The 'Run-machine' Virat Kohli has smashed another batting record in his milestone 200th one day international. Kohli surpassed former Australia captain Ricky Ponting (30 tons) in the list of batsmen with the most number of ODI hundreds and is now at the second spot behind master blaster Sachin Tendulkar (49). After opting to bat first, Kohli scored his 31st ODI century for India in the first game of the three-match series against New Zealand at Wankhede.
The 28-year old also becomes the second batsman in the world after AB de Villiers to score a hundred in his 200th ODI. Kohli is now only the 14th Indian and the 72nd cricketer to play 200 one-day international matches.Interestingly, the Delhi-born batsman also becomes the second Indian after Tendulkar since 1996 to score a ton at the historic Wankhede stadium in Mumbai. Sachin scored a brilliant hundred at his home ground way back in 1996 against South Africa in Mumbai. It was Sachin's 10th ODI ton in the limited-over format.
The champion batsman also broke Mohammad Azharuddin's record of scoring most number of runs by an Indian captain in a calendar year in ODIs. Kohli has so far scored 1318 runs for India in 2017. Azharuddin held the record with 1268 runs (1998) followed up by Sourav Ganguly 1223 runs (2000).
Coming in to bat at number three after the fall of Shikhar Dhawan, Kohli played risk-free cricket right from ball one. He reined himself in, gave respect to the new ball bowlers and treated each ball on its merit. The Indian skipper was dropped by Santner early in his innings but from there he dominated the Kiwi attack with aplomb and mould his attacking instincts m bat like this in ODIs.
Virat was handed over the responsibility of captaincy earlier this year after MS Dhoni decided to step down from the helm position. Team India has been in sublime touch since Kohli took over the baton from Dhoni. They first defeated England in a limited overs bilateral series at home and then ended as runners-up in ICC Champions Trophy 2017 after losing the final to arch-rivals Pakistan. From there, the men in blue never looked back, they defeated West Indies 3-1 in their backyard, went on to thump Sri Lanka 5-0 in a five-match ODI series. India also blanked the Lankans in three Tests and in the one-off T20I. Kohli and co. continued their splendid run against the world champions Australia, they thrashed them 4-1 win at home in the five-match series.
