Babar Azam better than Virat Kohli and Steve Smith? Pakistan batsman has his say

Pakistan limited-overs captain Babar Azam is surely one of the rising stars of modern-day cricket. In a very short time, he has impressed cricket pundits and fans with his impeccable batting. Understandably, this had led to many comparing him with modern-day batting greats in opposition teams.

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Azam, who is the backbone of Pakistan batting line-up currently, arrived at the international stage with a bang as he took the world by storm with his impressive performances in T20Is and ODIs. A decent performance in Test matches in Australia recently has increased his stocks drastically. In no time, he sees himself compared to the likes of Virat Kohli and Steve Smith, who are arguably two of the best batsmen in the world right now. 

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Traditionally, the world of cricket has always regarded those batsmen the best who perform well across all three formats of the game. Unsurprisingly, Azam’s name was not taken in the same breath as Kohli or Smith earlier. However, the right-hander impressed in Australia recently, burying his demons for his poor performance on Pakistan's last tour to the country in 2016. In 2 Tests, he scored 210 runs which include a century at the Australian fortess of The Gabba. He missed another century at the Adelaide Oval by just 3 runs. Prior to the Test series, Babar had also scored two fifties in the three-match T20I series.

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Babar Azam dismisses comparisons with Virat Kohli

After the comparisons were made, Azam himself said on Tuesday that they remain invalid as of now since he had not played as much cricket as others had already played. He reminded many that he had only played 23 Tests and 74 ODIs. The right-hander said that when he started playing cricket, his goal was to compete with the best. He wants to do well for his country and be among the top five batsmen in the world. He added producing good performances is not difficult, but maintaining consistency needs a lot of hard work.

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