Virat Kohli made his 35th birthday a memorable one when he smashed a record-equalling ton at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata against South Africa. It was the 37th game of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2023, and India thrashed the Proteas by a record-breaking margin of 243 runs.
It was the biggest defeat for South Africa in its history. South Africa got all out on a tough pitch where India made a massive 326/5 in the first inning. The former Indian captain soaked up all the pressure and scored a fighting hundred. Virat made 101 not out from 121 balls, with ten boundaries.
However, it was the joint-slowest hundred scored by Virat in his ODI career, which took him 119 balls. That was the reason that some even questioned him about playing for his personal milestones. Former Pakistani captain Mohammed Hafeez also targeted Virat and said on a local TV show that it was a selfish innings for personal milestones.
He said, “I saw a sense of selfishness in Virat Kohli’s batting, and this happened for the third time in this World Cup. In the 49th over, he was looking to take a single to reach his own hundred, and he didn’t put the team first.“
He also compared Rohit Sharma, who played a 24-ball 40-run innings at the top and took the charge. Hafeez said that Rohit could have gone for a big score, but he is playing for the team, not for his personal stats.
However, the par score at the pitch was around 226 and India posted 100 runs more than the par score. Other batters played well around Virat while he was playing an anchor role. Shreyas Iyer scored 77 off 87, and Ravindra Jadeja scored a 15-ball 29 runs. In reply, South Africa got all out for 83 runs. Jadeja took 5/33, while Mohammed Shami and Kuldeep Yadav took two wickets each.
