Faf du Plessis gives his opinion on the Virat Kohli-Babar Azam debate

Former South Africa captain Faf du Plessis has given his view on the 'Virat Kohli versus Babar Azam' debate.

Azam has earned the respect of many fans and cricket experts with his incredible consistency in all three formats, with a few of them comparing him with Kohli owing to his records in international cricket.

And now Faf du Plessis has weighed in on the subject. The 36-year-old believes that Azam is an extraordinary cricketer and told Cricket Pakistan:

"I do [see similarity between Kohli and Babar]. They are extremely high quality players. Babar, over the last year or so, has taken another step towards becoming one of the greats of the game so he has got an exciting future."

The 26-year-old from Pakistan has a magnificent technique and his batting style has helped him achieve much success in the longer formats of the game. Still, not many expected him to rule T20 cricket the way he has done in the last few years.

Faf du Plessis took note of his T20I records and continued:

"I think he surprised a lot of people with his T20 cricket. People would have originally boxed him as a guy that hasn't got a lot of power but certainly of late his T20 game has been remarkable."

How Babar Azam has taken giant strides in the cricket world

Babar Azam is present in the Top 5 of the ICC rankings for batsmen in all formats. He holds the fifth spot in the Test rankings, while the Pakistani skipper is at the third position on the ODI charts and only behind Dawid Malan in the T20I rankings.

Azam has aggregated 1681 runs in 42 T20I innings at an amazing average of 50.94.

Due to his supreme consistency across formats, pundits have regularly drawn comparisons between him and Virat Kohli. Some even consider Azam as a candidate to join the 'Fab 4' group of batsmen - namely Kohli, Joe Root, Kane Williamson and Steve Smith.

However, Babar Azam has clarified that he does not want to be compared with the Indian captain because he is still far away from matching his records.