Warner shatters 28-year-old Australian record

It may go slightly unnoticed in the wake of Australia's unprecedented batting blitz in Mumbai, but David Warner smashed a 28-year-old Australian record during his breathtaking century on Tuesday.

On his way to his 18th ODI hundred, Warner became the fourth-fastest man in history to score 5000 one-day international runs, reaching the mark in just his 115th ODI innings.

Image Id: 2B0DAB1C992C46349F6FC93BFC2FC700 Image Caption: Warner was in top form in Mumbai // AAP

That puts him behind only Hashim Amla (101 innings), West Indian legend Sir Vivian Richards and Indian skipper Virat Kohli (both 114 innings) among males in one-day international cricket.

And among Australians, Warner is streets ahead of the pack, reaching the milestone well ahead of Dean Jones, who broke through 5000 runs in his 128th innings way back in 1992.

Matthew Hayden (133 innings), Michael Bevan (135) and Ricky Ponting (137) are the only other Australians to reach the mark in less than 140 innings.

Warner pushed on and finished unbeaten on 128 on Tuesday night as he and Aaron Finch (110no) shared a record-breaking 258-run stand in a crushing 10-wicket win.

Warner has spoken at length in the past about his early struggles in the 50-over format, despite making an instant impact in both Test and T20 cricket at international level.

Up to and including Australia’s 2015 World Cup triumph, the left-hander averaged less than 35 with the bat in 62 matches, scoring just four hundreds in that time.

But since that World Cup final, he has averaged almost 60 in 56 games, adding 13 more hundreds and striking at better than a run a ball.

"I think first and foremost it's probably been the format I reckon I struggled at early in my career," he said in 2016.

"The last 18-24 months I've really worked hard on trying to construct my innings and build an innings and not play too many big shots early on.

"And just relay that Test match attitude into the one-dayers because you do get a few more balls in your area in one day stuff where you can actually play through that line."

Underlining his improvement in the past five years, Warner was the equal-56th fastest man to reach 1000 career runs, equal-42nd fastest to 2000 and the 20th fastest to 3000.

But having raced from 3000 to 4000 runs in just 12 innings during a golden period in 2016-17, he’s added another 1000 runs in just more 22 innings.

Fewest innings to 5000 ODI runs

101 – Hashim Amla (South Africa)

114 – Viv Richards (West Indies)

114 – Virat Kohli (India)

115 – David Warner (Australia)

116 – Joe Root (England)

118 – Brian Lara (West Indies)

118 – Shikhar Dhawan (India)

119 – Kane Williamson (New Zealand)

Australia Qantas ODI Tour of India 2020

Australia squad: Aaron Finch (c), Ashton Agar, Alex Carey (vc), Pat Cummins (vc), Peter Handscomb, Josh Hazlewood, Marnus Labuschagne, Kane Richardson, D'Arcy Short, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc, Ashton Turner, David Warner, Adam Zampa

India squad: Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan, KL Rahul, Shreyas Iyer, Manish Pandey, Kedar Jadhav, Rishabh Pant (wicketkeeper), Shivam Dube, Ravindra Jadeja, Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav, Navdeep Saini, Jasprit Bumrah, Shardul Thakur, Mohammed Shami.

First ODI: Australia win by 10 wickets in Mumbai

Second ODI: January 17, Rajkot (D/N) (Fox & Kayo)

Third ODI: January 19, Bengaluru (D/N) (Fox & Kayo)