Virat Kohli stamped his authority in the historic pink-ball Test against Bangladesh as the India captain chalked up his 27th Test century at Eden Gardens on Saturday. It was his 20th Test century as captain in just 86 innings, as he passed Ricky Ponting on the list, who had 19 centuries to his name.

Kohli is now only behind Greame Smith, who has 25 Test tons as South Africa captain, albeit in 193 innings. He reached the milestone in 141 innings, incidentally the exact number of innings a certain Sachin Tendulkar took to score his 27th Test ton.

His latest three-figure score also means that Virat Kohli now has 41 centuries as captain across formats, a record he shares with Ricky Ponting.

It was also his 70th international century, making him only the third batsman after Sachin Tendulkar and Ricky Ponting to have that many centuries in international cricket.

During this innings, Kohli also scored 5000 Test runs as India captain, the only one to reach this milestone and also the fastest. Post a lean 2013-14 season, the Delhi lad has been ultra-consistent and this can be seen in his conversion rates.

Kohli is one of the few batsmen to have more Test centuries (27) than fifties, giving him a conversion rate of 55.1%, second only to the great Don Bradman, who had one of 69%. It still puts Kohli above the likes of Matthew Hayden, Younus Khan and Martin Crowe and also famed contemporary, Steve Smith (49.1% conversion rate).

If all of those statistics weren’t enough, Virat Kohli became only the fourth Indian batsman to have Test centuries in India’s premier venues- Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru and Kolkata.

Needless to say, Kohli is also India’s first centurion in a Day/Night Test, and he achieved the feat exactly 13 years after his debut First-class game, a milestone he shares with Delhi and India teammate, Ishant Sharma.

 

Featured image courtesy: Twitter/ @ICC

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