ICC ODI Rankings: Virat Kohli maintains top-spot, Pandya enters top-50
Kohli’s two fifty-plus scores in the recently-concluded ODI series against Australia cemented his spot at the top with 870 points.
Indian skipper Virat Kohli would be ending the year 2020 as the No. 1 ODI batsman after retaining the top spot in the latest ICC rankings. His two fifty-plus scores in the recently-concluded ODI series against Australia cemented his spot at the top with 870 points.
Kohli had scored 89 and 63 in the second and third ODI against Australia in Sydney and Canberra respectively. India lost the first two games but managed wining the third by 13 runs to avoid the whitewash.
Pakistan captain Babar Azam, Ross Taylor and Australia captain Aaron Finch are the 3rd, 4th and 5th ranked batters, respectively.
ALSO READ | Australia to allow 30,000 fans per day at Boxing Day test
Hardik Pandya, who had a phenomenal white-ball series in Australia, made his first appearance in the top 50 batsmen at 49th place with a career-best of 553 points. During the first ODI of India’s tour of Australia in Sydney, India batsman Hardik Pandya missed out closely from becoming the third batsman to score a century in the match following the likes of Australia captain Aaron Finch and batsman Steven Smith.
From the Australian camp, captain Finch’s innings of 114 in the first Australia vs India ODI, followed by 60 and 75 helped him up to a career-best tally of 791 points and fifth place, just behind his best of fourth achieved earlier June 2019.
Steve Smith’s pair of 62-ball centuries in the first two matches enabled him to move back into the ODI to 20 batsmen for the first time since 2018. He is currently at number fifteen with 707 points.
All-rounder Glenn Maxwell’s 167 runs in the series came at a strike rate of 194.18 and featured two half-centuries, to push him back up to 20th rank. This is the first time he has been in the top 20 since February 2017.
ALSO READ | ‘That’s a real big milestone’: Matthew Hayden picks India’s most impactful player of the decade
In a series dominated by batsmen, Adam Zampa made the big impact with the ball, enabling him an entry in the top 20 ODI bowlers for the very first time. Zampa’s seven wickets at 23 took him to the fourteenth position with a career-best 623 points. Josh Hazlewood took six wickets and moved up a place to the sixth rank.