What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?
In attempting to separate modern cricket’s two batting pillars, that is the question one must contend with.
What happens when Kohli’s flamboyance and elemental fire, which rages with the luster of a thousand suns, squares up against Smith’s superhuman hand-eye coordination and herculean resolve?
Numbers can help us better ascertain the situation. However, numbers, even in a sport that is consumed by them, are not everything.
How does one quantify Kohli silencing his English demons on that glorious tour in 2019? What number can be allocated to what Smith accomplished on his stunning return to Ashes cricket?
Numbers, then, can be futile. Having said that, two key numbers emerge. Two numbers that crystallise and contextualise the magnitude of their accomplishments.
For Steve Smith, that number is 62.84, his batting average in Test match cricket. For Virat Kohli, that number is 59.31, his batting average in ODI cricket.
Why are those two numbers significant? Because they demonstrate, without an inkling of a doubt, just how far away the two are from their peers in the respective formats.
For Smith, that number places him behind only Donald Bradman, the finest man to ever wield a bat.
For Kohli, that number places him in rarefied air. No one in the history of ODI cricket has attained and sustained that average.
They are masters of their domain. Keepers of their respective kingdoms.
If we must make a comparison, then what works in Kohli’s favour is that he is closer to Smith in Test cricket than Smith is to him in ODI cricket. Because is ODI cricket, Kohli truly is peerless.
But there are mitigating factors at play here. One of them being that Australia doesn’t play as much ODI cricket as India.
The second factor is perhaps more telling – Test cricket is the pinnacle of the sport. And that is the domain that Smith has conquered.
In Tests, while Kohli’s average of 53.63 is mighty impressive, numbers fail us here because Smith, setting aside his average, is a game-changer with the bat. And he does so with a consistency that leaves Kohli behind.
And the situation is reversed in Limited Overs cricket, a domain where Kohli reigns supreme. Not just in his time, but arguably all time.
And thus, we circle back to our initial quandary - What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?
A stalemate. That’s what happens.
Virat Kohli and Steve Smith represent the very best of modern batting. They are Titans walking among mortals.
And we don’t compare Titans. We enjoy them. We appreciate what they have brought to this beautiful game of ours.
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