Kohli made 115 and 141 in Adelaide Test of 2014 in his first match as India captain.
Australian spinner Nathan Lyon recalled a weird incident involving Virat Kohli, where he was bemused at something the then-Indian captain had told him. Virat Kohli is being plastered on the front pages of Australian media as the build-up for the BGT 2024 five-Test series is being hyped up.
Ahead of the five-match Border-Gavaskar Trophy series, which begins in Perth on November 22, Australian spinner Nathan Lyon recalled a similar battle with Virat during the 2014 Test at the Adelaide Oval.
"The one battle that comes out to me is the 2014 Test at Adelaide Oval where he (Kohli) got hundreds in both innings. I was bowling to him and he was batting that easily. He'd come down to the non-striker's end and just say 'Federer'. And I was like 'Oh, okay, what's this?' He kept doing it, kept doing it every time.
Every time he'd come down there, he was like 'Federer, Federer'. And I said 'Mate, I don't know if I'm wrong, but are we playing the wrong sport if you think you're Roger Federer.' And he goes 'Nah, nah, I've got a beautiful forehand'. I'm just like 'Ah, okay.' You're a decent player when you can just sit there and do that mid-innings,” Lyon said in a video posted by Cricket Australia.
This was Virat Kohli’s first Test as full-time India red-ball captain and he celebrated the occasion by hitting 115 and 141, but India lost the game by 48 runs.
Having scored six hundreds from 13 Test matches and averaging 54.08, Kohli has historically dominated red-ball cricket in Australia but he has only averaged 22.72 in his six Test matches this season.
Kohli begins his seventh tour to Australia after scoring just 91 runs in India's humiliating 0-3 series loss against New Zealand at home earlier this month.
The 36-year-old Kohli's last Test century came against the West Indies in July 2023, and he has only struck one fifty this year, against New Zealand in the second innings of the first Test at Bengaluru (70).
Up to now, Kohli has participated in two Test matches in Perth. In January 2012, he scored 44 and 75 runs in two innings at the WACA, which Australia won by an innings and 37 runs.
In 2018, Kohli played his second Test match in Perth while serving as captain. At the age of 30, he hit his 25th Test century, making him the first batter to reach the 100 mark at the new Perth venue.