IPL 2018: Ravichandran Ashwin opens up about MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli and captaincy

Ravichandran Ashwin, Kings XI Punjab's newly-appointed captain, recently opened up on Virat Kohli and MS Dhoni's qualities as captains and the traits he'd like to 'imbibe into his captaincy'. In an eight-year-long career at the topmost level, the off-spinner has played under the both of them but for the first time will be up against them, in the IPL.

Ashwin said that pulling a leaf out of his former and current national captains' respective books is important. He, however, highlighted the point that he'd prefer being original and will try and stay in his comfort zone.

“Ya I mean it’s very important to take all the best qualities from each one of them and they have their own strengths and to take those strengths and try and imbibe into my captaincy is going to be very critical, but for me to try and stay original is very very important and not really look to be someone else and go out of my comfort zone in as much as I’ll take those from them as stay original as possible,” he said.

This will be the World Cup winner's first major stint as a skipper and he'll be leading players of the stature of Chris Gayle, Yuvraj Singh and the likes. Naturally, Ashwin will have considerable weight on his shoulders, which he opened up on.

“I mean leading a franchise in the IPL will be a massive pressure because it’s a big tournament and well all know about it and leading a side is going to come with a lot of responsibility, but pressure is something I really like to take upon myself and I really look forward to the challenge and I’m sure I can do really well in this job,” he added

It remains to be seen whether Ashwin can lead the franchise to its first ever IPL title but this can surely be a turning point in the off-spinner's career.

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