Muttiah Muralitharan is the toughest batsman I bowled to: Shoaib Akhtar

Former Pakistan gun fast bowler Shoaib Akhtar has surprisingly said that Muttiah Muralitharan is the toughest batsman he bowled to in his glorious career.

Akhtar revealed that the legendary spinner used to tell him to pitch the ball up to him and told him that he will give his wicket easily.

However, when Akhtar bowled in the full-length area, Muralitharan used to swing hard to get his runs. In fact, Muralitharan requested the Pakistan former ace fast bowler not to bowl short to him as he was afraid of Akhtar’s pace.

“Muttiah Muralitharan is the toughest batsman I have bowled to. I am not even kidding. He requested me not to kill him and told me that he will die if I hit him with a bouncer. He said, ‘Please pitch the ball up and I will give you the wicket away’.”Whenever I pitched the ball up he just used to slash hard and used to tell me that he hit it by mistake,” Shoaib Akhtar narrated while talking to Sportskeeda.

On the other hand, Shoaib Akhtar is regarded as one of the quickest fast bowlers to have embraced the game. Akhtar bowled the fastest ball in the history of the game when he clocked 161.3 km/h while bowling to England’s opening batsman Nick Knight.

Meanwhile, Akhtar named Virat Kohli, Babar Azam and Ben Stokes as the three batsmen he would like to dismiss had he played in the current generation.

Furthermore, Shoaib Akhtar feels England batsman Jonny Bairstow is an overrated batsman. Bairstow has done a fine job for England in the limited-overs format while opening the innings with Jason Roy.

Moreover, Akhtar revealed that he will play in the Pakistan Super League because of his nationality whereas he will also play in the lucrative Indian Premier League as it pays the cricketers well.