After bitterly-fought Border-Gavaskar Test series, Merv Hughes takes dig at Virat Kohli, calls him 'flog'

Melbourne: Former fast bowler Merv Hughes has taken a dig at Virat Kohli, who was targeted by current and former Australian players as well as the media during the just-concluded Test series, calling the Indian skipper a "flog", an apparently derogatory Australian slang.

"He (Kohli) is a great player and he is probably a bloke you would love to have on your side, but watching it from afar and watching him in other colours, you just think 'what a flog'," Hughes was quoted by 'Daily Telegraph' as having told SEN Radio.

Hughes' comments come after a bitterly-fought Test series which India won 2-1 at home.

At the end of the fourth and final Test in Dharamsala, which India won by eight wickets, Kohli said he no longer considered Australian cricketers his friends after being targeted both on and off the field by them.

Earlier, Kohli had stopped short of calling his rival captain Steve Smith a cheat for his 'DRS Brain Fade' moment after which a section of Australian cricketers (current and former) along with their media targeted the Indian skipper, going as far as to compare him with controversial US president Donald Trump.

Worst, the Cricket Australia CEO James Sutherland, in a sarcastic remark to a radio station, said Kohli perhaps does not know how to spell the word "sorry".

Kohli pulled himself out of the fourth and final Test due to a shoulder injury. Hughes said both sides were probably better off with Kohli injured for the final Test as the star Indian batsman might have "gone over the top" had he played in Dharamsala.

"The Indians played a real tough brand of cricket. I think they went out in the first Test and thought it would be a real piece of cake and when Australia knocked them over in that first Test match, they changed their attitude and they came out real strong and Virat Kohli especially.

"If he is talking about the Australians playing it hard, it is a bit hypocritical for me because he turned his game around and played that way in especially that second Test and then going into the third Test, it probably was not a bad thing he was injured because he may have gone over the top," said 55-year-old Hughes, who played 53 Tests and 33 ODIs between 1985 and 1993.