Virat Kohli hits a sixer on Instagram, becomes the first Indian to hit 50M followers

• Virat Kohli is the first Indian celebrity to hit 50 million on Instagram.
  
  
• Kohli’s net worth is $25 million, according to Forbes.
  
  
• Kohli also retained the most valuable celebrity brand in India for the third time in Duff & Phelps' report.

Indian cricket team captain Virat Kohli became the first-ever Indian to hit 50 million followers on Instagram. Kohli known for record-breaking cricketing triumphs amassed a huge social media following beating Bollywood and political figures.

Kohli had replaced the ‘captain cool’ MS Dhoni to lead the Indian cricket team, in 2014. Dhoni still has a huge fan base but his Instagram followers are at 20 million followers.

Apart from popular cricketers, Kohli also popular actors like Priyanka Chopra 49.9 million by a few thousands. Deepika Padukone has 44 million followers and Kohli’s wife and top actress Anushka Sharma has 32.6 million.

But in the world of sports though, Kolhi might have a long way to go. Portugal’s footballer Cristiano Ronaldo— the guy with the four ‘Golden European Shoes,’ has an Insta fan base of 200 million. This is the highest of any athlete on the social media platform.

Brand value and the rise to fame

The millions of fans he has social media has swelled his own value along with his brand value. Due to the strong connection he has gained with millennials earned him top billing on Duff & Phelps celebrity brands list. His brand value is pegged at $237.5 million in 2019 - leaving actor Akshay Kumar far behind at $104.5 million.

His net worth is $25 million in 2019, according to Forbes.Apart from his swagger and looks, Kohli became one of the few cricketers who is compared to Sachin Tendulkar. Kohli has a world record of being the fastest batsman to gain 11,000 runs in ODI cricket.

The aggressive batsman rose to fame when he captained India’s victorious Under-19 World Cup side in 2008 in Malaysia. He was immediately propelled into the lucrative Twenty20 tournament and since then has been the part of the IPL team Royal Challengers Bangalore. Kohli, later on, became the team captain in 2012 and has retained the position since then.

Last year, Kohli surpassed Dhoni and became the most successful Indian Test captain. Going by the way he is winning matches and fans, he might surpass a lot more in leading India.