India vs Australia: Ex-cricketers predict when Virat Kohli will end Test century drought

Former India cricketers Sanjay Bangar and Irfan Pathan have predicted when Virat Kohli will score his next century in Test cricket. Both Bangar and Pathan have said that Kohli would want to end his century drought during the upcoming Border-Gavaskar Trophy (Test series) against Australia. Kohli has not scored a century in the format for more than three years. Bangar said Kohli loves to play against Australia and bring his best side as well, adding that he would want to continue his white-ball approach in the longest format. 

"He loves to play against Australia. He loves to have that banter against the Australian players and he raises his game, and Test cricket is a format that brings the best out of Virat Kohli as well. Yes, the last two-and-a-half years haven't been as productive by his standards. So he would want to continue the freshness of approach that he has enjoyed in the T20 and ODI formats and now he would look to transform that into Test cricket as well. So he is going to make a big bang and create an impact in this series as well," Bangar said. 

"Especially, how he plays against the spin. If you see his numbers from 2020 to now in Test cricket, those are embarrassing numbers, for a guy like Virat Kohli who is an absolute legend of Indian and world cricket, having scored nearly 25,000 runs. When you see you can't even have an average of 30 for three years, that's a long period of time, so I think that's one thing he will have on his mind," Pathan said. 

Kohli's last Test century had come in a pink-ball match against Bangladesh in 2019. Since then, Kohli has scored four centuries, all of which have come in white-ball cricket. Kohli ended his century drought in international cricket with a hundred against Afghanistan in the Asia Cup 2022. He then scored his first ODI century in three years, which came against Bangladesh in December 2022. Kohli then scored two more ODI centuries against Sri Lanka in January this year. 

Kohli will next be seen in action during the four-match Test series against Australia starting February 9. The first match will be played in Nagpur, followed by Delhi, Dharamsala, and Ahmedabad. 

India vs Australia: Full squads

India’s Test squad for the first two Tests against Australia: Rohit Sharma (Captain), KL Rahul (vice-captain), Shubman Gill, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, KS Bharat (wk), Ishan Kishan (wk), R. Ashwin, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Ravindra Jadeja, Mohd. Shami, Mohd. Siraj, Umesh Yadav, Jaydev Unadkat, Suryakumar Yadav.

Australia's squad for the Test series against India: Pat Cummins (Captain), Ashton Agar, Scott Boland, Alex Carey (wk), Cameron Green, Josh Hazlewood, Peter Handscomb, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Lance Morris, Todd Murphy, Matthew Renshaw, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc, Mitchell Swepson, David Warner.

Image: AP