The race for first position in the MRF Tyres ICC Men’s T20I Batter Rankings keeps heating up as Pakistan’s Mohammad Rizwan and Babar Azam have a chance to overtake rising Indian sensation Suryakumar Yadav for the top spot.
Babar will have another opportunity to catch up to Suryakumar by the start of Pakistan’s five-game T20I series against New Zealand on Saturday, per the most recent ICC rankings, which show him climbing up to third.
Both Babar Azam and Rizwan were absent from Pakistan’s most recent T20I series against Afghanistan and will be anxious to score freely against the Black Caps, who just won a nail-biting 2-1 series at home against Sri Lanka.
With 906 rating points, Suryakumar now has the highest rating among T20I batters, but while the India star is participating in the IPL, Rizwan (811) and Babar (755) could overtake him.
Ironically, because Devon Conway was not there for New Zealand’s series against Sri Lanka, Babar moved up one spot to third in the most recent rankings. Conway is a batter from New Zealand who competes in the IPL for the Chennai Super Kings.
Several New Zealand and Sri Lankan stars who did take part in the just finished T20I series were honored for their services. The 22-year-old spinner Maheesh Theekshana, who tied for fifth position among bowlers and hit a career-high rating, was the biggest draw.
Due to his performance in the Super Over, Sri Lanka’s off-spinner Theekshana was able to win the first game of the series, and he followed that up in the remaining two games by opening the bowling in a brace of excellent displays.
He dropped two ranks to fourth on the list of top T20I bowlers as a result of teammate Wanindu Hasaranga’s costly play during the series, with Australia’s Josh Hazlewood moving up one slot to third and Afghanistan’s Fazalhaq Farooqi moving up one spot to second.
Afghan bowlers currently occupy the top two spots in the T20I rankings, with Rashid Khan (a spinner) and Farooqi (a rapidly emerging fast bowler) engaged in a fierce competition for the top spot.
The other big winners on the most recent T20I rankings for batters were Sri Lankan dasher Kusal Mendis (up 11 ranks to equal 25th) and right-handed batsman Tim Seifert of New Zealand (up from outside the top 100 to 36th). The Test rankings changed a little following Bangladesh’s victory over Ireland in Mirpur.
Senior right-hander Mushfiqur Rahim moved up five ranks to position 17 on the list of Test batsmen following scores of 126 and 51*. On the list of bowlers, the spin duo of Taijul Islam and Shakib Al Hasan was identified.
Taijul went up three ranks to tie for 20th as a result of his crucial five-wicket haul in the first innings, while the Bangladesh skipper moved up two spots to tie for 26th as a result of his 2/26 performance as the opening bowler in the second innings.
Haris Rauf’s ten wickets in three T20 Internationals moved Shadab Khan to the top spot among Pakistani bowlers in the ICC Men’s T20I Bowler Rankings.
Rauf brought up back-to-back four-wicket hauls in the current T20I series against New Zealand, winning Player of the Match honors in the first game.
The Pakistani fast bowler finished last week just ahead of Shaheen Afridi and below Shadab Khan, who was ranked 12th in the T20I bowling rankings. Rauf moved up five spots in the rankings to take up position 11 with ten wickets in the first three T20Is.
He might have finished the five-match series with a rating of 657 points, which would rank him among the top 10 all-time players.
Ish Sodhi (620) and Shaheen (624) also moved up by four and two positions, respectively, while those around them lost ground.
