Babar Azam Pips Virat Kohli, Shubman Gill, Rohit Sharma To Become No. 1 In ICC Rankings
Babar Azam (X.com)
After a lean patch in World Cup 2023 and Tests in Australia, Pakistan's Babar Azam found form against New Zealand in the five-T20Is series, slamming 213 runs.
Rise in performance with the bat witnessed Azam climb up the ICC T20I Batting Rankings charts to the fourth position, behind leader India's Suryakumar Yadav, England's Phil Salt, and fellow countryman Mohammad Rizwan.
Azam replaced Aiden Markram, who moved down to fifth position after a poor series against India last month. India's young opener Yashasvi Jaiswal gained the most, rising up to sixth position after impressive outings against Afghanistan.
ICC ODI Rankings (Screenshot)
Meanwhile, Azam has also reclaimed his No. 1 ranking in ICC ODI batting, leapfrogging over India's Shubman Gill, who did not feature in the 50-overs series in South Africa.
Azam and Gill are followed by India's former captain Virat Kohli and current skipper Rohit Sharma, who occupy the No. 3 and No.4 spots, just above Australia's recent ODI and Test retiree David Warner.
The former Pakistan captain has already led the batting charts in T20Is and ODIs for the past few years, slowly making his way up the modern-day greats list.
In 117 ODIs, and 109 T20Is, Azam has slammed 5,729 and 3,698 runs, respectively, with 22 centuries, and 65 fifties.
A format, in which Azam still struggles to find his peak is in Test, where in 52 matches, the middle-order batter has scored 3,898 runs with nine tons, and 26 half-centuries.
.jpg "Hyderabad Crowd Chant ‘Kohli Kohli’")
 "Vishal Mehra")
