ICC Test Rankings: Virat Kohli Reclaims Number One Spot In Tests, Hardik Pandya Makes Big Gains Too

Virat Kohli has reclaimed the top spot in ICC Test Rankings for batsmen after his scores of 97 and 103 in the third England vs India Test at Trent Bridge.

Kohli now has reached a career-best 937 rating points which helped him to dethrone Steve Smith from the top, Kohli had reached the No.1 spot after scoring 151 and 49 in the first Test at Edgbaston. However, scores of 23 and 17 at Lord’s saw him losing his spot.

But the India skipper bounced back in style at Trent Bridge. In the first innings, he scored 97 in tough conditions. He looked set for a hundred but was caught by Ben Stokes at slip off the bowling of Adil Rashid while going for an expensive cover drive.

However, he made amends for it in the very next innings by slamming his 23rd Test ton. The 29-year old scored 103 in the second, helping India post 352 for 7 (declared) and set England a target of 521. In reply, the hosts were all out for 317. Kohli went on bag the Man of the Match award. It was his fifth award as Test skipper, a record for his country.

With 937 points,  Kohli is now only one point outside the top 10 of an all-time rating points list.

The list is led by the legendary Don Bradman (961 points), Steve Smith (947), Len Hutton (945), Jack Hobbs and Ricky Ponting (both on 942), Peter May (941), and Gary Sobers, Clyde Walcott, Vivian Richards and Kumar Sangakkara (all on 938 points).

Here is the list of top ten Test batsmen:

Kohli is one of the several Indian players who made big gains after impressing at Trent Bridge. Allrounder Hardik Pandya picked his maiden five-wicket haul – a 5/28 in the first innings before scoring a run-a-ball 52 not out in the second innings. The all round performance helped Pandya rise to No.51 in the batsmen’s rankings and the same spot in the bowlers’ list too. In the allrounders’ list, he rose to No. 17 after jumping 27 places.

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Jasprit Bumrah was another Indian who impressed. The pacer marked his return to team by a match-winning five-wicket haul in the second innings.  As a result, Bumrah has now moved to 37th spot.

Here is the list of top ten Test bowlers:

From England, Jos Buttler has made significant gain after scoring a fighting 106 in the second innings. The knock helped the England vice-captain move up 22 places to No.47 in the batters’ chart.

Adil Rashid, who picked up four wickets in the match and scored 33* in the second innings, jumped up eight spots among both batsmen and all-rounders, and is now 116th in the batting charts and 43rd among all-rounders.

Joe Root, on the other hand, dropped to fifth from third.