“I’ll go so far as to say, at the same age, I reckon, he’s as good as Virat Kohli”

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Pakistan head coach Mickey Arthur has heaped praise on batsman Babar Azam, saying that he is just as good as India superstar Virat Kohli.

In the recently concluded Test series against New Zealand, which Pakistan lost 2-0, Azam was his side’s top-scorer with 142 runs, which included a career-best 90 not out, at an average of 47.33.

With Azam having made his presence felt in New Zealand ahead of the upcoming Test series against Australia, Arthur feels that the Lahore native is just as good as Kohli was when he was 22.

“He’s a young gun who will be an exceptional player. I’ll go so far as to say, at the same age, I reckon, he’s as good as Virat Kohli, which I know that’s high praise but he’s right up there,” Arthur was quoted as saying by the Express Tribune.

In regards to the series itself, Arthur was disappointed that his side were whitewashed, but pointed out that their preparation wasn’t ideal as their warm-up match against New Zealand A was completely washed out due to heavy rain.

“I think we’ve become better and better as the series has gone on,” he added. “We arrived straight from Dubai to five days of rain in Nelson so we didn’t get any training or a practice game, which was completely rained out. And there was an earthquake as well.

“We almost went into the first Test match pretty cold, played OK there and we’ve played a lot better in this [second] Test match. Had this series gone another Test match we would have been better for the conditions. Hopefully, this has put us in good stead for what we can experience in Australia.”