Star India batter Virat Kohli ended his much-talked-about century drought in the longest format on Day 4 of the fourth Test against Australia at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad.
The former skipper scored 186, helping the hosts take a crucial first-innings lead of 91 runs. It was the 28th hundred of his Test career and his first since November 2019.
Speaking with Star Sports at the end of the fourth day’s play, batting legend Sunil Gavaskar said it never seemed like Kohli was out of form but was getting out on his first mistake.
"Every great batter thinks about a hundred. A century is the minimum price he keeps for his wicket. The way Kohli was batting in the last two-and-a-half years when he didn't score a century, he was batting well, scored seven or eight fifties. So it never seemed that he was out of form. The only thing that was happening was that he was getting out on his first mistake,” Gavaskar stated.
In particular, Gavaskar was impressed with the way Kohli constricted his innings. He started off slowly and absorbed the pressure before going on to complete his three-figure mark.
After reaching the landmark, Virat put a pedal on the accelerator and started hitting boundaries regularly. His 364-ball marathon knock was studded with 15 fours.
"It was like how a Test match century should be constructed. He started slightly slowly, where he was trying to figure out the pitch and the bowling. Then he played a few shots after getting set and tried to play even more shots after he had scored a century. It shows how determined he was,” Gavaskar said.
"He knew that India were quite far behind Australia, who had scored a mountain of runs. He had seen that Usman Khawaja played a 180-run knock and Cameron Green scored a century for Australia, and Shubman Gill played a 128-run knock. This was a good opportunity for him to play a big knock so that the Indian team reaches close to 480,” he further remarked.
Coming to the match, Australia did well to survive six overs without losing a wicket in their second innings. The visitors were 3/0 at stumps on Day 4.
