Virat Kohli vs Sachin's records : Can he or can he not?

#2 Highest number of centuries in Test matches

Sachin was en emotion, Kohli is an experience - A quote on the internet

Sachin's 51 hundreds came in 329 innings, although he didn't score a single one in his last 40 innings. Virat has scored 17 in 101 innings. He is still 34 hundreds behind. Co-incidentally that's the total number of Test hundreds Gavaskar scored in his career, and held the record before Sachin did.

Virat has scored a century every 5.94 innings. He may not score Test hundreds with such frequency in his coming years. When Sachin scored his 51st hundred, he was scoring them at 5.67 innings per hundred. At the time of his retirement, that rate went up to 6.45. For Virat Kohli, a good conservative estimate would give us 8 innings per hundred.

An estimate of 235 innings gives him about 29 more hundreds. That leaves him with 6 more to break the record. A rate of 7 innings per hundred gives him 33 centuries, totaling to 50 Test hundreds at the end of his career. Still very close, but not quite there yet.

With cricket becoming more batting friendly in general, pitches becoming flatter across the world, rates at which hundreds are being scored is on a rise. Some of Virat's contemporaries have scored centuries at an even higher rate.

The thing with Virat is that even if he touches the '50 Test hundreds' mark, he would not play further just to break the record. That's not the Virat fans know. He would only play if he has the desire to win and can contribute to the team. Numbers don't put him much further away from Sachin. But cricket is much more that just statistics and numbers.