The glorious 2017 of Virat Kohli

Bengaluru, December 12: Sometime last year, Mark Zuckerberg ran a discussion on his Facebook page about his annual challenge. A cool billionaire hobby for the rest of us - how to build an AI system to run his home.

The topic spawned a viral discussion among FB users with the hashtag - #BeTheNerd. Zuckerberg is a business model with no real parallel. He has no prototype. He is the prototype.

But in the sporting world, we may have a parallel, at least one very close to Zuckerberg. Virat Kohli. Zuckerberg transformed from a sweaty, dreaming college student to a ruthless Silicon Valley CEO of a company that reaches out to nearly one eighth people on this planet.

Kohli changed from a brat, in-your-face youngman to the mascot of a NewGen Indian team, its captain, its voice and batsman supreme. He has scored six double hundreds in just over one and half years.

What a year it has been for @imVkohli - the third highest number of runs by a player in a single calendar year across all formats, and look at that average! #howzstat pic.twitter.com/1sTBcyUyKB

— ICC (@ICC) December 8, 2017

Kohli has made 2818 runs in 2017 across all formats, only Kumar Sangakkara (2868) and Ricky Ponting (2833) have scored more runs than in him in a calendar year. Of course, he has just tied knot with his long-time girlfriend and Bollywood actress Anushka Sharma in a swank ceremony in Italy.

Perhaps, we might soon see a social media discussion with the hashtag: #BeViratKohli.

2017 has been that kind of year for Kohli. In this year, Kohli was also seen standing for several issues that envelop cricket - schedule, management of players to give them ample rest, reducing the number of playing days, adding more context to cricket, urging youngsters to focus on Tests, payment for players etc.

But such years have this dangerous side. They are difficult to emulate. They can raise hope among the followers of a sportsperson of many more such miracles. Sometimes, the protagonist himself could be under immense pressure to sustain the standard.

In that backdrop comes 2018 and the challenges it offers for Kohli. The ardous road will begin with a trip to South Africa - a country where success has been fleeting for India.

Then he will have England and Australia waiting with equally hard tasks. Kohli had already toured all these destinations in his career with varying degree of success. But those trips were invariably about overcoming personal barriers.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni had the burden of managing and planning. Now, Dhoni no longer plays longer format and does not captain in the limited over versions. Yes, Dhoni passes on his wisdom acquired through the years to Kohli at crucial junctures.

But the pressure is taken off his shoulders and placed on Kohli's. In the time being the captain of Indian team, the Delhiite has shown a propensity to take the challenges head on - as a captain and as a batsman.

But he has done that largely on home conditions or places similar to home. There has been some challenges - Australia walloped India in Pune and New Zealand were on the verge of winning the ODI series, Sri Lanka tested them in pace friendly conditions at the Eden Gardens and Dharamshala.

Practice done. Game ready! 🤙 pic.twitter.com/FiUml049Ze

— Virat Kohli (@imVkohli) December 1, 2017

But India wriggled out of them through the familiarity with the conditions. But those two outings against Sri Lanka have been taken as portends to bigger strife away from home for India in the coming months.

But this version of Virat Kohli is more polished. Don't mistake that word. He is still aggressive. He is still animated. He is still passionate. He may rattle opponents with a few words.

But this Kohli knows the point till he can stretch himself. Now, it's safe to assume that we will not see that middle-finger gesture. He's more like a traveler who knows many routes to one destination.

Former Australian captain and India coach Greg Chappell wrote a while back. "Kohli is a driven individual. We can look forward to many more match winning performances and series-defining efforts from him before he has finished."

Kohli may tame those challenges. He may falter. But it will be fascinating to see Kohli battling against them. Just like in 2017.