Lucknow Super Giants spinner Amit Mishra’s remarks on star India batter Virat Kohli have sparked a huge debate. Mishra, who recently appeared on a podcast, stated that due to immense power and fame, Virat has changed a lot as a person and the relationship between the duo is not the same anymore. As Mishra’s statement went viral, the social media divided as many came in support of Kohli and criticised the spinner. Recently, former India batter Robin Uthappa also hailed Kohli for his hard work and personality.

Uthappa, who was a part of the Indian team that won the 2007 T20 World Cup, said that the former Royal Challengers Bengaluru skipper has evolved into a mature human being. 

“I have actually seen Virat kind of evolve from a brash young Delhi boy to an evolved human being. You know the evolution has been quite tremendous, to be honest. Today he’s practically reaping what he had sown 15 years ago. One of the things that has always stood out to me about Cheeku has been his conviction in himself,” Uthappa said on cricket.com/tv.

“When I listen to a young 19-year-old Virat Kohli, you know talking about himself or his conviction in himself, you’ll get mortified, you’ll be like ‘What is this dude talking about?’. “But fast forward 10 years and you be like ‘Okay now that makes sense,” he added. 

Earlier, Punjab Kings star batter Shashank Singh also came in support of Kohli and shared an interesting tale from the IPL.

“He was standing, I was standing. We were standing for 40 minutes. I didn’t even know when 40 minutes passed. Our team position was 12:45. It was 12:40, I didn’t know when 40 minutes passed. And we were talking about cricket, about technique, about shots, about mental chatter,” Shashank Singh told InsideSport.

“And the way he was answering, it felt like, keep doing it, keep doing it. It felt like, he is one of our Chhattisgarh players. He was so friendly, talking to me to help me understand. It felt so good to talk to him,” he added.