Virat Kohli on Wednesday, 24 October, became the fastest cricketer to cross the 10,000-run mark in the One Day Internationals (ODIs). The India captain reached the milestone in just 205 innings – 54 innings less than the now second-fastest, Sachin Tendulkar.
Kohli became the 13th cricketer and fifth Indian to achieve the feat during India’s second ODI against the West Indies at Visakhapatnam. Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid and MS Dhoni are the only other Indian cricketers to have reached this milestone in their careers.
The India captain eventually scored an unbeaten 157 off 129 balls, which was his 37th ODI hundred and sixth against the Windies – which is the most any player has scored against the Windies.
In the process, he also became the fastest to 1,000 runs in a calendar year, taking just 11 innings to get there.
At a venue set amidst picturesque hills, Kohli reached the mark when he played Ashley Nurse for a single in the 37th over of the second ODI against the West Indies. Fortune, too, was on Kohli's side as West Indies skipper Jason Holder dropped his Indian counterpart on 44.
Having an enviable record at the Dr YSR ACA-VDCA Cricket Stadium with scores of 118, 117, 99 and 65, Kohli began his latest innings with a boundary through the off-side.
Entering the game 81 short of 10,000, with this achievement the run machine added another feather to his illustrious cap.
Kohli has been in sublime form across formats this year and has scored over 900 runs in ODIs alone. He is currently the world's No 1 batsman in both the Test and one-day formats.
2018 is the sixth year overall and the second consecutive year in which Kohli has breached the 1000 ODI runs mark; he had amassed 1460 runs in ODIs in 2017.
Kohli's journey has been awe-inspiring, from his first-class debut, winning the U-19 World Cup, captaining the Indian team, to rewriting batting records at will.
With his unbeatable performances, Kohli has won several accolades including the Arjuna award, ICC World Cricketer of the year and multiple BCCI international Cricketer of the Year awards.
It’s an incredible achievement by Virat to complete 10,000 runs ODI before he is even 30 years old. It’s only expected that Virat will reach many more batting milestones in future.CK Khanna, BCCI Acting President
During India’s first ODI against the Windies, Kohli had become the fastest cricketer to score 60 international hundreds. In the process, he broke Sachin Tendulkar’s record, who had taken 426 innings, whereas Kohli reached the landmark in 386 innings, 40 fewer. Kohli, who has now scored 36 ODI and 24 Test centuries, is the fifth cricketer to hit 60 international tons.
Though he was eventually dismissed for 140, Kohli also equalled another record set by Tendulkar – scoring more than 2,000 international runs in a calendar year for India for a record fifth time.
(Follow live updates from the second India vs West Indies ODI here.)
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