Picture Credit: BCCI/IPL
Virat Kohli, the former India captain, has announced his retirement from Test cricket on Monday, May 12, in a sudden turn of events, putting an end to a glittering career in the longest format of the game. After making his Test debut in 2011, Virat Kohli went on to play more than 100 Test matches for the Indian cricket team during his near 14-year journey in the format, creating lasting memories, not just as a player, but also as the captain of the side.
The start to the Test career of Virat Kohli wasn’t a smooth one following his debut match, beginning on June 20, 2011, against West Indies in Kingston, Jamaica, scoring only a couple of fifties in his first 12 innings. But then, he successfully took on the challenge of Australia on their own turf at the start of 2012, bringing up his debut hundred in Adelaide, and it led to his journey in the longest format of the game skyrocketing, especially with the departure of few of the senior players.
Following his struggles against England on the 2014 Test tour, Virat Kohli went on to dominate the longest format of the game for many years, scoring more than 1,000 runs each year from 2016 to 2018, which solidified his status as the best batter in the world at the time. He also took the captaincy of the Indian Test team full-time during those years, not only making them a dominant force at home, but ensured that they competed well in overseas conditions, including a couple of series wins in Australia, which wasn’t done before.
In 2019, Virat Kohli brought up his highest score in Test cricket, staying unbeaten after scoring 254 runs against South Africa in Pune during a time when he was at the peak of his power in all formats of the game. Following the advent of COVID-19 in the year 2020, his career graph went down in the Test format, but he still managed to produce quality innings from time to time in India and overseas as well.
Below are the stats of Virat Kohli in Test cricket:
|
Tests |
Innings |
Not Outs |
Runs |
BBI |
Average |
Strike-rate |
100s |
50s |
|
123 |
210 |
13 |
9230 |
254* |
46.85 |
55.57 |
30 |
31 |
Following his retirement from the T20 format after winning the T20 World Cup last year, Virat Kohli’s international career was slowly but surely starting to wind down. But now, the speculations on his retirement from Test cricket has brought the eventuality of him never playing for the Indian cricket team closer than ever before, although the fans can now see him compete for the national side in ODI cricket for a foreseeable future.
