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With a glorious start to India's Test captaincy, Shubman Gill continued to level and topple records with a blistering hundred against the West Indies during the second Test at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in the national capital on Saturday.
Since Gill took over the leadership duties from his predecessor, Rohit Sharma, runs have effortlessly flown from his bat. During his second captaincy assignment, Gill continued to ride high on his scorching form against the Caribbean side. On the second day of the final fixture of the series, the 26-year-old brought up his fifth Test ton since donning the skipper's hat. Gill's tally is the most by a player in the year they first began captaining their country. He also levelled stalwart Virat Kohli's record for most Test hundreds as a captain in a calendar year. The former Test skipper notched five tons each in 2017 and 2018. Gill brought up his fifth red-ball hundred in his 12th innings and stands behind icons Alastair Cook (nine innings) and Sunil Gavaskar (10). In terms of matches, Gill took the same number as Australia's legend Don Bradman (seven), while Cook (five) and Gavaskar (six) got to the feat quicker. While revelling in a consistent purple patch, Gill boasts a staggering average of 84.81, second best to Bradman's (101.51) among those who have led their teams at least seven times in Test cricket. India posted 518/5 before declaring their innings and inviting the tourists to bat. After basking in success yet again, Gill returned unbeaten on 129(196), as India's highest run-getter in the World Test Championship history. Gill has garnered 2,826 runs in 39 matches in the WTC at an average of 43.47 and a strike rate of 61.36. With 10 centuries to his name, he also boasts the record for most tons by an Indian in the WTC. For the West Indies, while labouring hard for almost five sessions, there was a period during which their speedsters bowled 318 deliveries but returned wicketless. Before their long toil in Delhi, only twice had West Indies quicks gone wicketless in a Test innings despite bowling 300-plus balls. The first instance was against New Zealand in 1972 at Georgetown (540 balls*), and the second was against Pakistan in 2016 at Dubai (432 balls). (ANI)
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