In good humour, ICC ranks all the batsmen as No. 1 on its Test rankings

On Tuesday, the International Cricket Council (ICC) in good humour and for a short while, ranked all the Test batsmen as number one after American singer Kanye West wrote tweeted, ‘no one is better than anyone’. ICC’s twitter handle, In response to Kanye’s tweet, posted an image which showed all the batsmen sharing the No. 1 spot. For those who didn’t understand the humour, the tweet caused quite a lot of speculation.

The rankings were soon changed back to normal, but Twitterati made the most of the brief joke, as was seen in the replies generated by ICC’s fabricated rankings message. Meanwhile, on the original rankings, India captain Virat Kohli lost out on his numero uno Test batsman rankings to the banned Australian skipper Steve Smith, who has always been Kohli’s rival in the longest format.

If you say so yeezy ¯_(ツ)_/¯ pic.twitter.com/y4P1BVmTyc

— ICC (@ICC) August 14, 2018

Kohli dropped to second in ICC Test rankings for batsmen after playing knocks of 23 and 17 at the Home of Cricket, Lord’s. His Australian counterpart is currently serving a one-year ban owing to his involvement in ball-tampering scandal against South Africa earlier this year.

Indian all-rounder Ravichandran Ashwin’s position on the Test rankings, however, has gone up. Primarily an off-spinner Ashwin has moved up in the list for batsmen from 67th to 57th, thanks to his innings of 29 and 33 not out.

India need to level up

India’s horrendous performances in the first two Tests against England has come under severe scanner of the critics, some of whom are calling for head coach Ravi Shastri to be axed from his position. The openers, the middle-order and the team selection have also come under scrutiny and Virat Kohli will have to make some wise decisions ahead of the third Test.

One big positive for India is that their pacer Jasprit Bumrah will now be available for selection having missed out on the first couple of Tests due to an injury he sustained in Ireland prior to the England tour.

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