Last week, Virat Kohli made a rare appearance for the Delhi team in their final league stage match of the Ranji Trophy, against Railways. Despite Kohli's modest score of six runs, the Arun Jaitley Stadium witnessed a significant turnout, a sight seldom seen for a domestic first-class match in recent years.
It was the first time Kohli turned up at the Ranji Trophy since November 2012, when Delhi took on Uttar Pradesh in Ghaziabad. His return to Delhi marked the first time he wore his state team's jersey for a professional match since September 2013.
Kohli had led Delhi in the NKP Salve Challenger Trophy in Indore in 2013, where India Blue and India Red were the other two competing teams. The Champions League T20 was held in India simultaneously. However, Royal Challengers Bangalore, led by Kohli, failed to qualify for the tournament, finishing outside the top four in the IPL earlier that year.
Kohli's hiatus from the Ranji Trophy lasted 12 years and 86 days. This break was primarily due to his commitments with the Indian team, where he was a regular across all formats and served as captain for much of that time. His return coincided with the Indian team's T20I series against England, a format from which Kohli retired last June.
This 12-year-long absence is significant, especially considering Kohli's extensive experience, having played 123 Test matches and being an advocate for the longer format. It is the longest time any player with 50 Test caps has gone without participating in their country's premier first-class competition. The next longest gap belongs to Wasim Akram, who went 11 years and 253 days between two Quaid-e-Azam Trophy matches, played in 1986 and 1997.
Throughout his nearly 20-year first-class career, Akram only played five matches in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, including four while he was a Test cricketer. However, he was a regular participant in the County Championship, playing 94 matches for Lancashire and Hampshire, with 89 of those matches taking place during his Test career.
Saeed Anwar, a prominent ODI batter, also spent over ten years without playing in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy during the 1990s. Saleem Malik's hiatus from the tournament lasted seven years and 345 days between November 1991 and October 1999. Interestingly, six of the ten biggest gaps between domestic first-class fixtures were due to the players being regulars in all three formats for their respective countries in recent decades.
Rohit Sharma also returned to the Ranji Trophy last month after a nine-year gap. His previous appearance in the competition was against Uttar Pradesh in November 2015, when he did not make the playing XI for the first Test against South Africa. Like Kohli, Rohit retired from T20Is after last year's World Cup, making himself available for the Ranji Trophy instead of participating in the T20I series against England.
Australia's Bob Simpson also makes an unusual appearance in the top five of this list, with a gap of nine years and 266 days between February 1968 and November 1977. Simpson retired from all first-class cricket at the end of the 1967-68 season but came back in the 1977-78 season. He made himself available for national team selection when the first-choice players were absent due to the World Series Cricket.
Simpson began the season playing in the Sheffield Shield and was appointed the national team captain at the age of 41. He led Australia in a five-match home series against India and a five-match series in the West Indies before retiring again.
Kohli also tops the list of most Test matches for a player since his previous appearance at his country's premier domestic first-class competition. He played 113 Test matches during his 12-year break from Ranji Trophy. In third place is Akram, who played 67 Tests during his 11-year absence from the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy.
MS Dhoni ranks second with 90 Tests, having not played in the Ranji Trophy since his Test debut in December 2005. The last of his 27 Ranji Trophy matches was in March 2005, marking the first season his domestic team transitioned from Bihar to Jharkhand.
Notably, Dhoni is the only player on this list to have played over 50 Test matches without appearing in their respective premier first-class competition during his Test career. Kohli, Rohit and Anwar follow him, each having played one first-class competition match.
However, Kohli and Rohit will surpass Anwar if they play one more Test match from here, as both participated in the Ranji Trophy last month for only the second time since their debuts.
Frank Worrell, who played 51 Tests for the West Indies, is not included in the above lists. His first-class career spanned from the 1941-42 season to the 1963-64 season, but he did not play in the Shell Shield (now the West Indies Championship), as its inaugural edition took place in the 1965-66 season. Garry Sobers, Rohan Kanhai, and Lance Gibbs of West Indies are excluded, as they debuted in Shell Shield in 1966, years after their Test debuts. Players whose gaps in first-class careers were caused by World Wars are also excluded.
Kohli's match against Railways last week was his first non-Test first-class match in nearly ten years. His previous non-Test first-class game was in July 2015, where he played for India A in an unofficial Test against Australia A. This match, in Chennai, served as preparation for a subsequent three-match Test tour of Sri Lanka.
For nine-and-a-half years, Kohli played only international matches for India or IPL matches for RCB. He maintains the longest streak of consecutive first-class matches with Test status - 89. The next longest is Dhoni's 47 matches, played between 2010 and 2014.
Each of Dhoni's last 47 first-class matches were Tests. His most recent non-Test first-class game was in 2010 against Sri Lanka Board President's XI, a warm-up for the Test series in Sri Lanka. Notably, nine of the ten longest streaks of first-class matches as Tests occurred among players during the 2010s, when proficiency in all three formats became essential.
In terms of duration, Kohli's gap of nine years and 182 days ranks second behind the streak of Simpson, who retired and unretired. Ijaz Ahmed, similarly, played the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy in 2007, nearly six years after his last Test tour.
Since his Test debut, Kohli has played 125 first-class matches, with 123 being Test matches - accounting for 98.4% of his first-class appearances. This percentage is the highest among the players who have played over 50 Tests.
Faf du Plessis (95.83% - 69 out of 72) and Rohit (95.71% - 67 out of 70) follow closely behind. In fact, 78.85% of all first-class matches Kohli played are Tests, placing him third behind Pat Cummins (82.71%) and AB de Villiers (80.85%).
Those numbers illustrate how difficult it is for an all-format player to feature in domestic matches. Even regular Test players find it challenging to participate in first-class cricket outside of Tests, as ODIs, T20Is, and T20 leagues gain equal importance. The workload becomes significant unless a player focuses solely on the longer format.
Jasprit Bumrah, who has yet to reach 50 Test matches, does not make it onto any of the above lists. He last played in the Ranji Trophy in January 2017, a year before making his Test debut in January 2018. Since then, Bumrah has played in 47 first-class matches, with 45 being Tests.
The premier first-class competition for each country is as follows: Afghanistan - Ahmad Shah Abdali 4-day Trophy, Australia - Sheffield Shield, Bangladesh - National Cricket League, England - County Championship, India - Ranji Trophy, Ireland - Inter-Provincial Championship, New Zealand - Plunkett Shield, Pakistan - Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, South Africa - CSA 4-Day Domestic Series, Sri Lanka - Major League Tournament, West Indies - West Indies Championship and Zimbabwe - Logan Cup.
(With assistance from Shiva Jayaraman)