Team India continued their dominance in red-ball cricket as they whitewashed South Africa 3-0 in the recently held Test series at home.
While India won the series opener at Vizag by 203 runs, they inflicted an innings defeat on the visitors in the last two Tests.
With this imposing series win, Virat Kohli and company have once again sparked the debate whether the current Indian team is better than all the past sides produced by the country.
Sharing on two cents on this topic, former South Africa batsman Hashim Amla has said that it is unfair to compare Kohli’s side to any of the older Indian teams.
“Having played against Sachin (Tendulkar), (Rahul) Dravid, (VVS) Laxman, (Sourav) Ganguly, (Virender) Sehwag. You are not going to get a batting line-up which is going to be better than that, worldwide. India at the moment are playing really good cricket, they are established and a balanced team. They are doing well. But having played against Sachin and the like, that team was brilliant. (Anil) Kumble and Harbhajan (Singh) were fantastic bowlers. It may be for other people to decide, but I have played against some really good cricketers and (with) the change in over a decade, I do not think you can really compare each team,” Amla told Hindustan Times.
Except for the first innings for the opening Test, the Proteas batsmen looked out of sorts throughout the series. Riding on Dean Elgar and Quinton de Kock's century-plus partnership, South Africa posted 431 in Vizag. But in Pune and Ranchi, they were also found wanting.
Amla, who was disappointed with South Africa’s batting performance, acknowledged that ups and downs happen to every team and expects them to bounce back stronger.
“We have to be very aware that (after) one bad tour like the one we have had in India, everybody starts scrambling and looking for reasons for it (team’s failure). But whenever we had lost a tour, we would take the responsibility; yes, we did not play well enough—if that was the case. But if we had a good tour we would say we played well enough and we keep improving. It is difficult to quantify what has just come up,” he said.
“Watching the Proteas in India, they did not do too well. As an ardent supporter of the team, it was certainly disappointing but then at the same time having played the game you have to understand these things happen in international cricket. Teams do go through (periods) wherein they do not perform well.”
