Former India head coach Ravi Shastri put it aptly by saying a “600kg gorilla is off his back now” when Virat Kohli smashed a stunning Test century on Day 4 of the fourth Test against Australia to end his 3-year-long wait.
In fact, Kohli looked good to register a double century however, he eventually returned to the pavilion after scoring 186 runs off 364 balls, smashing 15 boundaries. Marnus Labuschagne caught him off Todd Murphy in the 179th over.
Virat Kohli Talked About His Century Drought
All thanks to his knock Team India surpassed Australia’s first innings total of 480 and took a lead to put the pressure back on the visitors.
Meanwhile, after the fourth Test match resulted in a draw with team India winning the 4-match series by 2-1 to take the Border-Gavaskar Trophy for the fourth time in a row, former India captain and current head coach Rahul Dravid asked Kohli about his feelings of not being able to score a century for such a long time in the longest-format.
Speaking in an interview for the BCCI.Tv, Rahul Dravid asked: “I know you are someone who takes a lot of pride in his performance and has that habit of scoring 100 regularly. I know there was COVID, so, not a lot of Test matches but has it been hard not to have scored a Test hundred (for this long)? I know we get a little obsessed with numbers. I’ve loved seeing some of the other innings. Even the 70 in Cape Town was a really good innings. But has (not scoring a hundred) been at the back of your mind?”
Responding to the same, Kohli said that he is never happy with the 40s or 50s. He said:
“Honestly, I’ve let the complications grow on me a bit because of my shortcomings. The desperation to get to the three-figure mark is something that can grow on you as a batsman. I let that happen to me to a certain extent. But a flip side to it is, I’m not a guy who is happy with 40-45. I take a lot of pride in performing for the team. It’s not like when Virat Kohli should stand out. When I’m batting on 40, I know I can get a 150. That was eating me up a lot. Why am I not able to get that big score for the team? Because I took pride in the fact that when the team needed me, I stood up, scoring in difficult conditions. The fact that I wasn’t able to do that, was bothering me,”
With this century, Kohli went past Virender Sehwag, Dilip Vengsarkar, and Mohammad Azharuddin. However, he said it is never about the milestones for him. He said:
“It was never about the milestones. A lot of people ask me, ‘how do you keep scoring those hundreds’. And I always say a hundred is something that happens along the way within my goal, which is to bat as long as possible for my team. But yeah, if I’m brutally honest, it does become a little difficult as the moment you step out of the hotel room, right from the guy outside, to the guy in the lift, the bus driver everyone is saying ‘we want a hundred’. So, it does play on your mind all the time but that’s also the beauty of playing for so long to have these complications come up and overcome these challenges,”
A conversation full of calmness, respect & inspiration written all over it! 😊 🙌
A special post series-win chat with #TeamIndia Head Coach Rahul Dravid & @imVkohli at the Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad 👍 👍 – By @RajalArora
FULL INTERVIEW 🔽 #INDvAUShttps://t.co/nF0XfltRg2 pic.twitter.com/iHU1jZ1CKG
— BCCI (@BCCI) March 14, 2023