Shree Charani closes in on record rating points in ICC T20I bowler ranking list

FILE PHOTO: Shree Charani is now just two points short of the highest rating points ever achieved by a women’s T20I bowler. | Photo Credit: Getty Images

Indian players were rewarded with significant gains in the ICC Women’s T20I Player Rankings following their team’s record eighth Women’s Asia Cup title, with Shree Charani strengthening her position at the top of the bowling rankings and Shafali Verma returning to the top six among the batters.

Charani’s outstanding four for 20 in the final against Sri Lanka at the Dubai International Stadium lifted the left-arm spinner above the 800-point mark for the first time, to a career-best 804 rating points.

That is the highest rating points ever achieved by an Indian in the ICC Women’s T20I Player Rankings for both batters and bowlers, surpassing Mithali Raj’s previous record of 780 points in the batting rankings back in 2011.

Charani is now just two points short of the highest rating points ever achieved by a women’s T20I bowler achieved by Australia’s Megan Schutt in November 2018.

India’s bowling attack was further rewarded with Deepti Sharma moving up four places to second after finishing the Asia Cup as the tournament’s leading wicket-taker with 14 scalps.

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In the Women’s T20I Batting Rankings, Shafali’s outstanding tournament saw her rise from seventh to sixth.

Shafali was the leading run-scorer at the Asia Cup with 236 runs, including scores of 64 in the semifinal and 68 in the final, and now has 741 rating points – her highest since October 2021.

She is just one place and four rating points behind teammate Smriti Mandhana, who sits fifth on 745 points after scoring 213 runs in five innings.

Shafali has also made significant progress in the all-rounders’ rankings, moving up five places to 15th and reaching a career-best 221 rating points.

Captain Chamari Athapaththu also made an impact with the ball, with her headline figures of seven for five against Indonesia contributing to a tournament tally of 12 wickets. She has moved up one place to 27th among the bowlers while retaining third place in the all-rounders’ rankings.