Press Trust of India
Melbourne, Jan 17: Star Indian batsman Virat Kohli Sunday became the fastest to register 24 hundreds and pile up 7,000 runs in ODI cricket, surpassing the twin milestones in just his 161st innings.
The top-order batsman got the better of the Australian bowling attack at the hallowed turf of the Melbourne Cricket Ground with a run-a-ball knock that was laced with seven fours and
two sixes.
During his well-paced effort, Kohli left his idol and cricket icon Tendulkar far behind in terms of the quickness in the number of centuries and runs scored so far. Tendulkar got to his 24th ton in his 219th innings while scoring 7000 plus runs in 189 innings. Coming to the crease after the fall of Rohit Sharma (6), Kohli got the 7000-run mark early in the innings after scoring a boundary off James Faulkner in the 10th over.
The quickest to 24 centuries list has some big names in former Australian captain Ricky Ponting (278) and Sri Lankan greats Sanath Jayasuriya (370) and Kumar Sangakkara (378), but none comes close to Kohli.
The 27-year-old left behind South African run-machine AB de Villers (166) in terms of getting to the landmark early. Former India captain Sourav Ganguly (174), West Indian legend Brian Lara (183), former Caribbean batsman Desmond Haynes (187), South African great Jacques Kallis (188) and Tendulkar (189) also got the 7000-run mark early in their respective careers, but stand way behind Kohli.
India’s Test captain also stitched a 119-run second wicket partnership with Shikhar Dhawan, which was also an Indian record at MCG beating the previous best of 101 between Sunil Gavaskar and Dilip Vengsarkar in January 1981.
