49 Fun Facts About Virat Kohli

Which Bollywood actress did Kohli marry in December 2017 at a private ceremony in Tuscany, Italy?

Anushka Sharma and Kohli first met on a shampoo commercial shoot, and the Indian press fused their names into the couple's nickname, "Virushka".

Kohli's 76 in the 2024 T20 World Cup final, his last T20 international, came against which team?

South Africa lost by seven runs in Bridgetown, where Kohli, without a fifty all tournament, made his 76 when it mattered most and was named player of the match.

Whose record of 49 ODI centuries did Kohli overtake at the 2023 World Cup, with his 50th hundred?

Sachin Tendulkar was watching from the stands in Mumbai when the 50th hundred came in the semi-final, and Kohli turned and bowed to him from the middle.

Whose mid-series retirement in Australia in December 2014 made Kohli India's permanent Test captain?

MS Dhoni cited the strain of playing all formats, and the board announced his exit in a statement straight after the drawn Melbourne Test, with one match of the series left.

Which shirt number does Kohli wear for India, echoed in the name of his own lifestyle brand?

18 was just the number Kohli was handed with India's Under-19s, but he came to call it fated: his India debut fell on 18 August 2008 and his father died on 18 December 2006.

Which team did Kohli's RCB beat by six runs in the 2025 IPL final to win their first title?

Punjab Kings fell short chasing 191 in Ahmedabad, and Kohli, top scorer with 43 for a side beaten in three earlier finals, was in tears before the last ball was bowled.

What nickname, made famous by a wicketkeeper's chatter on the stump mic, do teammates use for Kohli?

Cheeku came from a Delhi coach who thought a cropped haircut made young Kohli's cheeks and ears stand out, like the rabbit in the Champak comics.

Which stroke does Kohli consider his signature, despite a known weakness to balls wide of off stump?

The cover drive tempts Kohli into reaching for wide balls, and in the 2024-25 Tests in Australia he was out again and again edging outside off stump to the slips.

As of 2026, Kohli is the most-followed Asian on which social media platform, with over 250 million followers?

Instagram is where a 2023 report claimed Kohli earned over 11 crore rupees for every sponsored post, a figure he publicly dismissed as untrue.

Which magazine placed Kohli on its 2018 list of the world's 100 most influential people?

Time ran a tribute praising how Kohli answered criticism after a poor series by going home to rebuild both his technique and his fitness.

Which national award did Kohli share with weightlifter Mirabai Chanu in 2018?

The Khel Ratna is India's highest sporting honour; it still carried Rajiv Gandhi's name when Kohli received it, three years before it was renamed for hockey great Dhyan Chand.

At which position in the batting order does Kohli customarily walk in for India in ODIs?

Number three became Kohli's home only after an ODI debut as an opener in 2008, and in January 2026 he passed Ricky Ponting for the most ODI runs ever made from that spot.

Which dietary change did Kohli make in 2018 to ease a cervical spine problem caused by uric acid?

Kohli went vegetarian after a trapped nerve left his little finger tingling and made it hard to bat; he said high uric acid was drawing calcium from his bones.

Which IPL award did Kohli win in both 2016 and 2024?

The Orange Cap goes to the season's leading run-scorer; Kohli's second came in a year when RCB lost seven of their first eight games, then won six in a row to reach the play-offs.

From which format did Kohli retire in May 2025, after 123 matches and 30 centuries?

Test cricket lost Kohli at 36, and he ended his farewell post with the words '#269, signing off', the number on his India Test cap.

Which tyre company's logo is on Kohli's bat, in one of the most lucrative bat deals in cricket?

MRF renewed Kohli's bat deal in 2017 for a reported 100 crore rupees over eight years, a huge jump from the 8 crore it had paid for the previous three.

What was the profession of Kohli's father, Prem Nath, who died suddenly in December 2006?

A criminal lawyer, Prem Kohli once refused an official's hint for 'a little extra' to get his son picked for a Delhi junior side, saying Virat would be chosen on merit or not at all.

Kohli has said that batting in shoes of which colour is a superstition of his?

White shoes are a habit Kohli owned up to in a 2020 live video chat with Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola: 'It's more of a superstition for me.'

Which India captain retired from T20 internationals the same night as Kohli, after the 2024 final?

Rohit Sharma lifted the trophy and quit the format the same night as Kohli, and Ravindra Jadeja followed a day later, three retirements from one winning eleven.

Which country hosted the 2008 Under-19 World Cup that Kohli captained India to win?

Malaysia staged the rain-hit final in Kuala Lumpur, and the title earned Kohli his first IPL contract, signed with RCB.

Kohli's century on World Cup debut came in the 2011 tournament's opening match against which team?

Bangladesh had helped knock India out of the 2007 World Cup, and four years on India made it a revenge game: 370 for 4 in Mirpur, with Kohli unbeaten on 100.

Kohli made his Test debut in June 2011, with several senior batters missing, against which team?

West Indies kept Kohli to 76 runs in five innings in his first series, yet seven months later he made India's only century of a 4-0 defeat in Australia.

Against which side was Kohli batting for Delhi when his father died overnight, before he made 90?

Karnataka were the opponents in a December 2006 Ranji Trophy match; Kohli, unbeaten on 40 overnight, batted on to 90 and only then left for his father's funeral.

Which coach took on Kohli at the newly founded West Delhi Cricket Academy in 1998, when he was nine?

Rajkumar Sharma met the Kohlis on the day the academy opened, when Virat's father brought both his sons along; the elder, Vikas, soon fell away while Virat surged ahead.

At which ground did Kohli make 115 and 141 in December 2014, his first Test as stand-in captain?

Adelaide Oval saw Kohli refuse to settle for a draw: set 364 on the final day, India went for the win and fell 48 runs short, his 141 leading the chase.

Which prize did Kohli lift in 2019 as the first Asian captain to win a Test series in Australia?

The Border-Gavaskar Trophy came with a 2-1 win, 71 years after India's first tour; they even made Australia follow on in the last Test before rain washed out the final day.

Kohli's highest ODI score, 183, came in a 2012 Asia Cup chase of 330 against which team?

Pakistan had made 329 in Dhaka, yet Kohli's 183 off 148 balls won it with 13 balls to spare, though India still failed to reach the final.

Kohli's 254 not out in 2019 took him past which legend's Test tally of 6,996 runs?

Don Bradman needed only 52 Tests for his 6,996 runs, whereas Kohli went past him in his 81st, on the way to the seventh double hundred of his career.

Whose record for India's fastest ODI century did Kohli break with a 52-ball hundred against Australia in 2013?

Virender Sehwag's 60-ball record fell as India made light of a target of 360: all of Australia's top five had passed fifty, and India still won with 39 balls to spare.

In Kohli's record 973-run IPL season of 2016, which teammate shared a 229-run stand with him against Gujarat Lions?

AB de Villiers hit 129 not out as the pair, both centurions, put on their 229 in just 96 balls; Kohli's 973 runs are still the season record, yet RCB lost the final.

Whose record for the most IPL centuries did Kohli pass with back-to-back hundreds in 2023?

Chris Gayle's record of six fell to an unbeaten 101 against Gujarat Titans, but Shubman Gill answered with a hundred of his own and RCB were knocked out that night.

Who took over as RCB captain when Kohli stepped down after the 2021 IPL season?

Faf du Plessis took over in 2022 after Kohli gave up the job to manage a workload he called immense; his nine seasons in charge had brought one final and no title.

Kohli's only T20I century, an unbeaten 122 at the 2022 Asia Cup, came against which team?

Afghanistan conceded Kohli's first hundred in any format for more than 1,000 days, in Dubai, and he went on to top the run charts at that year's T20 World Cup.

Kohli's 117 in the 2023 World Cup semi-final, his 50th ODI century, came against which team?

New Zealand had knocked India out at the same stage in 2019; four years on, Kohli's 117 set up 397 for 4 at the Wankhede and a 70-run win.

Kohli's first series win as Test captain came in 2015 in which country?

Sri Lanka won the first Test, but India took the next two for their first series win there in 22 years; the second Test was the first of Kohli's 40 wins as captain.

Kohli won the ICC's 2019 Spirit of Cricket award for asking Indian fans to stop booing which Australian batter?

Steve Smith was back from a ball-tampering ban and being jeered during the World Cup when Kohli pointed at India's supporters and urged them to clap him instead.

Which men's casual-wear brand did Kohli launch with Anjana Reddy's Universal Sportsbiz?

Wrogn arrived in 2014 with Kohli as its face, and he went on to back it with his own money, investing in its parent company himself.

Which Indian Super League football club has counted Kohli among its co-owners since 2014?

FC Goa appealed to Kohli twice over, he said in 2014: football is his second-favourite sport, and he wanted a business to plan for life after cricket.

Kohli's first Test double century came in 2016 at a stadium named after Viv Richards on which Caribbean island?

Antigua opened the floodgates: Kohli made a double hundred in each of his next three Test series as well, a run no batter had managed before.

Which Australian fast bowler's bouncer hit Kohli on the helmet in 2014, at the start of his 692-run series?

Mitchell Johnson's bouncer came two weeks after Phillip Hughes's death, and the Australians rushed to check on Kohli; he got up to score 115, the first of four centuries in the series.

Kohli captained India in the first World Test Championship final in 2021 at which English ground?

The Rose Bowl in Southampton took the final from Lord's because its on-site hotel let both teams live inside a COVID bubble; India lost there by eight wickets.

Which city hosted Kohli's 100th Test in March 2022, a match that was also Sri Lanka's 300th?

Mohali was first told to stage the milestone behind closed doors, until the board reversed its decision three days before the start and let in a half-capacity crowd.

Kohli's unbeaten 82 at the MCG in the 2022 T20 World Cup turned on two late sixes off which bowler?

Haris Rauf was punched back over his head off the back foot, then flicked over fine leg, with 28 needed from eight balls; India got home in the final over.

Which animal-rights group named Kohli its India Person of the Year in 2019?

PETA India cited the letter Kohli sent to officials on its behalf, calling for the release of Malti, an elephant used for rides at Amer Fort who had reportedly been beaten.

Kohli's Mumbai restaurant, opened in 2022, occupies part of the former bungalow of which legendary playback singer?

Kishore Kumar's Juhu bungalow, Gouri Kunj, was leased for the restaurant, and its owners describe the place as their homage to the late singer.

Which England fast bowler dismissed Kohli four times in the 2014 Test series, when he averaged 13.4?

James Anderson had Kohli edging the swinging ball all summer; four years later Kohli went back and topped the series scoring with 593 runs.

Which charity football fixture of Kohli's foundation pits cricketers against Bollywood actors?

The Celebrity Clasico raises money for charity, and in 2017 the cricketers, playing as All Hearts FC under Kohli, beat the actors' All Stars FC 7-3.

What is the name of Kohli's daughter, his first child, born in January 2021?

Vamika, a name associated with the goddess Durga, was kept out of the public eye: her parents asked photographers from the start not to take pictures of her.

India won the rain-shortened 2013 Champions Trophy final by five runs, Kohli top-scoring with 43, against which team?

England needed 20 from 16 balls with six wickets in hand, then lost Eoin Morgan and Ravi Bopara to successive balls and finished five runs short.