Shikhar Dhawan Retires as One of Cricket's All-Time Greats, Leaving Behind a Legacy of Records and Milestones

New Delhi: Shikhar Dhawan has drawn the curtain on his illustrious cricket career but the opening batter remains the multiple record-holder in international cricket.   

Dhawan, who made his India debut in 2010, became the vital cog of Men in Blue’s top order along with Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli in the white-ball formats. The southpaw’s career flourished as an India opener pairing with Rohit and he went on to become the second-fastest Indian to complete 6,000 ODI runs. He took 140 innings to reach the milestone figure in the 50-over cricket. Kohli was the fastest to achieve the feat in 136 innings.

Dhawan ended his ODI career with 6793 runs in 167 matches including 17 centuries and 39 half-centuries. His average in the format stands at 44.11.

In Test cricket, the 38-year-old made an impressive start in the debut innings against Australia in 2013. The opener smashed the fastest century by a debutant in the red-ball cricket. He reached the three-figure mark in 85 balls in Mohali and went on to register the highest individual score by a debutant for India in Test cricket. Dhawan played a memorable knock of 187 in his Test curtain-raiser but missed out on the much-deserved double ton.

Dhawan’s stellar career is incomplete without the mention of his records in the ICC tournaments. The batter is always remembered as the man of big tournaments and carries the tag of ‘Mr ICC’. Dhawan’s dominance can be stamped with the fact that he was India’s highest run-scorer in three back-to-back 50-over ICC tournaments including finishing two spectacles as the tournament’s highest run-scorer.

In the 2013 Champions Trophy, Dhawan amassed 363 runs in just five matches, making him the tournament’s highest run-scorer. He repeated his success in the 2017 Champions Trophy, finishing as the leading run-scorer with 338 runs. During the 2015 World Cup, Dhawan scored 412 runs, the most for India in the tournament. Unfortunately, he suffered an injury after scoring a century against Australia in the 2019 World Cup, which ruled him out of the remainder of the tournament.

Apart from his batting stats, Dhawan donned the captain’s hat for India on multiple occasions. He led India in 15 limited-overs matches, winning eight and losing five under his captaincy.

In his IPL career, he played 222 games for different franchises and amassed 6,769 runs, the second-best in the tournament’s history after Virat Kohli’s tally of 8,004 runs. He has smashed 768 fours in 221 innings, the most by any batter in the IPL history. IANS

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