'He could get his job done in 2 hours': SL legend Muralitharan on Sehwag's batting heroics

Sri Lankan cricket legend Muttiah Muralitharan says he didn’t fear bowling to Indian legend Sachin Tendulkar, but the hard-hitting Indian batter Virender Sehwag troubled him a lot in his cricketing days.

The former Sri Lankan spin maestro lauded Sehwag's batting abilities while discussing the most difficult batters he had ever faced. Muralitharan has over 1,300 International scalps in all three formats of cricket after making his debut with Test cricket in 1992. He was known as a spin wizard from the island nation and caught the world’s eye with his unorthodox bowling action while as soon as he started playing at the highest level. He went on to play 19 years for the Sri Lankan Cricket Team.

In a conversation with Akash Chopra, on ESPN Cricinfo, Muralitharan said he feared bowling to only two players and they were Virender Sehwag and West Indies legend Brian Lara. “Some batsmen really troubled me because on the day sometimes they get up in a good mood and everything goes right for them, whatever I tried it doesn’t go right for me. So many batsmen have got hundreds, double-hundred and only Sehwag missed the triple-hundred against us. It was so difficult to bowl two people, one is Brian Lara, and the other is Virender Sehwag,” he said. 

'On his day, Sehwag would attack any bowler he wanted to'

Sehwag is considered one of the most destructive opening batters in the world as he continuously gave India terrific starts during his career. He is known for breaking the stereotypes of batting, coming out of traditional techniques, and hitting fours and sixes at will during any point of the innings.

"Sehwag is so dangerous, for him we put deep fielders because I know he would go for his chance. He would go for his instincts and he knows ‘On my day I will attack anyone I want.' So what we will do is go for the defensive field and wait for him to make a mistake. But what Virender Sehwag does is he makes sure that he will play two hours of the day and make 150 runs or if he plays the entire day he would make 300, that kind of attitude he had. So such kind of players were dangerous for us and our match-winners,” Muralitharan said. He accepted that bowling to Sehwag was more difficult than bowling to the great Sachin Tendulkar. Muralitharan has dismissed Tendulkar 13 times in international cricket.

(Image: PTI/ Muttiah Muralitharan/Facebook)