Virender Sehwag makes HUGE statement about Shoaib Akhtar, calls Pakistan pacer a ‘chucker’

Virender Sehwag enjoyed facing Shoaib Akhtar and his Pakistan team in Tests averaging over 90 with a century, two double tons and a triple.

Shoaib Akhtar (left) and Virender Sehwag. (Source: Twitter)

Former India opener Virender Sehwag renewed his old rivalry with neighbours Pakistan, taking on the like of former pacer Shoaib Akhtar on the front foot. Sehwag didn’t mince his words while calling the Pakistan fast bowler a ‘chucker’ in a TV interview.

“Shoaib knows he used to jerk his elbow; he knew he was chucking too. Why would ICC ban him otherwise?” Sehwag said on the Sports18’s show ‘Home of Heroes’. “Brett Lee’s hand came down straight, so it was easy to pick the ball. But with Shoaib, you could never guess where the hand and the ball will come from.”

The ‘Nawab of Najafgarh’ said Shane Bond was the toughest fast bowler he faced. “His deliveries would come swinging into your body, even if he bowled outside off stump,” Sehwag said, adding Lee and Shoaib were the other two who were quickest he faced.

“I never feared facing Brett Lee, but with Shoaib, I could not trust what he would do if I hit him twice to the fence. Maybe a beamer or a toe-crushing yorker,” admits Sehwag, who considers the Pakistan pacer his ‘boundary bowler’.

Date mein kya rakha hai?
March 29th, a very significant date in my cricketing life. Got to the first triple hundred against Pakistan in Multan on this date and got out on 319 against South Africa on this very date.
Coincidentally, without plan have a car which is numbered 2903. pic.twitter.com/tJ1rf3GPbw

— Virender Sehwag (@virendersehwag) March 29, 2022

No wonder Sehwag enjoyed facing Shoaib and his team in Tests averaging over 90 with a century, two double tons and a triple.  “Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, VVS Laxman, Sourav Ganguly all would score their centuries playing 150-200 balls. If I scored hundreds at the same rate, no one would remember me. I had to score runs faster than them to create my identity,” Sehwag added.

Sehwag also revealed that milestones never stopped him from taking his foot off the pedal. “I always thought that if I stayed till the end of the day, I should score 250 runs, and in that process, I obviously would have to cross 100, 150, 200 and so on. So, there was no pressure in hitting a ball to or over the fence in the nineties because the goal was not to stop at 100,” the former India opener said.