India vs West Indies: Chase-master Kohli goes after Sangakkara, Kallis’ record, registers international century No. 60

India vs West Indies, 1st ODI: Chase-master Virat Kohli chasing Sangakkara, Kallis’ record, registers international century No. 60

Virat Kohli recorded his 36th One-Day International (ODI) and overall 60th international century during the first (ODI between India and West Indies in Guwahati on Sunday.

The Indian captain scored the century off just 88 balls and his knock so far includes 16 fours.

Kohli is just 40 centuries away from equaling Sachin Tendulkar’s world record of a total of 100 international centuries across formats. Meanwhile, he is just two centuries away from equalling South African great Kallis' 62 international hundreds and three away from equalling Sri Lankan legend Kumar Sangakkara (63 international tons). 

The 29-year-old cricketer meanwhile also became the first-ever captain to have aggregated 2,000-plus runs in two consecutive years. He scored 2,818 runs in 2017.

Although he was not the captain in 2016 (2,595 runs), it still is a great achievement to have recorded 2,000-plus international runs in three consecutive years.

Kohli overall became only the fourth batsman to have scored a total of 2,000 or more runs across formats after Sachin Tendulkar (1996, 97 and 98), Matthew Hayden (2002, 03, 04) and Joe Root (2015, 16, 17).

Talking of just Indian batsmen, Kohli and Tendulkar (5 times) have scored 2,000 or more runs in a calendar year for the most number of times ahead of former Indian captains Sourav Ganguly (4 times) and Rahul Dravid (3 times) and Delhi batsmen, Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir (1 time).