Career bests for Mitchell, Blundell and Leach in ICC Men’s Test Player Rankings

New Delhi, June 29: The New Zealand batting pair of Daryl Mitchell and Tom Blundell have attained career-best positions in the MRF Tyres ICC Men’s Test Player Rankings as has England spinner Jack Leach, after superb performances in the third match of their ICC World Test Championship series in Leeds. Mitchell and Blundell, who were involved in century partnerships in all three Tests of the series, are both in the top 20 now. Mitchell’s scores of 109 and 56 see him advance four places to 12th position while Blundell’s knocks of 55 and 88 not out have lifted him 11 slots to 20th position. England batter Jonny Bairstow, who has been quite the centrepiece with his blistering knocks in this series, has advanced 20 places to 21st after scoring 162 and 71 not out while Oliver Pope is up three places to 49th after his 82 in the second innings of the Test, which England won by seven wickets to complete a 3-0 series victory. Left-arm spinner Leach’s Player of the Match effort of 10 for 166 has helped him leap 13 places to a career-best 25th position among bowlers while Stuart Broad has moved up one place to 13th in Wednesday’s weekly update that also includes the second Test between the West Indies and Bangladesh. West Indies skipper Kraig Brathwaite is up one place to 27th after his first-innings half-century while Kyle Mayers (up 22 places to 57th) and John Campbell (up four places to 76th) are the others to move up the batters’ list for the West Indies, who won the WTC series 2-0. Nurul Hasan (up 14 places to 84th) and Nazmul Hossain (up 11 places to 88th) are the ones to advance for Bangladesh. Alzarri Joseph and Jayden Seales are now joint-40th among bowlers and Khaled Ahmed is in 88th position. Bangladesh captain Shakib al Hasan has slipped behind India’s Ravichandran Ashwin to third position among all-rounders.