Virat Kohli enters 14th year in int'l cricket amid century drought

NEW DELHI: Wednesday (August 18) marked 13 years in international cricket for current India skipper Virat Kohli. Through these 13 years, the 32-year-old has grown to become one of the best batsmen in the world and a leader who leads from the front.

The victory in the second Test at Lord's against England this week proved that Virat Kohli, whose captaincy was under cloud recently, is safe for the time-being in his leadership position.

However, the big challenge for him now will be to break his brief, recent drought of centuries, and how soon he can go past Sachin Tendulkar's record of most centuries in ODI cricket. While Tendulkar has 49 ODI tons, Kohli has 43 centuries in the format to his name.

At the start of 2020, fresh from scoring five centuries in 2019, it looked like he would equal Tendulkar's record within a year. He began the year with two half-centuries. He scored five more fifties over the next year-and-a-half, but couldn't get a single century.

Since January 2020, he has gone 12 ODIs, 15 T20Is and 10 Tests without a single century. The last time he hit an international ton was way back in November 2019 in a Test against Bangladesh in Kolkata.

Kohli has 12,169 runs in 254 ODIs and is sixth in the list of top run-getters behind Tendulkar (18,246), Kumar Sangakkara (14,234), Ricky Ponting (13,704), Sanath Jayasuriya (13,430) and Mahela Jayawardene (12,650).

Kohli, who had made his international debut in 2008 in an ODI against Sri Lanka in Dambulla, also has 7,609 runs in 94 Tests with 27 centuries and is No. 36 in the list of highest run-getters.

While it is unlikely he will surpass Tendulkar's Test record of 15,921 runs and 51 tons, there is a chance that he will surpass Tendulkar's ODI numbers. It all depends on his fitness and hunger for runs and big scores. (IANS)

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