India’s Shafali Verma rose to the top of the T20I rankings for batters in Women’s T20Is. She overtook Australian star opener Beth Mooney to reach the spot for the second time.
It hasn’t been a happy return to competitive cricket for the Indian Women’s team. They lost the ODI series against South Africa Women 1-4 at home. They also lost the T20I rubber in the first two games itself. The second T20I was a thrilling game as it went down to the wire and the Proteas Women chased down 159 off the final delivery. India missed opportunities as they conceded the series.
However, there was a small positive coming out of the second T20I. After the game, ICC updated the T20I rankings for batters and Shafali Verma rose to the top. She pipped Australia opener Beth Mooney to reclaim the No. spot among the batters in T20I cricket.
This is the second time in her career that Verma is at the top of the T20I rankings. After the 2020 Women’s T20 World Cup, the Haryana-born opening batter had shot to the top. However, Mooney reclaimed the top spot after the home series against New Zealand in September. At the moment, the 17-year-old Verma stands at 750 ratings but Mooney follows her only by two ratings.
Lizelle Lee lost her top spot in the ODI rankings for batters after she missed the fifth ODI against India. However, she gained three places in the T20I rankings after she scored 70 in the second game. She now sits at the 11th spot while Laura Wolvaardt has moved up to No. 24. South African skipper Sune Luus and Nadine de Klerk also moved up the rankings and now stand at No. 24 and No. 74 respectively.
For India, it was Harleen Deol who made massive jumps on the T20I rankings. After registering scores of 52 and 31 in the first two T20Is, she moved up to No. 85 and it was a jump of 262 places. Rajeshwari Gayakwad also gained nine places as she jumped from No. 34 to stand 25th on the bowlers’ rankings in T20Is.
