Former Indian opener Virender Sehwag spoke his heart out after hanging his boots from the international cricke... Read More

NEW DELHI: Former Indian opener Virender Sehwag spoke his heart out after hanging his boots from the international cricket, thanking all his fans and players who supported him during his 16-year long career.

Wish Sehwag on his second innings

Speaking to ANI on Tuesday, Sehwag heaped praise on former captain Sourav Ganguly . Viru recalled Ganguly had confidence in him and how he sacrificed his opening spot for him in limited overs cricket. Sehwag also felt lucky enough to have played in the era of Sachin Tendulkar , Rahul Dravid , Anil Kumble and Zaheer Khan.

Sehwag also has plans in his kitty for the future, "I will stay in cricket, maybe commentary or coaching in some academy," the batsman told ANI. Sehwag reminiscized his valuable moments of his stupendous career, "When I crossed 281 was happy to see VVS Laxman standing and clapping in the dressing room" he added.

"It was his mindset which made Viru great, he is an absolute champions who could turn the game and was one of the greats in world cricket," Ganguly told India Toady news channel.

Sehwag brought down the curtains on a remarkable career in which he scored 17,253 international runs across formats. Sehwag is the only Indian batsman to score a triple-century in Tests, and he did it twice.

With 8586 runs from 104 Test matches, Sehwag stands at fifth in India's all-time list. In ODIs, he scored 8273 runs, with 15 centuries including the second-highest individual score of 219. In 19 Twenty20 internationals, the right-hander made 394 runs. Aside from all those runs, Sehwag took 40 wickets in Tests and 96 in ODIs.

Sehwag was a part of the Indian team that reached the final of the 2003 ICC World Cup and lifted the 2011 edition. In Twenty20 internationals, he was a member of the side that lifted the inaugural ICC World Twenty20 in 2007. He occasionally captained India, in 12 ODIs scattered between 2003 and 2012 and four Tests from 2005 to 2012. He led India in their maiden T20I too, at Johannesburg in 2006.

His last Test was in March 2013 against Australia in Hyderabad and his last ODI came against Pakistan in January 2013. He lost his place in the T20 team in 2012.