Shubman Gill has established the start of a new era of Indian cricket, leading by example with the bat to help India to victory over England in the second Test at Edgbaston. Gill slammed 430 runs across two innings in the Test, as India beat England a mammoth 336 runs. Following the win, former India cricketer Dinesh Karthik stated that he noticed striking similarities between Gill’s mentality and Virat Kohli‘s mentality when the latter took over as India’s Test captain.

Karthik reflected on a conversation he had had with Kohli regarding captaincy, and then pointed out the similarities between Kohli and Gill.

“I met him (Kohli) a few days ago, and this talk about captaincy came up. He said ‘People think ‘I’m a great Test cricketer. I enjoyed my Test batting but the fact is that getting my captaincy was the best thing to happen in my life.’ Why I am saying this is that the same line was used by Shubman Gill,” revealed Karthik, speaking on the Sky Sports Cricket podcast.

Karthik then revealed the conversation he had had with Gill after he got the Test captaincy, and why it was so similar to Kohli’s mentality.

“He (Gill) said ‘I used to bat differently, but now that I’ve got captaincy, I almost think this is what my team requires, rather than me wanting to do something individually as a batter.’ I said wow, this is something for which the world of cricket has to take notice,” Karthik said.

Kohli is widely regarded as one of India’s greatest Test captains, having won the most Tests by any Indian captain to date. Kohli led India in 68 Tests, winning 40.

Gill has made a terrific start to his captaincy career when it comes to his performance with the bat. The 25-year-old – India’s youngest Test captain in the 21st century – has scored 585 runs in the first two Tests of the England tour.

In his first four innings, Gill has already slammed superlative knocks of 269, 161 and 147, finishing as the team’s top run-scorer in all three cases.

It has seen Gill’s Test batting average shoot up from just over 35 to nearly 43 in the space of just two matches.

His start has been very similar to Kohli’s time as captain. Gill followed Kohli’s footsteps in becoming the second Indian captain to score three centuries in their first four Test innings as captain.