Kohli Meets Gill, Pant At His Home In London Ahead Of 1st Test: Report

Despite announcing his retirement from Test cricket recently, star India cricketer Virat Kohli is seemingly still involved with the Indian team. As per reports, Kohli invited Team India's new Test captain Shubman Gill, new vice-captain Rishabh Pant, pacer Mohammed Siraj and a few others to his home in London, days before the start of India's five-match Test series against England. With the first Test at Headingley underway from June 20, Gill and co. spent an evening at Kohli's house to unwind.

Gill, Pant and some other members of the Indian team met up with Kohli at his London home for a couple of hours, as per a video report by RevSportz.

The tour of England will be Shubman Gill's first Test series as Team India's captain in red-ball cricket. Gill succeeded Rohit Sharma as India's full-time Test captain. Rohit and Kohli had announced their Test retirement in quick succession during IPL 2025.

Meanwhile, England fast bowling great James Anderson enjoyed his battles against Indian stalwarts Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kohli over the course of his 21-year long career but he found bowling to the latter a tad tougher.

Anderson, who made his Test debut in 2003, retired only last season to cap off a special career. The Lancastrian got success both against Tendulkar and Kohli, dismissing the Indian superstars nine and seven times respectively.

"I had some success early against Kohli the first time he came to England (2014). I really exploited, he had a weakness outside off stump, really exploited that and then the next time I played against him (in 2018), he'd obviously gone away and worked on that and it was like bowling at a different player," Anderson told talkSport.

However, it is worth mentioning that Tendulkar and Kohli were at different stages of their careers when they faced the challenge from Anderson, who continues to play county cricket at 42.

"He'd (Kohli) really taken his game to a different level made it very difficult for not just me but for the bowlers in general and I think I got him out maybe four or five times the first series and then didn't get him out in the next series I played against him.

"Against Sachin for example I didn't feel like there was that sort of shift in dominance. With Kohli, there was definitely a shift and yeah I found him a really difficult player to bowl at because he also had that sort of steely mindset." He referred to Tendulkar as a 'God like' figure while Kohli was an in your face character.

"Kohli wanted to get into a battle. He wanted you to know (that). He's very competitive and after that initial success it was pretty difficult to go up against him.

With PTI inputs

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