Published: Oct 05, 2018, 12:49 PM (IST)
Edited: Oct 05, 2018, 12:49 PM (IST)
Virat Kohli’s 139 on day two of the first Test between India and West Indies at Rajkot has seen him become the first Indian batsman to score 1,000 Test runs in a calendar year for three years in succession.
On 999 runs for the year when lunch was taken on Monday, having become the second fastest batsman after Sir Don Bradman to 24 Test centuries, Kohli moved to 1003 with an off-drive for four when play resumed in the afternoon. This made it the third straight year that Kohli scored 1,000 Test runs in a calendar year.
In 2017, he made 1059 runs in 16 innings at an average of 75.64, with five centuries and a fifty. Of these, three were double-centuries. In 2016, Kohli stacked up 1215 runs from 18 innings at an average of 75.93, with four centuries and two fifties. Here too he scored three Test double-centuries.
So far in 2018, Kohli leads the Test run-charts for all teams with 1018 from 17 innings while averaging 59.88 with four hundreds and four half-centuries.
Former Australia opener Matthew Hayden holds the record for scoring 1,000 Test runs for the most years in a row – five. Banned former Australia skipper Steve Smith achieved it for four consecutive years. Before Kohli, Marcus Trescothick, Brian Lara and Kevin Pietersen scored 1,000 runs in three straight years.
