New Delhi: India skipper Virat Kohli proves to be the star in the series against South Africa. Under his captaincy India has made history by winning their first ODI series in the country.
Kohli has 870 runs from 13 innings at an average of 87.00 and a strike rate of 82.38. The Indian skipper currently has scored 870 runs in South Africa and is shy of 175 runs to match the record created by Richards, 42 years ago on a single tour.
West Indian legend Vivian Richards is the only batsman in the history of cricket to score 1000 runs on an international tour. Richards achieved the feat in 1976 when he amassed 1045 runs in England. While Richards had scored 216 runs in ODIs, he hit 829 in four Test matches.
In comparison, Kohli scored 286 runs in the three-match Test series with a hundred and a fifty, 558 runs in the 6 ODI innings with 3 hundreds and a fifty and 26 runs in the first T20I at the Wanderers Stadium in Johannesburg.
Virat Kohli guided India to a 5-1 series thrashing of South Africa with his ton of 129 paving the way for an eight-wicket win in the dead rubber, the sixth and final match of the Momentum ODI series.
After bundling out the Proteas for 204, the India skipper smashed a sizzling ton to help the visitors reach the target with 107 balls to spare.
With this win the Men in Blue became the first team since Australia in 2002 to clinch five ODI victories in a series against the hosts.
Records meant to be broken
Recently, Ravi Shastri said that he needs to buy the latest Oxford dictionary to improve his vocabulary to praise King Kohli. Kohli’s passion for cricket has made him one of the best batsmen in the world across formats, and has also boosted team India’s image as an aggressive team. Under Kohli’s ruthless captaincy India has managed to post successful run chases and solid team effort to take on any rival in world cricket.
Kohli is a naturally aggressive batsman with strong technical skills. He has curbed his aggression and has channeled his anger while he is batting.
If we talk about shorter formats, i.e. T20 and ODIs, then no doubt he is the best in the world. And that’s because of his temperament, consistency and adaptability. Kohli has made a great impact on the game and the standard he is setting for the next generation to look up to is quite high.
He became the first Indian batsman to score 100 runs by running in an ODI innings, achieving the feat during his 160*(159) against South Africa. The innings was the first instance of Kohli playing more than 150 deliveries in an ODI. This shows his fitness, both physical and mental to play long innings. The stories on how Virat Kohli attained supreme fitness are well documented and the captain takes it very seriously.
He also became the eighth Indian to hit 100-plus ODI sixes during the innings.
In ODIs, Kohli has the second highest number of centuries and the highest number of centuries in run-chases in the world. Kohli holds numerous Indian batting records including the fastest ODI century, the fastest batsman to 5,000 ODI runs and the fastest to 10 ODI centuries. He is only the second batsman in the world to have scored 1,000 or more ODI runs for four consecutive calendar years. Among the T20I world records held by Kohli are: the fastest batsman to 1,000 runs, most runs in a calendar year and most fifties in the format. He also holds the records of most runs in a single tournament of both the World Twenty20 and the IPL. He also has the highest historic rating points for an Indian batsman in ODIs (889 points) and T20Is (897 points) in ICC rankings and 2nd highest rating points in Tests (912 points) behind Sunil Gavaskar. He is the only batsman in history to average over 50 in Test matches, ODIs and T20Is simultaneously.
Kohli also has the highest batting average in ODIs (more than 100 matches) with a staggering average of 57.34 with a strike rate of 91.89. Former skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni is the second in the list with an average of 51.35 in 315 matches.
The right-hander also became the fastest player to reach 17000 runs in international cricket, having achieved the feat in 363 innings so far – 18 ahead of 2nd best Hashim Amla.
The skipper tops the list for the most hundreds scored by an Indian captain in ODIs with 13 to his name, overtaking Sourav Ganguly who ended with 11.
Kohli is not spreading his magic in the five-day format yet but he is a knight of the limited overs cricket.
