Imran Khan beats Virat Kohli in ICC poll

• A total of 536,346 votes were cast in poll
• Imran Khan secured 47.3% of the votes
• Virat Kohli came in second with 46.2% of votes

DUBAI: Former Pakistan cricket team captain Imran Khan on Wednesday was judged by Twitter users for being the best captain whose cricket thrived during captaincy.

Imran Khan was put up against India captain Virat Kohli, former South African captain AB de Villiers, current captain of Australia’s women Team Meg Lanning in a Twitter poll by the International Cricket Council (ICC) that was launched a day earlier.

A total of 536,346 votes were cast in the poll with Imran Khan securing 47.3% of the votes.

India's Virat Kohli was a close second in the poll and received 46.2% of the votes.

On the other hand, Ab de Villiers bagged 6% of the votes while Meg Lanning ranked last after securing 0.5% of the votes.

The ICC said that for these four players the captaincy stood out for them and became a blessing for them. It said the players' averages improved when they became leaders of their dressing room.

“You decide which of these ‘pacesetters’ were the best among these geniuses!” tweeted the ICC.

The ICC tweets show that Virat Kohli’s average shot up to 73.88 from 51.29 in ODIs when he took over the captaincy.

On the other hand, South Africa’s Ab de Villiers average was 45.97 when he was not the captain but during the captaincy, the average shot up to 63.94.

Meanwhile, Meg Lanning also saw a spike in her average when she became the captain. The stats show that when she was not the captain she was averaging 43.87 but while playing as the skipper her average rose to 60.93.

Imran Khan, who is also the current prime minister of the country, had a test average of 25.43 with the bat and 25.53 with the bowl in Tests. However, the world cup winning skipper’s Test average was 52.34 and bowling average was 20.26 when he was captaining.