After successfully lifting the Test championship mace in the final of the World Test Championship 2023, the Aussie batters have eaten up the top of the batting charts in the latest ICC rankings. Australia's 209-run win over India saw them become the only team with all ICC titles available in the world. Travis Head and Steve Smith's outing with the bat saw the former earning the Player of the Match honour and now the duo finds itself in a special trio shattering a 39-year-old record in Test cricket.
Before the game kicked off last Wednesday, Marnus Labuschagne was the No.1 Test batter and Steve Smith and Travis Head occupied the 3rd and 6th spots respectively. But after those thunderous tons in the Test final, Smith has pipped Kane Williamson to take the second place, while Head has jumped three places to go on to the third place.
A 39-year-old record broken
The Aussie trio of Labuschagne(903 ratings), Smith (885) and Head (884) occupy the top three spots now. This becomes the only instance of players from the same country being the top three batters in the ICC rankings after December 1984. At that time, West Indies' trio of Gordon Greenidge, Clive Lloyd, and Larry Gomes took the first, second and third spot in the Test chart, respectively.
For India, there were no places gained in the Test chart and Ravi Ashwin remained the World No.1 Test bowler. Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli keep their 12th and 13th places, respectively, with Sharma and Kohli losing 10 and 5 rating points respectively to show 729 and 700 as their latest ratings.
Scott Boland also got the reward for his lethal bowling performances as he climbed five places to reach 36, while Nathan Lyon's second-inning outing took him two places up to joint 6th along with Ollie Robinson.
