Virat Kohli would have been competitive but faced difficulties in Sachin Tendulkar's era: Shoaib Akhtar

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Shoaib Akhtar has compared the eras of Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kohli, saying that the former would have scored a lot many runs in modern day cricket.

Akhtar pointed out that players during Sachin Tendulkar's era played the entire innings with one ball that would support reverse swing towards the end. He also said there were no field restrictions favouring the batters.

“Back then, Sachin was playing with one ball, which would reverse swing against some of the best bowlers in the world. There was only one circle. Today, Sachin would have made a lot of runs,” the fast bowler was quoted saying when speaking to ANI.

Further, Akhtar also reckoned that Virat Kohli would have faced difficulties facing the likes of Wasim Akram, but would have managed to score the runs he has scored now.

“Virat would have been competitive (in our era),” he added. “He could have faced difficulties, but he would have scored the runs he has scored now. We would have faced a similar beating. But playing Wasim Akram is not easy. Virat is Virat,” Akhtar added.

Virat Kohli became the first batter to hit 50 ODI hundreds during the World Cup 2023. He took over Sachin Tendulkar's tally of 49 hundreds. Kohli also broke Tendulkar's record for most runs in a single ODI World Cup. He went past Tendulkar's 673 runs in 2003 World Cup, by accumulating 765 runs in the 2023 editions.

Tendulkar still holds the record for most runs in ODI cricket. He scored 18426 runs in 463 runs. Kumar Sangakkara is second in the list with 14234 runs in 404 matches. Kohli is third with 13848 runs in 292 runs.