Kohli, Pujara take a hit in ICC Test rankings

India’s top-ranked Test batsmen, Virat Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara have slipped down the ICC rankings after the horrendous batting display at Cape Town. Despite the loss to South Africa, India continue to be the number 1 ranked Test team in the world with 124 points. Second on the chart, South Africa have 111 points followed by Australia at 104

One the other hand, splendid performance by Bhuvneshwar Kumar has rewarded the pacer highly as he jumped 8 places to gain his career-best position of 22 in the latest Test rankings released by ICC.

South African batsmen have also lost ground with Hashim Amla and Dean Elgar slipping three places to 10th and 16th respectively.

On the other hand, Markram moved up six places to 48th while AB De Villiers jumped 5 spots to be ranked 13th.

No prizes for guessing Australian captain Steven Smith sits comfortably atop the ICC Test batsman ranking charts with 947 points. India’s Murali Vijay, Shikhar Dhawan and Rohit Sharma have also lost ground. Vijay is now 30th after dropping five places, Dhawan has slipped three places to 33rd, while Sharma has ended up 44th after falling three places. Australian batsmen Usman Khawaja, Shaun Marsh and Mitchell Marsh have all achieved career-best rankings after stroking excellent centuries in the Sydney Test.  Khawaja, who scored 171 in Australia’s 649 for seven declared, has jumped eight places to 19th after collecting 55 points, Shaun Marsh has earned 42 points for his fine 156 that has moved him from 31st to 20th spot, while his younger brother Mitchell has been rewarded for his 101 with a leap of eight places that has put him in 57th position.There is no change in the top-five of the all-rounders’ list, which is still headed by Shakib Al Hasan, with Ravindra Jadeja and Ravichandran Ashwin in second and third place, respectively.