODI format, with almost 70 per cent of the runs coming in while batting at No.4 and No.5. While he scored 3169 runs at No.4, Dhoni amassed 4164 runs at No.5. Dhoni batted only 16 times at No.3, scoring 993 runs with his last attempt being back in 2009. However, Dhoni has the highest batting average and strike rate at No.3 than at any other batting position - 82.75 and 99.69 respectively, with two centuries and six half-centuries.
"There’s nothing that I am taking away from Mahendra Singh Dhoni, obviously he has been an absolute legend of the game. Everyone has their own opinion. I will still take Virat any day," Pathan said.
Meanwhile, Kohli has scored more than 80 per cent of his career ODI runs while batting at No.3 - 9751 runs in 187 matches - which is the second-most in the world after Ricky Ponting's tally of 12662 runs. Moreover, Kohli's batting average of 62.90 at No.3 is the best among batters who have scored at least 1000 runs at that position. Kohli also has the most number of ODI centuries at No.3 in the world with his tally of 36 hundreds.
