However, such is the greatness of the man, that the Delhite has still not matched the celestial expectations given his abilities. Kohli presently has 43 ODI centuries and 27 Test hundreds to his name, with his tally of 70 being only second best in the game's history to Sachin Tendulkar's astronomical 100 hundreds. The fact that the top-order batter was always aware of the heights he could scale speaks volumes about the sheer confidence he has in his abilities. Oakley head of marketing Ashwin Krishnan has revealed a 24-year-old Virat Kohli had confidently claimed he would match Sachin's record of 49 ODI centuries since he only had to score 40 more at the time.

"That Virat Kohli's one-day record is phenomenal is an understatement. And he is inching closer to that record of Sachin's - whether he gets there or not that's not the point. I will tell you a little story. In 2013, we went to sign Virat in LA, for Oakley. And we were sitting there. Virat had come with his manager Bunty and I had come down from Mumbai. I was doing the Champions League and has gone down just to sign him. And sitting there, as a 24-year-old with 9 ODI hundreds under his belt, he sat down and said, 'One-Day mein toh main paaji (Sachin) ko pakad loonga. Paaji had 49 hundreds," he told Jamie Alter on his Glance chat show, The Alternate View.

Perhaps the best part of the tale is that not once did anyone doubt Kohli's potential to achieve what he said. After all, in 2019 he looked to be cruising well beyond Tendulkar's record having stacked up 43 centuries in the 50-over-format at the raw age of 31. It looked like a mere formality for him to become the first cricketer ever to reach the magic figure of 50 centuries but a drop in form has since kept the man from adding to his tally. Nevertheless, there's still a long road ahead for Kohli given his fitness levels and should he pick up his form anytime soon, there is no doubting he will end up getting what he desired.