Babar Azam has slipped to seventh place in the ICC T20I rankings following his failure in the first T20 International against South Africa. This was his comeback game in the format after being rested for the Zimbabwe tour and Babar couldn't get off the mark bagging a four-ball duck before being dismissed by Kwena Maphaka.
This was his seventh duck in the shortest format of the game equalling Virat Kohli in this aspect who has now retired from T20Is. Babar played his 127th match in the format on December 10 (Tuesday) while Kohli featured in 125 T20Is for India. Coming back to the rankings, Babar has slipped below Pakistan's current T20I captain Mohammad Rizwan who trudged along in his 74-run knock in the first T20I against the Proteas.
Rizwan played 62 deliveries for his 74 runs as Pakistan failed to chase 184 runs falling 11 runs short. However, he jumped a couple of places in the rankings to be at the sixth place with 713 rating points, three more than his former skipper and teammate.
Travis Head continues to be on top of the T20I rankings for batters in the latest update while India's Tilak Varma and Suryakumar Yadav are at third and fourth place respectively.
As for Babar Azam, his fall in the rankings has been steep in Tests and T20Is. Not long ago, he was the only player to be in the top five across all formats. But he is on top of the batting rankings only in ODIs and is at 7th place in the shortest form of the game. Babar is at the 18th place in the Test rankings as Harry Brook has been crowned the new no.1 in the format in the latest update.
ICCT20I rankings for batters
| Rank | Player | Rating Points |
| 1 | Travis Head | 855 |
| 2 | Phil Salt | 829 |
| 3 | Tilak Varma | 806 |
| 4 | Suryakumar Yadav | 788 |
| 5 | Jos Buttler | 717 |
| 6 | Mohammad Rizwan | 713 |
| 7 | Babar Azam | 710 |
| 8 | Yashasvi Jaiswal | 706 |
| 9 | Pathum Nissanka | 672 |
| 10 | Rahmanullah Gurbaz | 636 |
