Former Australian cricket captain Steve Waugh may feel that India doesn’t deserve to be the number one test team in the world, but he definitely vouches for the country as a must-visit tourist spot. "India is a fantastic place. I believe everyone should come here once in a lifetime," says the former cricketer, who was in town to endorse educational consultant group, Navitas.
Waugh loves Delhi for its "beautiful architecture and openness", and hopes to visit as many places as he can. "I really want to go to the Himalayas, Ladakh and Kerala," he says.
Waugh, who has been promoting Australian education for the past few years, believes that despite the spate of untoward incidents in his country, "99.99 per cent Aussies love Indians studying in Australia".
The ex-cricketer also observes a fall in the hysteria that used to surround cricket in India during his days on the field. "When you are a cricketer here, you seem to be someone from a different planet," he says. "Thankfully, I’m not untouchable anymore."
Ask if he’d ever walk the ramp like Brett Lee, and Steve answers in the negative. “At 45, I don’t see myself doing anything like that. Brett is good looking, young and single… he’s perfectly suited for that,” he reasons. But he is candid enough to confess that if age was on his side, he’d have loved to play in IPL.
{{/usCountry}}Ask if he’d ever walk the ramp like Brett Lee, and Steve answers in the negative. “At 45, I don’t see myself doing anything like that. Brett is good looking, young and single… he’s perfectly suited for that,” he reasons. But he is candid enough to confess that if age was on his side, he’d have loved to play in IPL.
{{/usCountry}}“I guess I was born in the wrong decade,” he jokes.