Joe Root becomes the new No. 1 Test batter

Joe Root has reaped the rewards of being the highest run scorer in the home Test series against the West Indies. He ended Kane Williamson's reign, sat at the top of the ICC’s Test batting charts, and reclaimed the top spot for himself, which he had occupied in eight different stints earlier.

Root vacated the position last year, after which Williamson pipped him to that spot with some big scores during New Zealand’s home Tests. This big news has come just a few days after Root went past Brian Lara’s Test match tally of 11,953 runs and became the second youngest batter to 12,000 Test runs, right behind Alastair Cook, who reached the coveted landmark at 33 years & 10 days. 

The English batter is closing in on Cook’s overall tally of 12,472 Test runs and is just one century short of Cook’s 33 in the format after bringing up his 32nd Teat Ron in the second Test of the Windies series at Trent Bridge, Nottingham. Earlier, Root also became one of the six batters in history to have passed the 50-run mark in Tests at least 95 times. 

Currently, Root has 12,207 runs, which is the most among active cricketers. Along with Root, Mark Wood is the other English player to have made big strides in the ranking, with his 7/92 lifting him to the 20th spot on the Test bowling rankings. 

Meanwhile, Indian T20I openers Shubman Gill and Yashasvi Jaiswal also steadily climbed the T20I batters rankings. While Jaiswal moved two spots to fourth, Gill climbed 16 spots to reach 21st on the table and attain a new career-high rating in the shortest format. 

India lead the team rankings in both the white-ball formats, while Australia maintain their top spot in Test rankings. 

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