New Delhi. England's star batsman Harry Brook has once again secured the top position in the latest ICC Men's Test Player Rankings. Brook has overtaken Australia's Travis Head to become number 1 in the rankings for Test batsmen. This is the fourth time that Brook has become the top batsman in the world in the Test batting rankings. He reached this position for the first time in December 2024. After the latest changes, the competition between the top four batsmen has become very close and after the upcoming Test matches, there may be a change in the rankings again.
The Darwin Test performance against Bangladesh proved costly for Travis Head. The Australian batsman scored 22 runs in the first innings of the match and 17 runs in the second innings. Australia had to face defeat by nine wickets at the hands of Bangladesh in this match. After this result and individual performance, Head slipped three places to fourth place. In his place, England's Joe Root has reached second place and Australia's Steve Smith has reached third place. Smith had played innings of 71 and 44 runs against Bangladesh.
In the latest rankings, Brook is at first place with 852 rating points while Joe Root is at second place with 840 points. Steve Smith is at third place with 833 points and Travis Head is at fourth place with 819 points. That means there is a difference of only 33 rating points between the batsmen from number-1 to number-4. In such a situation, after the ongoing Test series between England and Pakistan and the second Test between Australia and Bangladesh, a big change in the top order is possible.
In this ranking update, Bangladesh players have also got a big benefit of the historic victory. Bangladesh captain Nazmul Hussain Shanto, who came into limelight after defeating Australia, has jumped nine places. He has now reached his career best ranking of 20th. Shanto played an important inning of 84 runs in the first innings of Darwin Test. His innings played an important role in strengthening the foundation of Bangladesh's historic victory.
For Bangladesh, there has been a big improvement in the ranking of not only Shanto but also many other players. Mominul Haq has moved up five places to reach 31st position. Shadman Islam has reached 58th position and Mehdi Hasan Miraj has reached 59th position. Tanjeed Hasan has made a place among the batsmen who have made the biggest jump and has moved up 84 places to joint 88th position. Australia's Cameron Green has also moved up five places to reach 30th position after scoring a century in the second innings.
Bangladesh has also got a huge advantage in the ranking of bowlers. Fast bowler Hasan Mahmood has jumped 26 places by taking six wickets in the first innings against Australia and a total of nine wickets in the match. He has now reached 38th position. Mehdi Hasan Miraj has also moved up three places to number 24. Whereas Indian fast bowler Jasprit Bumrah remains at number-1 position in the ranking of Test bowlers.
