Kohli smashes 31st ton, next only to Tendulkar now

The India skipper surpassed Ricky Ponting (30) to record the most number of hundreds in ODI cricket after the Little Master (49); he is also the second player to smash a ton in his 200th game.

India skipper Virat Kohli raises his bat after his century against New Zealand at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai on Sunday.

India skipper Virat Kohli overtook Ricky Ponting in the list of most ODI tons (30) — after smashing his 31st hundred (121 off 125 balls) in the first one-dayer of the three-match series against New Zealand — at the Wankhede Stadium here on Sunday. The 28-year-old is the only cricketer behind the legendary Sachin Tendulkar (49 hundreds) in the elite list currently.

Read: Matching Tendulkar will take a hell of an effort, acknowledges Kohli

The right-handed batsman created another record with his ton. The hundred came in his 200th cap for Team India. He is the second player to have achieved the milestone, the first being AB de Villiers (South Africa).

Kohli took 192 innings to score the ton. Ponting, the former Australia skipper, had reached his 30th ton in his 349th appearance.

Now, the Indian is only 18 hundreds away from touching the maestro’s record, who hung up his ODI boots in 2012 with 18,426 runs in 463 innings, which also included 96 half-centuries.

Earlier, Kohli had overtaken Sanath Jayasuriya (28), Kumar Sangakkara (25), Sourav Ganguly (22) and Tillakaratne Dilshan (22).

With most of the players in the honours board being formers, Kohli has little competition.