After India clinched a historic victory in Centurion in the first Test, Proteas bounced back in some style as they registered their first-ever win over India in Johannesburg on Thursday (January 6).
Chasing a total of 240, the South Africa showed incredible grit and courage to hunt down the target with seven wickets in hand, on the back of a brilliant captain’s knock from Dean Elgar (96 not out off 188).
Team India must have missed it's regular Test captain Virat Kohli's presence as he has never lost a Test match whenever India set a 150+ target.
King Kohli's unbeatable feat
Virat Kohli as a Test captain when India set 150+ target:
27 - Matches
25 - Won
2 - Draw
0 - Lost
But KL Rahul, the stand-in skipper for the second Test match against South Africa, remained hapless by conceding in his very first Test match as a skipper.
However, Rahul became the 34th captain to lead India in the longest version of the game. Rahul is also the 4th India Test captain from Karnataka after Gundappa Viswanath, Rahul Dravid and Anil Kumble.
He created history and joined the likes of Mohammad Azharuddin, Sunil Gavaskar, Bishan Singh Bedi, Ajit Wadekar in a unique list of Indian cricketers to have captained the Test team before leading India in limited-overs cricket. Rahul is the first player to do the same since Azharuddin in 1990.
Nonetheless, the 29-year old failed to spur India past South Africa so as to make it more memorable which would have helped him earn more records to his name.
Kohli's impeccable record as a Test Captain
On the other hand, King Kohli, has been a brilliant ambassador for Test cricket globally in the way he has led transformation in the Indian Test team. India also reached the final of the inaugural World Test Championship in 2021.
Under Kohli's captaincy, India won its maiden Test series in Australia in 2018-19 after 71 years since 1948. It was under Kohli's leadership that India was crowned as the No.1 Test team in the ICC Rankings for a continuous period of 42 months from October 2016 till early March 2020.
Let's have a look at some of Kohli's record as a Test captain:
67 – Kohli holds the record for most Test matches as captain for India. Virat Kohli played his 61st Test match as Captain in the World Test Championship Final against New Zealand. He surpassed MS Dhoni's tally of 60 Tests as India Captain.
40– With 40 wins in Test matches, Kohli is the most successful Indian Test captain. He has leapfrogged some of India's most successful captains in Test cricket with utmost ease. He's followed by MS Dhoni with 27 wins as captain.
24 – Virat Kohli now has the most Test wins at home for India. India's victory in the Mumbai Test against New Zealand was Kohli's 24th Test win at home. Kohli went past MS Dhoni's tally of 21 Test wins at home as India skipper.
20 – Kohli has scored most Test centuries for India as captain. With 20 centuries since being an Indian Test skipper, Kohli is only behind Graeme Smith (25) with most Test hundreds as captain. In the last couple of years, Virat has failed to add to his tally of Test centuries. His last Test ton came against Bangladesh in India's first-ever Pink-Ball Test in 2019.
7 – Kohli has scored seven double centuries in his Test career. Coincidentally, all of his Test double tons have come during his tenure as captain. This also puts him first on the list of most double centuries for any Test captain.
1 – Kohli also holds the record for scoring most Test runs for India as captain. In 67 Tests so far, Virat has scored 5756 runs at an average of 54.82 including a highest score of 254 not out against South Africa.
