"It never seemed that he was out of form" - Sunil Gavaskar on Virat Kohli ending his century drought in the 4th IND vs AUS Test

Sunil Gavaskar has highlighted that Virat Kohli's hundred in the fourth and final Test of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy was only a much-needed milestone achieved as the modern batting great was always in form.

Kohli scored 186 runs off 364 deliveries as India posted a mammoth 571 in their first essay at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad on Sunday (March 12) in response to Australia's first-innings score of 480. The visitors ended the day at three for no loss, trailing Rohit Sharma and Co. by 88 runs heading into the final day of the series.

During a discussion on Star Sports, Gavaskar was asked about his thoughts on Virat Kohli scoring a much-awaited Test century, to which he responded:

"Every great batter thinks about a hundred. A century is the minimum price he keeps for his wicket. The way Kohli was batting in the last two-and-a-half years when he didn't score a century, he was batting well, scored seven or eight fifties."

He added:

"So it never seemed that he was out of form. The only thing that was happening was that he was getting out on his first mistake."

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The former Indian skipper felt Kohli paced his innings perfectly, explaining:

"It was like how a Test match century should be constructed. He started slightly slowly, where he was trying to figure out the pitch and the bowling. Then he played a few shots after getting set and tried to play even more shots after he had scored a century."

Kohli reached his hundred off 241 deliveries, hitting only five fours in the process. He was slightly more aggressive thereafter, with 10 boundaries coming from his blade post his century.

"It shows how determined he was" - Sunil Gavaskar on Virat Kohli hitting just 5 fours in his first 100 runs

Virat Kohli was most aggressive against Mitchell Starc. [P/C: BCCI]

Sunil Gavaskar was further asked about his views on Virat Kohli hitting just five fours before he reached his hundred, to which he replied:

"It shows how determined he was. He knew that India were quite far behind Australia, who had scored a mountain of runs. 480 runs is a big score. So India had to reach near that score."

The cricketer-turned-commentator concluded by observing that Kohli drew inspiration from the centuries scored by Usman Khawaja, Cameron Green and Shubman Gill, and ensured that India got into a dominant position, elaborating:

"He had seen that Usman Khawaja played a 180-run knock and Cameron Green scored a century for Australia, and Shubman Gill played a 128-run knock. This was a good opportunity for him to play a big knock so that the Indian team reaches close to 480 and then they can put a little pressure on Australia tomorrow after crossing 480."

Highest scores of Virat Kohli against each opposition in Tests:

South Africa - 254*
Sri Lanka - 243
England - 235
New Zealand - 211
Bangladesh - 204
West Indies - 200
Australia - 186

Kohli missed the world record by just 14 runs, double hundred against 7 countries. https://t.co/Tm0hnzHKvF

Kohli strung together a 162-run sixth-wicket partnership with Axar Patel (79) to give India a crucial 91-run first-innings lead. The Indian batting mainstay ran out of partners thereafter and was slightly unfortunate to miss out on a double century.