New Delhi: Virat Kohli made his long-awaited return to ODI cricket on Friday in the series opener against Sri Lanka in Colombo. Although the star Indian batter has a remarkable record at the R. Premadasa Stadium, yet he could not muster score runs as expected.
Kohli contributed 24 runs in the first ODI match, which ended in a tie as the hosts made a superb comeback in the game to stop India at the same score. In his first ODI appearance since the ODI World Cup 2023 final against Australia, Kohli took his run tally in the 50-over format to 13,872. With this, he reached closer to achieving a big milestone in the ODI format of the game.
Virat Kohli on cusp of major milestone
Just months after surpassing Sachin Tendulkar’s record for most ODI centuries, Kohli now has his sights set on another of Tendulkar’s long-standing records. During the ongoing series against the Lankan side, Kohli needs only 128 runs to break Tendulkar’s 18-year-old record for most runs scored in ODI cricket.
The batter is poised to become only the third player in history to reach the big milestone of 14000 runs in ODI cricket. If the 35-year-old prolific player does so, he will follow the footsteps of cricket legends Tendulkar and former Sri Lanka skipper Kumar Sangakkara.
Apart from this, the star Indian batter will also become the fastest player to reach this remarkable record in the 50-over format in terms of number of innings taken. Kohli has till now played 293 innings and he will anyways achieve the significant milestone in lesser number of innings as Tendulkar had achieved the feat in 350 innings while Sangakkara got to the mark in 378 ODI innings.
The second ODI of the series will be played on August 4, Sunday.
Star Indian batter Virat Kohli is on the cusp of breaking a massive record record in ODIs during the ongoing series against Sri Lanka. Cricket Sports News: Latest Cricket News, Cricket Live Score, Sports Breaking News from Sports Today