Shubman Gill has got off to a dream of a start with the bat to his tenure as India’s Test captain, even if that can’t be said for how the first match went for him overall. Gill has followed up the 147 he scored in his first ever Test innings as captain with a masterful double century in the second match at Edgbaston.
Gill’s sensational early run in this series, with an added context over the questions over his mediocre record with the bat in Test cricket before this, has led to former India wicketkeeper Parthiv Patel comparing it with the famous century that Virat Kohli had scored at Edgbaston in 2018. Patel said that the way both batters celebrated their centuries reflected the similarity in circumstances in which they came.
“There was something common in both these celebrations,” said Patel on Star Sports. “At the start of the 2018 series there were questions over Virat Kohli’s numbers in England, there were still scars from that 2014 tour. Similar questions were there over Shubman Gill because he had not yet scored a century in SENA nations.”
Answering doubters at Edgbaston
Kohli had famously scored just 134 runs across 10 innings in a nightmare 2014 tour. He ended up taking over captaincy of the team later in the year after MS Dhoni’s sudden retirement from Test cricket and went on to establish himself as one of the best batters in the world. When he returned to England in the 2018 series, Kohli started by scoring 149 in 225 balls at Edgbaston. He went on to finish as the highest scorer in that series, compiling 593 runs in 10 innings.
Similarly, Gill has had a largely forgettable time with the bat in the longest format leading up to this series, even being dropped during India’s last Test series in Australia. “So there were questions over his ability and skill. Both these batters proved the doubters wrong. Virat Kohli in 2018, Gill in 2025. He has got prince written on his bat but it will soon become King,” said Parthiv.
