Riding on his brilliant century, opener KL Rahul jumped 19 spots to 37th place, while captain Virat Kohli dropped to the fifth spot in the latest ICC Test rankings for batsmen.
England captain Joe Root, on the other hand, closed the gap with top-ranked Kane Williamson as he moved to the second spot with back-to-back centuries in the first two Tests.
When Kohli’s childhood coach Rajkumar Sharma was asked about Kohli’s recent performances in international cricket and his ouster from the top four in the latest ICC Test rankings, he said it was “a shocking news” for him as he expected Root to move up in the rankings but didn’t expect Kohli to drop out of the top four.
“It is a shocking news for me too that Virat Kohli has fallen to the fifth spot. I was expecting that Joe Root would have probably gone ahead of him. I will definitely talk to him,” Sharma was quoted as saying by Times Now.
He also said that the Indian skipper loves challenges, and the latter would be eyeing to move ahead of Root in the rankings during the upcoming matches.
“I don’t feel there is any need to motivate him because he is extremely motivated. When I had spoken to him after the last match as well, he was quite excited and was happy that they had won and was not too worried about his runs. When he has such an attitude, a big hundred is about to come,” said Sharma.
Kohli has 27 centuries in Test cricket, but he has not made a ton since November 2019. Since November 2019, he has scored just 407 runs in 17 innings at a poor average of 23.94.
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