Virat Kohli becomes second Indian to reach 900 Test ranking points

Team Indian skipper Virat Kohli has played a quintessential role for the national team across formats and has further become the second India batsman to reach 900 points in the Test ranking after former specialist Sunil Gavaskar owing to the astronomical rise in his cricketing career while donning the national jerseys.

Interestingly, the former Test veteran Gavaskar reached to the 900 ranking points when he featured in his 50th Test which eventually saw Kohli reaching the tally in his 65th Test fixture.

In his 50th Test, Gavaskar smashed 221 at The Oval, in London in 1979 which further saw him scoring 13 and his points tally rise from 887 to 916 and Kohli added 12 points to sit on exactly 900 points.

However, talking about Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar and batting mainstay stay Rahul Dravid didn’t surpass the 900 points mark, as the former managed his highest points in 2002 with 898 and Karnataka-based batsman recorded his highest Test points in 2005 when he registered 892 points in Test fold.

On Thursday (January 18), Kohli won the prestigious awards which subsequently include the ICC Cricketer of the Year, ICC ODI Player of the Year and has further been announced as the captain of the ICC’s Test and ODI teams respectively.

Earlier, in the second Test in Centurion, the 28-year-old top-order batsman Kohli had smashed 153 in the first innings before hosts sealed the series by 135 runs on day four which further saw the Delhi-based batsman managing just five runs in the second innings in which India folded for 151 in 50.2 overs.

The 29-year-old batting star Kohli is maintaining the second spot in the current ICC Test batting rankings, after going down to the third position while having the low string of scores on his back.

In the first Test at Newlands in Cape Town, Kohli managed to score 28 in the first innings and five in the second innings.

Australian skipper Steven Smith is positioned at the top of charts of the Test ranking with whopping 947 points.

England Test skipper Joe Root is placed at the third position with 881 points, and Kane Williamson has managed to collect 855 points in the latest rankings.

While talking about the batsmen who have crossed past the 900-point mark in the Test rankings, Kohli has become 31st cricketer to reach the remarkable club.

However, in the history of Test cricket, Australian Sir Donald Bradman is topping the charts with the overall maximum points of 961 which in itself is a record.

In 110 Test innings, Kohli is averaging 53.41 after scoring 5,459 runs in the Test fold. He has registered 21 hundreds and 15 half-centuries.

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