Discussing the likelihood that Kohli will overtake Tendulkar – Here’s Ricky Ponting’s take.
Discussing the likelihood that Kohli will overtake Tendulkar – Here’s Ricky Ponting’s take. Ricky Ponting, an Australian legend, talked about how he felt when Virat Kohli tied his record of 71 international centuries. He discussed this on the most recent episode of The ICC Review. They also talked about whether the Indian star can now beat Sachin Tendulkar’s remarkable record of 100 centuries.
Kohli’s 71st century finally happened during the Asia Cup after 1,020 days of waiting. When he hit an impressive 122* off 61 balls against Afghanistan, he tied the record of 71 international tons held by Ponting.
Ponting said, “It was only a matter of time,” when asked what he thought about his record.
During Kohli’s losing streak, Ponting spoke up for the former India captain. This was when a lot of other former players were calling for him to be dropped.
The Rise of Kohli
Kohli took a month off from cricket before the Asia Cup. During that time, he made sure not to touch the bat. He said this in an interview with Star Sports. He also talked about how his mental health was bad when he was going through a rough time.
Kohli scored 276 runs in five games at a strike rate of 147.59, which included two fifties and a hundred. This made him the second-highest run scorer in the Asia Cup.
“It’s (the century) taken a bit longer, the last couple of years because he has been in that century-making drought if you like, it has taken a bit longer to get to me than I thought it was going to.”
“But look, he is obviously one of the all-time greats and there’s still a long time to go in his career. It was good to see him back in the runs.”
Can Kohli outclass Tendulkar?
Now that he has tied Ponting, only Tendulkar, who has 100 centuries, is ahead of Kohli on the list of most tons. Now, people are asking whether Kohli can find a late-career boost to catch up to him. Ponting is not really sure he’ll make it.
“If you would have asked me three years ago, I’d have said yes,” said Ponting when asked if he could reach Tendulkar’s tally. “But the fact that it has slowed down as much as it did… yeah, I still think that it is possible for him, there’s no doubt.”
“I still think he has got a number of years ahead of him, but I guess to still be 30 international hundreds behind, that’s a lot. That’s five or six Test hundreds a year maybe for the next three or four years. If you throw a couple of one-day ones, maybe the odd T20 ones on top of it.”
“Look, I’ll never say never with Virat, because you know once he gets on a bit of a roll, you know how hungry he is and how keen for success he is. I’ll never say never that’s for sure.”
Should Kohli be the opening batter for India?
“The question we’re going to keep asking is – well I’m sure, the Indian selectors are asking the same question – does that create more of a problem than we thought with Virat getting that 100 opening the batting? What are we going to do now going into the World Cup?”
“So there’s a few other questions that are probably raised on the back of that magnificent 100 that he made. He was even on record saying that he was surprised himself that the first 100 back was actually in a (T20I) game. He thought that that’d be the last option he’d have to score his first hundred in a couple of years.”