Australia batters Marnus Labuschagne and Travis Head, thanks to their brilliant performances in the first Test against England at Gabba, Brisbane of the Ashes 2021-22, have attained career-best spots in the latest update of the ICC Test player rankings on December 15, 2021.
Labuschagne's first innings 74 in the first Test took him to a career-best second position while Player of the Match Travis Head's 152 helped him leap to 10th spot in the rankings.
Australia opener David Warner (up three places to sixth) and England's Dawid Malan (up 18 places to 77th) are the other batters to improve their rankings.
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On the other hand, Shaheen Afridi headlined the bowling rankings which included performances in the second Test between Bangladesh and Pakistan, which Pakistan won by an innings and eight runs to clinch full ICC World Test Championship points from the series.
Shaheen with three wickets in the match moved to 3rd spot in the rankings, while off-spinner Sajid Khan has zoomed up 52 places to 49th after a 12-wicket haul that won him the Player of the Match award.
Shakib Al Hasan gained one slot to reach fourth place among all-rounders, overtaking Ben Stokes along with India's Ravindra Jadeja, who is now third in the list.
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In the T20I players' rankings, Dawid Malan dethroned Babar Azam as the no.1 batter. Shadab Khan entered the top ten of the T20I bowling rankings, which is headed by Sri Lanka's Wanindu Hasaranga.
(ANI inputs)
