With India playing with a new-found spunk under stand-in skipper Virat Kohli, team director Ravi Shastri on Friday said he sees a bit of himself in the flamboyant Delhi batsman.
"He is aggressive and he is very young, so the exuberance is still seen in him, which is very good for the team. And I see a bit of myself in him," Shastri said in Kolkata.
"Even when I was 20-22 years of age, the adrenaline was running high. We've have been playing some good cricket. It's a passionate bunch of boys."
In his own admission, Kohli has brought the ruthless factor into the side as India outplayed Sri Lanka in the first four One-Day Internationals to take a 4-0 lead in the five-match series.
Rohit Sharma smashed a world record 264 as India piled 404 for five to register yet another convincing victory against Sri Lanka in the fourth ODI at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata.
Lavishing praise on Sharma, the former India skipper said "I just told him to spend some time in the middle and he responded well to the pressure."
Shastri said pressure always brings out the best in a player.
"Sometime having butterflies in your stomach is good... He was under pressure scoring the initial 10-15 runs, but once he overcame the phase, everything fell in place," he said.
