Matthew Hayden isn’t keen on Olympic entry

As if his bulging chest and ritual of squatting at the crease were not menacing enough, the towering Matthew Hayden intimidated bowlers by dancing down the wicket. The former Aussie opener who scored more than 14,000 runs in international cricket spoke about his strategy of attacking the bowlers before they could get to him and how a trip to India in 2001 transformed his career in a chat.

Excerpts: Having played under Dhoni you know how cool he could be under pressure. What do you make of Virat Kohli’s captaincy His aggression is very similar on the lines of a typical Aussie skipper though I don’t think Australians are necessarily as animated as Virat. He commands excellence, wears his heart on his sleeve and I enjoy that. Dhoni is at the other end of the spectrum. I feel Indian cricket is the biggest beneficiary having two different skippers for different formats. People always relate the limited overs formats to aggressive style, but look at Dhoni’s record as captain in ODIs. Isn’t spectacular to have Kohli as Test skipper I think from the strategic point of view, it’s good for India. You need more players like Kohli and A.B. de Villiers at the top of their game to bring fans to Test cricket. Does T20 make for a great viewing on the grandest stage — Olympics I don’t think it’s a good idea. It will be interesting for cricketers, but the big question is whether it will attract fans. Why do we need to involve in the Olympics I am still not convinced. For me, the Olympics are all about traditional games. When we keep adding more and more sports, its importance will be diluted. The schedule is already tightly packed for cricketers. You changed the landscape of opening batsmen in Test cricket with your aggressive approach Not only did have to change myself before I made my international bow I also had to transform the landscape of cricket to get into the highly competitive Australian side. I had to fight with the likes of Michael Slater and Mark Taylor to get a spot. That really made a huge difference as I was prepared to do more work and change my game. I was ready to do anything I could to become a better player. People always talk about me as someone who intimidated bowlers. However, the bowlers, each and every one of them, intimidated me. But my strategy was to get them before they tried to get me. It was as simple as that. It was a ploy I used to good effect.

Before the 2001 tour of India you averaged 24 and after that you were well over 50. How did that series transform you as a player Yes, it did make a huge difference to my career. That was sort of a pivotal stage where I came to life as a young Test cricketer and I think a lot of it because I enjoyed travelling to India. And it took a long time to prepare for the India series. I had seven years of preparations from the first time I had come here. In Brisbane, I grew up on a fast and hard track. It was not possible to play spin in Australia because the ball hardly spun there.

I had to go out to find out, research and develop my game. I had a couple of good county experiences in Northamptonshire where we had good young spinners in Graeme Swann and Jason Brown.

The club prepared turning wickets. And it helped me master the sweep shots against India’s quality spin attack.