Joe Root jumps up the ladder and climbs to the top 2 spots in the ICC test rankings which were released on June 8. Currently, the English Batter is seated at the 2nd Position leaving behind Australia’s splendid batter, Steve Smith and New Zealand’s skipper Kane Williamson. At the same time, the first place is strongly in the hold of the Australian batter Marnus Labuschagne.
This sudden uprise in Joe Root’s rankings came in the post the century which he made in the series against New Zealand at Lord’s, wherein he also managed to complete the milestone of 10000 runs becoming the only 3rd Englishman and 14th man overall to register his name in the history of Test cricket.
With Root’s upswing, there is indeed a minor shakeup within the top five, with Australia’s Steve Smith dropping one spot to third in the latest rankings.
Joe Root could even bring up the gap between him and Marnus Labuschagne as Root is only between 10 ranking points behind. England is supposed to play against New Zealand for the second test in Nottingham on Friday.
Pakistan skipper Babar Azam moves up to the fourth place, whereas New Zealand captain Kane Williamson falls two spots to fifth after scoring only two and 15 at Lord’s in the first test against England.
The Run Machine, Virat Kohli is on the verge of the top 10 rankings as he continues to find his appropriate form back. With only a couple of runs in the recently concluded Indian Premier League, Kohli only managed to score 2 half-centuries with the highest score of 73.
Updated Men's Test Batting Rankings #Cricket pic.twitter.com/2bpiB1ZyP9
— Saj Sadiq (@SajSadiqCricket) June 8, 2022
Whereas Kohli has been an outstanding batter in Test cricket since the beginning, for a couple of years Kohli seems to be struggling. Virat scored his last century back in November 2019 against Bangladesh in a home series where he scored 136 runs. The Indian team is supposed to play against England for the remaining match in the test series in Edgbaston, Birmingham this July.
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Our Run-machine still has a chance to stand back up and grab all the runs from the last match for this series. Whereas Joe Root might just look straight up against New Zealand to climb up the ladder to be ranked as the No.1 batter in Test Cricket.