Dubai:&nbsp;Newly-appointed India Test skipper&nbsp;Virat Kohli has jumped four places to 15th spot in the latest&nbsp;ICC Player Rankings after his good performance in the drawn&nbsp;third cricket Test at Melbourne.
Kohli, who scored 169 and 54 in the first and second&nbsp;innings of the just-concluded third Test, is the best-placed&nbsp;Indian batsman in the list with 737 ranking points.&nbsp;
<img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2014/dec/V-Kohli2912.jpg" alt="Virat Kohli in full flow." width="650" height="815" /> Virat Kohli in full flow against the Australians.
Cheteshwar Pujara and Murali Vijay are the next best&nbsp;Indian batsmen in the list at 19th and 20th spot after losing&nbsp;two and one place respectively. Ajinkya Rahane, who scored 147&nbsp;and 48 in the third Test, also made a jump of 15 places to&nbsp;reach 26th spot.
Australia captain Steven Smith, who scored a Test best&nbsp;192 in the first innings, has gained two places to claim fifth&nbsp;spot for the first time in his career. He now trails&nbsp;number-one ranked AB de Villiers, who has regained the top&nbsp;spot from Kumar Sangakkara.
Also moving in the right direction are Chris Rogers of&nbsp;Australia (24th, up by four places), Kraigg Brathwaite (37th,&nbsp;up by 11 places), Marlon Samuels (37th, up by seven places)&nbsp;and Dean Elgar (50th, up by 13 places).
In the ICC Player Rankings for Test Bowlers, Umesh Yadav&nbsp;and Mohammad Shami improved eight places each to be placed at&nbsp;the 36th and 38th spot in the list which is still headed by&nbsp;South Africa's Dale Steyn.
Australia's Ryan Harris has moved up two places to second&nbsp;following his six wickets at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG), while Trent Boult has achieved a best-ever ranking of&nbsp;seventh after rising two places. Boult had figures of three&nbsp;for 25 and four for 100.
Bowlers outside the top 20 and moving in the right&nbsp;direction include Neil Wagner (22nd, up by two places), Josh&nbsp;Hazlewood (53rd, up by 16 places) and Imran Tahir (58th, up by&nbsp;six places).
There is no change to the top five in the ICC Player&nbsp;Rankings for Test All-Rounders. Shakib Al Hasan of Bangladesh leads the field, followed by Vernon Philander of South Africa&nbsp;and India's Ravichandran Ashwin.
Meanwhile, South Africa is just a draw away from&nbsp;retaining the Reliance ICC Test Championship mace and with it&nbsp;winning a cash award of USD 500,000.&nbsp;
If South Africa draws the Cape Town Test and Australia&nbsp;wins in Sydney, then South Africa will finish on 122 ratings&nbsp;points, compared to Australia's 119 ratings points.&nbsp;
However, if the West Indies wins in Cape Town Test and&nbsp;Australia wins in Sydney, then Australia will finish ahead of South Africa by a fraction of a point (0.2).
The side that will finishes second will pocket USD&nbsp;390,000, while England and Pakistan have been guaranteed USD&nbsp;280,000 and USD 170,000 after sealing third and fourth&nbsp;positions, respectively, following the Christchurch Test result.
The annual cut-off for the Reliance ICC Test Championship&nbsp;is April 2015. But with the ICC Cricket World Cup 2015 to be&nbsp;played from 14 February to 29 March 2015, the current Test&nbsp;series are the last for the season.

Newly appointed India Test skipper&nbsp;Virat Kohli has jumped four places to 15th spot in the latest&nbsp;ICC Player Rankings after his good performance in the drawn&nbsp;third cricket Test at Melbourne

Steven Smith jumps to 5th, Virat Kohli at 15th in ICC Test rankings

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Home / Sports / Cricket / Article / Steven Smith jumps to 5th, Virat Kohli at 15th in ICC Test rankings

Steven Smith jumps to 5th, Virat Kohli at 15th in ICC Test rankings

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