Virat Kohli's 100th Test: Centurion on a ton hunt

All-format captain till September but only a middle-order bat now, Virat Kohli seeks to end his 15-match ton drought in his landmark Test

Centuries have been eluding him for more than two years, the captaincy has been relinquished and stripped in unseemly ways, and the build-up has been less than ideal. Bangalore, his home away from home, taken away as the venue and the match shifted to Mohali. Supposed to be a closed-door affair till a few days back, 50% attendance allowed now. The haphazardness doesn’t make it feel too heartfelt.

Kohli relinquishing the Test captaincy was perhaps his way of staying a step ahead of the mess (PTI)

Ignore all that for a while though. Virat Kohli is set to play his 100th Test, the 12th Indian to do so, and possibly the last in a very long time.

Doubt that? Try to recall the time when Kohli had just started out but was already hailed as the protégé who could fill Sachin Tendulkar’s shoes. Or when Sunil Gavaskar had predicted he would break most Test and ODI records.

Look around now. No 22-year-old is deemed as special as Kohli. No one who glows with as much fire as he did, making his mark and more even when Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman were still relevant, partly because of his talent but mostly because of his infallible confidence. Everything he did, or said, was with conviction. No hesitation, no stepping back once he decides, be it a cover drive against James Anderson or calling a press conference to give a blow-by-blow account of how he was cold shouldered into losing control of the team. Like him, hate him, you can’t ignore Kohli.

Neither can you ignore his presence in every facet of daily life. Today, Kohli is on TV, billboards and social media, selling cars, bikes, tyres, apparel and insurance in a relentless multi-media bombardment of adverts. Most followers on Instagram in India, making it to the Forbes List and hobnobbing with Roger Federer are some of the Virat things we are used to. Kohli is why cricket is in the pinkest of health now. And that’s what makes his journey all the more fascinating now. Where does Virat Kohli, age 33, after having led India in 68 Tests till January, go from here?

We never thought this day would come because, let’s face it, we never thought he would give up captaincy. There were a few murmurs after the Test Championship final loss but the 2-1 win in England should have put it to rest.

On the surface, everything looked hale and hearty. It didn’t, of course. What started as a partial offloading of responsibility before the T20 World Cup blew up into a raging controversy scarred by conflicting comments and ultimately Kohli stepping down after a dispiriting series defeat in South Africa. Win or lose, there was really no coming back for him after antagonising the entire establishment.

Kohli relinquishing the Test captaincy was perhaps his way of staying a step ahead of the mess. But it has also hit the BCCI where it hurts most. At a time when broadcasters make no bones about pitting two faces rather than two sides, Kohli isn’t the only face they can put a halo around.

So what was poised to be Kohli the India Test captain’s 100th match is now Rohit Sharma’s coronation and also Kohli’s 100th Test—not exactly a side note but also not the only talking point. By default, Kohli was supposed to address the pre-Test media conference as captain. But he has conceded that privilege. It’s a sign of things to come, of Kohli ceding from the picture and readjusting to a more understated role. And he may be at peace with it.

Kohli, if you remember, showed there is life beyond cricket when he went on paternity leave at a time India were trailing in Australia last year. There is every chance he might weigh his career in terms of achievements and not just numbers. World Cup? Check (2011). No 1 Test team? Check. Series wins in Australia and England? Check and check. Another World Cup from here should properly define his legacy. But numbers, hundreds especially, matter as a statistical reference to a batter’s greatness. Kohli knows that.

Giving up control when he is scoring hundreds at will isn’t the same as quitting captaincy when he isn’t hitting the mark. And this isn’t about a tour or two going wrong. We are talking 15 Tests without a hundred, 27 innings—through New Zealand, the Australian summer of 36 all out, England tours home and away, Test Championship final, a T20 World Cup, two IPLs, New Zealand again and then South Africa—without even a nervous ninety.

The wait for him to break the jinx continues as the graph slides. Kohli averaged 54.97 at the end of 2019, it’s 50.39 now.

Kohli doesn’t need a lesson on how to carve out a hundred. What he probably needs is, as his increasingly frequent breaks suggest, more time away from the scrutiny, from the ‘noise’. Professional cricketers internalise the game at a level we can hardly fathom. And it can be doubly difficult for someone in Kohli’s position—all-format captain till September, only a middle-order bat now. But this is a new world he must align himself with. That process begins here, in Mohali, as we wait and hope for a most anticipated event—a hundred in his 100th Test.