Virat Kohli, Shikhar Dhawan Gain Spots In ICC T20I Player Rankings

Kohli's match winning half ton in the second T20I of the three-match series against South Africa, saw him moving one place to the 11th position in the batting list while Dhawan gained three spots to reach the 13th place

Indian skipper Virat Kohli and left-handed opener Shikhar Dhawan moved up in the latest ICC Men's T20I player rankings announced on Wednesday. Kohli's match winning half ton in the second T20I of the three-match series against South Africa, saw him moving one place to the 11th position in the batting list while Dhawan gained three spots to reach the 13th place after registering scores of 40 and 36 in the series. The series in India also saw South Africa's Quinton de Kock move up from 49th to 30th, his highest position in two years, after scores of 52 and 79 not out. Spinner Tabraiz Shamsi has reached the top 20 in the bowlers' list for the first time while Andile Phehlukwayo has achieved a career-best ranking of seventh. The latest rankings have been updated by the apex body after the culmination of India-South Africa series, Bangladesh tri-series also featuring Afghanistan and Zimbabwe, as well as the Ireland tri-series in which Scotland and the Netherlands were the other teams. Fifth-ranked Hazratullah Zazai's current 727 points are the highest by an Afghanistan batsman in history while 21st-ranked George Munsey became the first Scotland batsman to reach 600 points after scoring an unbeaten 127 off just 56 balls against the Netherlands before dropping to 585 at the end of the series. In the Bangladesh tri-series. Zimbabwe captain Hamilton Masakdza retired from international cricket in 22nd place as their highest-ranked batsman at the time and Afghanistan spinner Mujeeb ur Rahman has moved into the top 10 with seven wickets in the series. The Ireland series saw the Dutch pair of Ben Cooper and Max O'Dowd achieve their highest rankings at joint 41st among batsmen while Ireland's Kevin O'Brien has achieved a career-high 459 rating points in batting. Andrew Balbirnie has also progressed from 95th to 53rd in the same list.