Babar Azam played a key role in Pakistan’s five-wicket win by scoring a century in the first ODI against West Indies late on 8 June 2022. The captain of the Pakistan cricket team played an innings of 103 runs in 107 balls with the help of 9 fours. He scored this third consecutive One Day International century. With this, he also became the first batsman in the world to score three consecutive centuries in One Day Internationals twice.
Not only this, he also made Virat Kohli’s world record for the fastest 1000 ODI runs as a captain. Virat Kohli completed 1000 runs in 17 ODI innings as a captain. He had achieved this feat in his name in 2017. Kohli then broke the record of former South African captain AB de Villiers. Babar Azam touched the 1000 runs mark in 13 ODI innings as a captain.
Talking about the recent performance of Virat Kohli and Babar Azam, on the one hand, the former captain of the Indian cricket team has not scored an international century for the last 31 months. At the same time, Babar Azam has been successful in scoring 11 centuries during this period.
Virat Kohli scored his last international century in November 2019. It was a red ball cricket match between India and Bangladesh played at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata. In that match, Virat Kohli scored 136 runs in 194 balls with the help of 18 fours. He also became the first batsman to score a century for India in red ball cricket.
Virat Kohli has not been able to score a single century since then. However, he scored 2614 runs in 64 international matches at an average of 39.01. It also includes his 24 half-centuries. Virat Kohli has so far scored 23650 runs in 458 international matches at an average of 54.11. This includes his 70 centuries.
Babar Azam has scored 11 centuries since November 2019. This includes his 4 Tests, 6 ODIs and a T20 International century. Babar Azam scored 3797 runs in 69 international matches at an average of 56.67 during this period. It also includes his 27 half-centuries.
Overall, Babar Azam has scored 9901 runs in 201 matches at an average of 51.03 since he started his international career in 2015. This includes his 24 centuries. Which is much less than the average Virat Kohli.