Indian cricket star Virat Kohli welcomed a new star Shubman Gill to the club on Thursday, February 2, a day after the opening batter smashed his maiden T20I ton, helping Men in Blue thrash New Zealand and win series 2-1 at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad. Gill broke Kohli's record of 122 not out vs Afghanistan for the highest individual score by an Indian in T20Is. Kohli's knock had come last year at the Asia Cup 2022 vs Afghanistan. Gill finished the 3rd T20I vs NZ with an unbeaten 126 off just 63 balls that included 12 fours and 7 sixes respectively.
It was a knock that had class written all over it. Kohli was mighty impressed. He called Shubman Gill a 'Sitara', hindi word for 'Star'. He shared Gill and his picture from the ODI series on his Instagram Stories and wrote that he is the future star of India.
Take a look at Virat Kohli's Instagram Story for Gill:
Gill would be looking to take his form to the Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2023. He has been playing non-stop cricket and he understands that fatigue cannot be a factor for him at this stage of his career. After the 3rd T20I vs NZ, he said, "When you represent your country, there is no fatigue. It was my dream to play for India, and I am very fortunate to be part of the team in all three formats."
The 23-year-old said that his captain in T20Is Hardik Pandya also backed him to the hilt. "It feels good when you practice and it pays off. I was backing myself to score big. Didn't happen in the Sri Lanka series, but happy to see it work out now. Everybody has a different technique to hit sixes. Hardik bhai told me to play my game, not do anything extra and he kept backing me," said Hardik.
