James Anderson played 188 Test matches in his career, 39 of which were against India. The veteran pacer dismissed Sachin Tendulkar nine times and got Virat Kohli out seven times during his Test career. Reflecting on his battles with Kohli, Anderson said he initially had great success but later found it much tougher as the Indian batter improved significantly.
“I had some success early against Kohli, the first time he came to England in 2014. I really exploited his weakness of outside off-stump, and then the next time I played against him – he had obviously gone back and worked on that – he was totally a different player. He really had taken his game to a different level, made it very difficult for not just me but for bowlers in general. I got him out 4-5 times in the first series and then didn’t get him out in the next I played against him,” Anderson told the talkSPORT podcast.
“He’s very competitive” – Anderson on Kohli
Anderson also spoke about Kohli’s mentality and how it contrasted with his experience against Tendulkar. “Against Sachin, for example, I didn’t feel like there was that sort of shift in dominance. With Kohli, there was definitely a shift. Found him a very difficult player to bowl at because he had that steely mindset, wanting to get into a battle. He’s very competitive and after that initial success, it was very difficult to bowl against.”
Kohli struggled during the 2014 series in England, scoring just 134 runs at an average of 13.50 across five Tests. Anderson dismissed him four times in that series. However, Kohli bounced back in the 2018 tour, amassing 593 runs at an average of 59.30 in five Tests. Despite being the leading wicket-taker in that series, Anderson was unable to dismiss Kohli even once.
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