Following his explosive knock of 69 runs off 36 balls with a strike rate of 191.67 in the penultimate T20I match against Australia, Suryakumar Yadav has climbed to the second spot in the latest ICC T20I batting rankings. The 32-year-old now has 801 points, two more than Pakistan captain Babar Azam, who is in the third spot.

The list is led by Pakistan’s Mohammad Rizwan, who has 861 points, 60 more than that of Yadav. Meanwhile, Aiden Markram of South Africa, who was previously at the third spot, has gone down to the fourth, conceding his position to Babar Azam.

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The second spot on the ICC T20I batting ranking is also the best in Yadav’s career. On the other hand, Babar Azam, who was at the pole position for 1,155 days, has failed to claim the top spot back once again. Yadav is also only the third Indian player who has scored 800 or more points in the ICC rankings, behind Virat Kohli and KL Rahul.

Suryakumar Yadav is also the only Indian player in the top 10 of the batting rankings, as Rohit Sharma holds the second highest spot among Indians, in the 13th place. Other Indian batters such as Virat Kohli (15), KL Rahul (22), Ishan Kishan (25) and Shreyas Iyer (30) find themselves further down in the list.

This could prove to be a boost in confidence for Suryakumar Yadav, who has been included in India’s squad against South Africa in the T20I series. Yadav has scored 682 runs in the shortest format of the sport this year, the highest by any cricketer. He has also scored four half-centuries and one century in these matches.

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He is also in contention to become the highest Indian run-scorer in T20I in a calendar year. The record is currently held by Shikhar Dhawan, who scored 689 runs in 18 matches in 2018. Yadav needs to score only eight more runs against South Africa to surpass Dhawan to create a new record.

Other Indian cricketers such as Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma’s highest tally was 641 runs in 2016 and 590 runs in 2018 respectively.