Virat Kohli retired from T20Is last year and Tests recently.
Former New Zealand skipper Kane Williamson has named Virat Kohli the 'best all-format player' of the previous 15 years. He also praised him for overcoming 'his own problems', such as being in the spotlight of a cricket-obsessed country, and stated that his main competitive advantage was on the field.
Kohli and Williamson were members of the Fab Four, which included Australia's Steve Smith and England's Joe Root, and dominated most of the sport across forms over the last decade and a half.
While Kohli has retired from Tests and T20Is, Smith has given up ODIs, and Root and Williamson have not been sure-shot starters in T20Is for their teams for some time.
“Virat is probably the greatest all-format player we have seen for probably in the last 15 years, you know, and [he] has his own challenges,” Kane Williamson told Sky Cricket.
“In an absolutely cricket-obsessed country and he has been at the top of that tree. Look, there are great sorts of relationships and friendships with all of them in slightly different ways, and we have] stayed in touch in a lot of ways as well. But, yeah, [there has been] no that sort of competitive thing. I think you are just in teams and willing to compete for those teams," he added.
During the conversation, a host reminded Williamson of how he recently met Kohli, while both were with their children. That made the Kiwi smile.
“Yeah, we did!" he said. “It was quite funny, just a full circle. And that’s the other part of it. [We have] not just played cricket but lived our lives in some sort of parallel way for a huge percentage of our lives, whether that’s having kids at similar times or experiencing different things as you get older. So you do connect on different levels," he added.
While Kohli is said to be living in London now, Williamson is in the city to play for Middlesex in domestic English cricket, which is based at Lord’s.