In the Champions Trophy 2025, Virat Kohli’s game-winning century against Pakistan at the Dubai International Stadium has earned acclaim from former Indian cricketer Navjot Singh Sidhu. With a six-wicket victory secured by Kohli’s tough performance, India unofficially guaranteed their place in the eight-team tournament’s semi-finals.
In addition, Kohli achieved some incredible milestones on his way to his 51st ODI century. He became the fastest hitter to amass 14,000 ODI runs, surpassing Sachin Tendulkar’s long-standing record of 350 innings in the 287th innings. Also, Kohli joined Tendulkar and Kumar Sangakkara on the exclusive list of hitters with 14,000 ODI runs.
After India hosted Bangladesh and New Zealand during a quiet home Test season, Kohli’s form came under intense criticism. In Australia, he continued to struggle in the 2024–25 Border-Gavaskar Trophy, scoring 190 runs in nine innings, 100 of which came in the second innings in the Perth series opener.
The knock against Pakistan, in Sidhu’s opinion, might have made it possible to obtain “an additional 10 or 15 hundreds.” The latest match against Pakistan was Kohli’s 81st century in international cricket, making him second only to Tendulkar (100).
“Character is displayed, not created in a crisis. Virat Kohli is a man with passion and a long lineage. And after this 100, I can tell with confidence that this man will continue to play for another two or three years, earning another ten or fifteen hundred. You take that from me,” Sidhu said to Star Sports.
Because, you see, a person’s ability to handle hardship and accept adversity is the true test of his character. He picked his moment because there has been so much going on over the past six months. People will remember the runs he scored against Pakistan for ten years,” he continued.
Virat Kohli is the kind of guy that does everything: Sanjay Bangar
Sanjay Bangar, a former cricket player for India and a co-panellist on Sidhu, praised Kohli for his commitment to the game.
I believe it’s more about his diligence and commitment to the game than it is about the effort I put in. For the simple reason that he is a man who does everything possible to prepare. He understood he needed to take charge. “You could see it in his body language that he brought that intensity to his game,” Bangar added.
“You could tell that fire was blazing there by the way his eyes lit up. He was ravenous, and boy, oh boy! Today’s innings made it easy to agree with Navjot Singh Sidhu’s statement that there will be another three to four years of international cricket. Therefore, he continued, “you get a master class like this if you can maintain that side of standards in terms of execution of pure skill and intent.”
Bangar also evaluated Kohli’s actions to rectify the drought and return to his previous level of performance. He emphasized that Kohli let the ball come to him, in contrast to all of his recent innings when he would want to hit the ball hard.
He probably waited for today’s ball. He was always ahead, therefore he didn’t really do that. He was his active self, willing to cover the infield as well, and waited for the ball to come to him. But from what I could see in the opening half of his innings, he was playing a lot of the back foot here against spin. After gaining that confidence, he began to come forward.
He moved forward to rotate his left arm and then spin it off. But he was glad to stay back against leg spin. However, he began to gain the upper hand as well as he sort of figured him out. Thus, beginning on the back foot and then progressively moving to the front foot as well.
India
