Our Bureau
New Delhi
Indian skipper Shubman Gill has etched his name in cricketing history by equaling Virat Kohli’s rare record of scoring five Test centuries in a single calendar year as captain, by scoring hundred in the second Test against the West Indies at Delhi’s Arun Jaitley Stadium. Gill’s superb 129 not out—his maiden Test century on home soil as captain—caps a prolific run that began with four centuries on India’s recent tour of England, making him only the second Indian captain after Kohli to achieve this milestone.
Kohli had previously accomplished the feat twice, in 2017 and 2018, and Gill’s achievement stands out for its swiftness: he needed just 12 innings as captain to reach five hundred, notably faster than Kohli, who required 18. Globally, only Alastair Cook (9 innings) and Sunil Gavaskar (10 innings) have done it quicker as captains. Gill’s milestone is particularly significant given the illustrious Indian captains who did not manage the same—Rohit Sharma, Sourav Ganguly, and Rahul Dravid among them.
The recent India-West Indies Test series has underlined India’s batting dominance. Of the 25 centuries scored in the last 14 matches between the two sides since 2013, 23 have come from Indian batters, with Roston Chase the lone West Indian to reach the mark twice. Gill, who took over as captain after Rohit Sharma’s retirement from Test cricket, has led from the front, steering India through transition with both bat and tactical acumen.
His landmark innings and India’s emphatic performance in the series underscore both his individual brilliance and the team’s continued supremacy in world Test cricket.
