Crickets Records Broken by Virat Kohli in his 200th ODI | Ind Vs Nz Series 2017 | 1st ODI, Mumbai | CricTalks

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Records Broken by Virat Kohli in his 200th ODI | Ind Vs Nz Series 2017 | 1st ODI, Mumbai | CricTalks

India skipper Virat Kohli once again illustrated why he is the best in business as he slammed a majestic century against New Zealand in the first ODI at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai on Sunday.

With this blazing century, Kohli surpassed the legendary Australian skipper Ricky Ponting to claim the second spot in ODI list for most 100s. Kohli is now behind only to Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar, who occupies the top spot with 49 tons in the 50-over format of the game.

Also, Kohli beat the record of legendary Indian captain Mohammed Azharuddin to become the skipper with most runs for the 'Men In Blue' in a calendar year. Kohli now has 1318 runs in 24 innings (100s: 5 ; 50s: 7), while Azhar had slammed 1268 runs in 33 innings in 1998 (100s: 3 ; 50s: 8). The most striking part is that Azhar had an average of 43.7, while Kohli is aggregating in the excess of 79 this year.

Overall, Kohli is now third in this illustrious list: Ricky Ponting in 2007: 1424 (100s: 5 ; 50s: 8) and Misbah Ul Haq in 2013: 1373 (100s: 0 ; 50s: 15).

When Kohli went past 110 in this match, he surpassed 1000 ODI runs against New Zealand and became the 6th Indian and 27th overall to achieve the landmark of 1000 ODI runs against the Kiwis. Also, this is the 4th country against whom Kohli has accumulated 1000 runs in ODIs (Sri Lanka, West Indies and Australia are the other three).

Meanwhile, Kohli also became only the second cricketer after AB De Villiers to slam a century in his 200th ODI.

The Indian skipper, tired from the heat, sweating profusely and battling for his country, pulls the Kiwi seamer to deep fine leg and ambled along for a single that would take him to his 31st ODI hundred. That the century came on the occasion of his 200th ODI makes it even more special. He had gone past Ricky Ponting's mark of 30 ODI hundreds and only one man lies ahead of him in terms of century count in this format of the game. We all know who that is.

Kohli now seems to be on a march towards the Master Blaster's record of 49 hundreds. Nothing seems to stop him. That the record would eventually be passed on to Kohli seems inevitable. Four years ago, when the legend walked off the cricketing field, the 49 hundreds looked taller than Mount Everest and deeper than the Pacific Ocean. Today, Kohli has made that look so normal that Tendulkar's loss is no longer mourned upon each time India lose.

When Ricky Ponting blasted his 30th ODI century, it was his 349th innings in ODI cricket. Kohli needed a mere 186 to scale the same number. Even Tendulkar took 267 innings to reach his 30th hundred. Kohli is only 28 years old at the moment but is already on his way to greatness, at least in this format of the game.

His conversion rate of fifties to hundreds is unparalleled in the history of ODI cricket. Kohli has 76 scores of 50 or more in the format of which 31 have been converted to hundreds, a conversion rate of 40.78 percent. Only Hashim Amla, David Warner and Quinton de Kock boast of better conversion rates, but two of them have played less than 100 matches, scored less than 15 hundreds and are also openers, a factor that puts them at a greater advantage than Kohli to hit centuries.

"I look to perform as well as I can for the team. These things keep happening as you go along in your career. You don't target these things, but those stat windows are hard to neglect because they pop up everywhere after you have achieved something," Kohli had said, a sign that the statistics may have finally crossed the unignorable level.

Perhaps the time has come to accept that fact he is not merely dragging himself to Tendulkar’s mountain of 49 hundreds, he is marching towards it with remarkable sangfroid, authority and poise.
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