Stats: Batsmen fastest to reach 50 international hundreds

The Indian run machine, Virat Kohli continued scoring runs in tons as he struck his 18th Test century in the 2nd innings against Sri Lanka. The Indian captain also raised his 50th century across formats and will need another 50 to get to Sachin Tendulkar’s summit tally. After bagging a duck in the first innings, the Indian skipper struck a century on the final day to take out a Sri Lankan win from the equation and set a target of 231 with help of his quick runs.

Kohli scored his 50th century in International cricket in his 348th innings and thus became the joint quickest to complete first set of 50 hundreds across formats. Kohli, who is one of the eight players and 2nd Indian to score 50 International centuries, is the joint fastest along with South Africa’s Hashim Amla.

Earlier in the ODI series at home against New Zealand, he went past Ricky Ponting’s tally of 31 hundreds in ODI cricket and later Rahul Dravid’s 48 International centuries to stand only behind Sachin Tendulkar (100) among Indians.

Quickest to complete 50 centuries in International cricket:

This was Kohli’s 11th Test hundred as captain and with that, he equalled former Indian captain Sunil Gavaskar’s (11) record. Overall, this was Kohli’s 21st hundred as Indian captain in International cricket which is already the most. He also scored his 9th hundred across formats in 2017 which is the joint most for a captain in a calendar year.

Virat who recently celebrated his 29th birthday became the 2nd youngest to complete 50 International tons. At this age, Tendulkar already had 60 centuries across formats and added 40 more centuries before retiring. Interestingly, exactly on 20th November 2009, Sachin completed 30,000 runs across formats also in a Test against Sri Lanka and is the only player to date with the feat.

(Stats as on November 20, 2017)