"If You Would Have Asked Three Years Ago...": Ricky Ponting On Whether Virat Kohli Can Surpass Sachin Tendulkar's 100-Ton Tally

Surpassing Sachin Tendulkar's feat of 100 international centuries is "possible" for Virat Kohli, Australian great Ricky Ponting has said looking at the Indian superstar's new-found hunger for runs. Kohli recently ended a wait of 1,020 days for his 71st international hundred when he smashed 122 not out off 61 balls against Afghanistan in the Asia Cup earlier this month. "If you would have asked me three years ago, I'd have said yes. But the fact that it has slowed down as much as it did... yeah, I still think that it is possible for him, there's no doubt," Ponting said on The ICC Review.

"Look, I'll never say never with Virat, because you know once he gets on a bit of a roll, you know how hungry he is and how keen for success he is. I'll never say never that's for sure," the two-time Aussie World Cup winning skipper said.

In the course of his century, Kohli equalled Ponting's feat of 71 tons. Kohli has now only one name on the list of most centuries above him -- Tendulkar.

Thirty international centuries may be a lot, but Ponting said: "I still think he has got a number of years ahead of him, but I guess to still be 30 international hundreds behind, that's a lot.

"That's five or six Test hundreds a year, maybe for the next three or four years. If you throw a couple of one-day ones, maybe the odd T20 ones on top of it," the 47-year-old added.

With Kohli back to his best, a debate doing the rounds now is whether he should open in place of KL Rahul, who has struggled to get into rhythm after coming back from an injury layoff.

Kohli has opened for India in nine T20Is, scoring 400 runs at an average of 57.14 with a superb strike rate of 161.29.

"The question we're going to keep asking is -- well I'm sure, the Indian selectors