Babar Azam Officially Overtakes Virat Kohli in ODI Cricket

Babar Azam vs Virat Kohli is the hottest debate in cricketing circles for quite some time. Every cricket fan, especially in the subcontinent, wants to have a piece of it.

They are the two of the most liked modern cricketers in their respective countries. While Kohli is a superstar with thousands of runs and so many international centuries under his belt, Babar is slowly matching his stardom with match-winning performances.

The main difference between Babar Azam and Virat Kohli is their seniority in the game. By the time Babar played his first international match for Pakistan, Kohli had already appeared in more than 150 One-Day Internationals and had 20 plus centuries to his name. Despite this, Babar has now has a better ODI average than Kohli.

Let’s take a closer look at how the stats stack up when we compare two of cricket’s modern greats:

Babar Azam vs Virat Kohli ODI Stats

Having played over 250 ODIs, Kohli maintains a 58+ average with a strike rate of 92.92. He is only one of the six players in history to have amassed over 12,000 runs in the format, scoring 12,311 runs to date. He is also the fastest player to reach the 12,000-run mark, having done so in just 251 matches.

On the flip side, Babar has recently overcome Kohli’s numbers in terms of average. The second consecutive hundred against Australia in Lahore helped Babar leapfrog Kohli’s ODI average. In 84 innings, Pakistan’s all-format captain has scored over 4,261 runs with an average of 59.18 and a strike rate of 90.29. He recently became the fastest Asian batter, and the second-fastest in the world, to reach 4,000 ODI runs in just 82 innings. His Indian counterpart took 93 innings to achieve this feat.

Here are is a statistical comparison of two modern greats in ODIs:

Babar Azam vs Virat Kohli ODI Stats

Player	Matches	Runs	Average	Strike Rate	100s	50s
Virat Kohli	260	12,311	58.07	92.96	43	64
Babar Azam	86	4,261	59.18	90.29	16	18