Kane Williamson; Captain of the NZ Cricket team recently hopped up one spot in the MRF Tyres ICC Test Rankings for Batsmen. He now sits at No.2 right behind Indian Skipper Virat Kohli.
The other substantial jump in rankings was made by Cheteshwar Pujara, who crept up into the TOP 5 in the batsmen rankings. Pujara’s big jump in rankings came after he scored 123 off 71 balls in Adelaide.He left Joe Root and David Warner to achieve a cozy 4th spot.
Kane Williamson’s divine performance against Pakistan in Abu Dhabi helped New Zealand grab a historic Test Win. His performance against Pakistan drove him up to an impressive 913 rating points. Which happens to be a first for any NZ Batsman
For his 194 gritty runs that turned the match, Cheteshwar Pujara is Player of the Match! #AUSvIND pic.twitter.com/wjI6Y6TxLR
— ICC (@ICC) December 10, 2018
Henry Nicholls is another NZ batsman who scored a century in the same innings. Nicholls hopped up eight places to make way into the top 10 at No.9, while BJ Watling moved up to No.22.
It was not just Pujara who made great leaps in the current rankings, other Indian Players are not far behind either. Ajinkya Rahane jumped 2 spots to achieve the 17th position. While recent record maker Rishabh Pant went up 7 spots to 59.
The players who lost their spots in the current rankings are all Indian Openers. KL Rahul went down to no. 26, Vijaywent down three spots to no. 45 while Rohit Sharma lost spots and landed at 53.
Pakistani batsmen Azhar Ali and Asad Shafiq made progress. Ali hopped up 2 spots to No.10 and Shafiq climbed 1 spot to No.21. Babar Azam, who scored 51 in Pakistan’s second test innings, also went up 3 spots to No.35.
History makers – read how New Zealand secured an away Test series win against Pakistan for just the second time in their history!#PAKvNZ REPORT 👇https://t.co/BPStXt4dH0 pic.twitter.com/GCkBko9wAU
— ICC (@ICC) December 7, 2018
The Pakistani Players that lost ground were Sarfraz Ahmed, Mohammad Hafeez and Imam ul Haq. Their subpar performance in the last test made them loose footing on international rankings. Hafeez slipped to no.65(58 before), Skipper Ahmed at no.32(31 before) and Imam ul Haq at no.97.
Australian Usman Khawaja lost footing as well and went down 3 spots to no.13. Aaron Finch went down to No.89. The Australian Players that made progress in the ICC Rankings were Shaun Marsh at no.38(6 places up), Tim Paine at No.55(4 spots up) and Travis Head jumped a whopping 17 spots to no.80.Nathan Lyon also went up 17-places to no.130.
