DUBAI – International Cricket Council ICC has unveiled latest testrankings.
Virat Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara held their second and sixth positionsrespectively on the batsmen’s list while off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwinslipped a notch to be at sixth among bowlers in the latest ICC Testrankings.
Australian speedster Mitchell Starc reached a career-best fifth positionamong bowlers after his ‘Player-of-the-match’ performance in the DurbanTest against South Africa helped his side win by 118 runs and take a 1-0lead in the four-match series.
The 28-year-old Starc finished with a match haul of nine for 109, enablinghim to overtake South Africa’s new-ball bowlers Morne Morkel and VernonPhilander among others, eclipsing his previous best sixth position that heenjoyed in December 2016.
Further, the left-handers 42 runs in the Test have not only helped him gainthree slots to reach 74th position among batsmen but have also helped himmake it to the top-five among all-rounders.
He is now on 312 points, 35 less than his tally when he was fourth on theall-rounders list in August 2016.
Other Australia players to have gained in the latest rankings updateinclude the Marsh brothers. Shaun Marsh has reached a career-best 16thposition among batsmen with his 73 runs in the match while his brotherMitchell has moved up to 43rd place from his 56th rank before the Test, toalso reach his highest ranking among batsmen thus far.
Mitchell has also gained one slot to reach 58th slot among bowlers.
For South Africa, Aiden Markram’s scores of 32 and 143 have helped him gain28 slotsto reach a career-best 19th place.
Markram, who had led South Africa to victory in the ICC U19 Cricket WorldCup in 2014, has had a phenomenal rise as he sees himself in the top-20after only his seventh Test, notching three centuries and two scores in the90s.
In other movements, AB de Villiers first innings score of 71 not out wasenough to pull him up one place to 12th position while Quinton de Kock hasgained three slots to reach 22nd rank after scores of 20 and 83 in thematch.