Williamson among top five in all formats

DUBAI: New Zealand captain Kane Williamson has broken into the top five of the Rankings for T20I Batsmen after a good series against Bangladesh which his side won 3-0.

Williamson scored 73 not out, 12 and 60 to finish with a series aggregate of 145 runs. He jumped two places to the fourth position.

Williamson already occupies positions in the top-five of Tests and ODIs. He sits in fourth place in Test rankings, while he is fifth in ODIs.

India’s Virat Kohli is the only other batsmen to be among the top five in all three formats. He is the number-one batsman in T20Is and second in ODIs as well as Tests.

Interestingly, both Kohli and Williamson captained their sides in the ICC U19 Cricket World Cup 2008 in Malaysia.

Apart from Williamson, Colin Munro has also made an impact on the latest T20I rankings. The left-hander smashed a 54-ball 101 in the second match, which helped him jump 20 places to 19th.

In the T20I bowling table, the biggest mover is Bangladesh’s Mustafizur Rahman who won the ICC Emerging Cricketer of the Year award. The left-armer has leaped 10 places to 10th in the latest rankings.

He became Bangladesh’s highest-ranked bowler, leapfrogging Shakib Al Hasan who is 11th.

New Zealand’s Mitchell Santner and Ish Sodhi also achieved career-high rankings. Santner gained 26 places and is now ranked 18th, while Sodhi rocketed 19 places to claim the 19th spot.

With Adam Milne now in the 17th place, New Zealand have three bowlers inside the top 20.

South Africa’s Imran Tahir is the number-one ranked T20I bowler. He is followed by Jasprit Bumrah of India and West Indies’ Samuel Badree.

New Zealand retained their status as the number-one ranked T20I side. For their 3-0 success, they earned one point which lifted them to 129 points.  Bangladesh lost one point to slip to 72 points.