ICC Rankings: Big leap for Crawley and Anderson in Tests

Crawley has ascended 53 spots to reach a career-best 28th position after recording the 10th highest individual score for England and its second highest maiden Test century.

England batsman Zak Crawley celebrates after scoring a century against Pakistan.

Indian captain Virat Kohli and his deputy Rohit Sharma maintained their supremacy at the top of the ICC ODI rankings for batsmen, occupying the first and second spots respectively in the latest list released on Wednesday.

Australian run-machine Steve Smith continued to top the chart in Tests and he is followed by Kohli and Smith’s compatriot Marnus Labuschagne.

India’s wicketkeeper-batsman K.L. Rahul is in second place in the T20 rankings for batsmen behind Pakistan’s Babar Azam and ahead of Australian white-ball skipper Aaron Finch.

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Indian pace spearhead Jasprit Bumrah held his numero uno position in the ODI bowling rankings, while Australian speedster Pat Cummins held the top spot in Tests and Afghanistan’s star spinner Rahid Khan in T20Is.

Among teams, India is placed second in ODIs and third in both Tests and T20 formats behind England, Australia and New Zealand.

Batsman Zak Crawley’s monumental 267 and fast bowler James Anderson’s match haul of seven wickets helped the English duo to rise exponentially in the Test rankings after the drawn final Test against Pakistan in Southampton.

Crawley has ascended 53 spots to reach a career-best 28th position after recording the 10th highest individual score for England and its second highest maiden Test century.

He had started the series in 95th position but his 320-run aggregate has made him the fourth best-ranked England batsman after only eight Tests, behind Ben Stokes, Joe Root and Jos Buttler.

Anderson has moved back to the top-10 after briefly dropping out of it since the preceding home series against the West Indies.

The formerly top-ranked bowler has gained six spots to reach eighth position after a Test that saw him grab his 29th five-wicket haul in the first innings and become the first fast bowler to 600 wickets with Azhar Ali’s scalp in the second innings.

Buttler is another England player to make notable progress in the latest rankings update after scoring a fine 152 in his side’s only innings of the Test. He has reached a career-best 637 rating points and 21st position, three off his best of 18th achieved in November 2018.

All-rounder Ben Stokes has ceded the top spot for all-rounders to Jason Holder after missing two Test matches, dropping one point behind the West Indies captain.

For each Test missed, players lose one per cent each of their batting and bowling points with a cumulative effect of about two per cent on a player’s all-round rating.

For Pakistan, captain Azhar Ali’s return to form with a solid 141 in the first innings has seen him gain 11 places and reach 23rd position, while wicketkeeper-batsman Mohammad Rizwan has gained three slots to reach 72nd position after a fighting half-century in the first innings.

Part-time spinners Fawad Alam and Asad Shafiq are in the top 100 for bowlers. Fawad has gained 22 slots to reach 94th position while Asad has moved up nine places to 100th place.