ICC Test Rankings: Virat Kohli Displaces Steve Smith As Number One Test Batsman
Virat Kohli has surpassed Steve Smith to become the seventh Indian to become the No.1 Test batsman in the world, according to the latest ICC Test rankings. The India skipper achieved the feat after his stunning show in the first England vs India at Edgbaston.
Kohli’s heroic knocks in the first Test might have gone in vain but it has helped him rise to the pinnacle of Test batsmen’s rankings. The India skipper became the seventh India batsman and first since Sachin Tendulkar in June 2011, to top the rankings.
The 29-year old scored scored 149 and 51 in the game but India still ended up losing the game by 31 runs. Kohli, however, managed to surpass Steve Smith as the best Test batsman. In doing so, he also ended the former Australia skipper’s 32-month reign as the top-ranked batsman. This is also the first time, Kohli has achieved the number one ranking in Test cricket.
Kohli now leads Smith by five points. The right-hander will have to deliver in the same manner throughout the series to strengthen his grip at the top.
Apart from Kohli and Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Gautam Gambhir, Sunil Gavaskar, Virender Sehwag and Dilip Vengsarkar are the other India batsmen to have achieved number-one rankings during their careers.
However, at 934 points, Kohli has become India’s highest-ranked batsman, 14th overall, on the all-time tally of points. Kohli had entered the Edgbaston Test on 903 points, 13 points behind Gavaskar, and is now ahead of the former India skipper by 18 points.
Kohli will have a chance to break into the top ten if he delivers in the second Test. The batting superstar can leapfrog Matthew Hayden, Jacques Kallis and AB de Villiers, whose highest points tally was 935 each. Legendary batsman Don Bradman leads the list with 961 points.
Sam Curran has also made significant gains in the rankings. The left-handed all-rounder earned the Man of the Match award for taking five wickets and scoring 24 and 63.
In the batting table, Curran has jumped from 152nd to seventy-second. In bowling, he has jumped 49 places to take the sixty-second position. He is 37th in the allrounders’ list.
Jonny Bairstow has moved up four places to share 12th position with West Indies’ Kraigg Brathwaite. The batsmen to lose ground after the first Test are Alistair Cook 17th (down by four places), Lokesh Rahul 19th (down by one place), Ajinkya Rahane 22nd (down by three places), Murali Vijay and Shikhar Dhawan, who now share 25th position after slipping two and one spots, respectively, and Ben Stokes 33rd (down by five places).
