Virat Kohli retains first spot in updated ICC Test rankings; Ben Stokes breaks into the top 10

Virat Kohli maintained his stranglehold on the top spot in the latest ICC Test rankings which were updated on Friday.

The Indian skipper remained at the zenith with 928 points, 17 more than Australia’s Steve Smith. In third place is Smith’s compatriot Marnus Labuschagne with 827 points, and the top five are rounded off by Kane Williamson in fourth place with 814 points and David Warner occupying the fifth spot with 793 points to his name.

India’s most integral player in the longest format of the game, Cheteshwar Pujara, remained in the sixth spot with 791 points whilst Ajinkya Rahane gained one place and moved to the eighth spot with 759 points.

The updated ranking got a lot of joy for Ben Stokes, who equalled his career-best ranking of the second spot in the all-rounder’s ranking.

Stokes also broke into the top 10 of the batsmen list, occupying 10th spot, courtesy his heroics in the recently-concluded Port Elizabeth Test against South Africa which England won by an innings and 53 runs.

Another beneficiary from that Test was England’s Ollie Pope, whose 135-run knock helped him scale an amazing upward trajectory and move 52 places to 61st spot on the rankings.

Jasprit Bumrah was the top-ranked Indian bowler in the bowler’s rankings, occupying the sixth spot with 794 points, whilst Ravichandran Ashwin and Mohammad Shami completed the top 10 in the eighth and 10th spot respectively.