Babar Azam opens up about his 'world famous' cover drive

Pakistan’s prolific batsman Babar Azam, while talking to opener Imamul Haq in a Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) video, opened up about his ‘world famous’ cover drive by revealing that it was inspired by South Africa’s legendary former batsman AB de Villiers.

The 26-year-old stated that he used to copy the exact way the Proteas batsman used to play the cover drive.

“I have worked really hard at this from the start. I was interested in it right from the start. I started being interested in it by watching AB de Villiers and I really liked his cover drive.  At that time I used to copy the way he played those cover drives,” Babar said.

“I got started from there and then when I started playing cricket, if the net started at 2, I would be there at 11. I would train first and then do the knocking on cement tracks. That created a habit,” he added.

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Babar revealed that he had struggled a lot while playing the cover drive in his early days but managed to overcome it by hard work.

“In under-15, this helped me a lot because I did not have confidence in my innings until I played a good cover drive. I have been out many times and a lot of seniors told me to not try it so much early on otherwise you will get out and I struggled a lot with it. But when you naturally like something, it is hard to let go of it. I overcame it by making my cover drive better. I gained more command over it by trying to improve it,” he said.

“I still keep practicing it and try to carry it forward. I am trying to improve my game day by day. When I get stuck on something, I try to work on it immediately and overcome it,” he concluded.