Border-Gavaskar Trophy: Shades of Tendulkar's epic 241 at Sydney in Kohli's ton

Virat Kohli had a disarming smile at the end of it all He had just dispatched a Nathan Lyon delivery towards midwicket for a singleThe 40month wait is over and Kohli has finally got his 28th Test hundredThere were no clenched fists no imaginary uppercut like a pro boxer and no giant leap in celebration There wasnt any customary cuss word eitherInstead there was just relief written all over his face Kohli kissed his wedding ring tied to his necklace and acknowledged the crowd unlike when he had completed a halfcenturyDuring those 40 long months Test runs dried up and average dipped to a lowly 25 There was criticism all around and his legion of fans were kept waiting for the day when he would play a special knock to warm their heartsGreat players have the knack of conquering the odds and on Sunday Kohli crossed a major hurdle with the fighting spirit of a championAlso Read IND VS AUS Bat first pad first But Virat Kohli had to goKohli had to channelise his inner Muhammad Ali who won the scrappy 12round tactical battle against Joe Frazier in 1974It wasnt Kohli the firefighter who hit a spectacular straight six against Pakistans Haris Rauf at the MCG during the T20 World Cup last year It was the scrappy Kohli who was only looking at the threefigure mark at any costThe Sydney discipline of TendulkarOn Sunday Kolhi looked less like himself and more like Sachin Tendulkar the man who didnt hit a cover drive till he had scored 200 against the Brett Leeled Australian attack at Sydney in 2004In terms of joy and spectacle that Kohlis centuries are meant to be the one in Ahmedabad would come lower down the pecking order perhaps not even among his his top20 Test hundredsA look at Kohlis wagon wheel till he completed his 100 would look eerily similar to Tendulkars wagon wheel in 2004Kohli stopped reaching out for deliveries outside offstump The cover drive hardly came out of the closet and he was only willing whip deliveries outside offstump in the arc between square leg and deep midwicketSample this little statistical nugget Kohli hit the fifth boundary of his innings off the 89th delivery he faced and the sixth boundary came off the 251st deliveryThere were 162 deliveries 27 overs in the interim including one full session between fourth days morning session that he faced and didnt hit a single fourFrom his individual score of 60 till he reached the century mark there were only singles and doubles It was arguably one of his slowest hundreds and came off 241 ballsIt wasnt as if he didnt play through the offside but it was more close to the body and just trying to tap it for singles save one off Matt Kuhnemann on the third evening which he hit for a boundaryOnce the monkey was off his back the customary Kohli panache was back and the boundaries flowedHe stopped reaching for deliveries even when Mitchell Starc angled one across or when Cameron Green bowled in the fourth or fifth stump channelThe first expansive cover drive came when he was on 145 Kohli reached out to a wide halfvolley from Green to get a boundary through extra cover The next delivery was a signature Kohli ondrive which took him to 150 The celebrations were even more muted compared to when he had reached his hundredThis time he didnt even take off his helmetThe testimony to Kohlis fitness was running a three with Axar Patel when he was in his 160sMotera over the years has seen some major milestones with Sunil Gavaskars 10000th run and Kapil Devs then world record 432nd Test wicket being a few of themKohlis knock on Sunday will certainly joint that list