Starc’s 6 for 12 has made him the No.1 Test bowler at 36, and Bumrah is 10 points behind

Jasprit Bumrah has not bowled a ball on this Sri Lanka tour. He was ruled out on 3 August with a left knee problem picked up while fielding in an ODI at Cardiff in July, and Auqib Nabi of Jammu and Kashmir went in his place. While he has been sitting it out, Mitchell Starc has taken his ranking.

Ten wickets in Mackay, and a career-best rating

Starc’s figures in the second Test against Bangladesh read 6 for 12 and 4 for 39. Australia won by an innings and 51 runs, squared the series, and Starc was named Player of the Series. The ICC’s rankings update, dated 25 August, has him first on 872 points, the highest he has ever been rated.

He is 36. He has spent much of a 15-year Test career inside the top ten and climbed into the top three after the Ashes at the end of 2025, but he had never been first until this week.

Bumrah drops to second, one point off third

Bumrah is on 862, ten behind Starc. Matt Henry is on 861, one behind Bumrah. The gap at the top is wider than the gap between second and third, which is the part India should be watching.

Bumrah first went top in February 2024 and has held the position for most of the two years since. His career-best rating is 908, set against Australia at Sydney in 2025, so 862 is some way short of his own ceiling. India had picked him for Sri Lanka subject to a final fitness test before the knee ruled him out.

Pat Cummins is fourth on 841 after 3 for 25 and 3 for 10 in Mackay. Marco Jansen, Kagiso Rabada and Scott Boland come next. Nathan Lyon climbed two places into the top ten. Mohammed Siraj is the next India bowler on the list, some way further down.

Headingley moved two Englishmen a long way

Ollie Robinson and Josh Tongue took 16 wickets between them as England beat Pakistan by an innings and 103 runs at Headingley. Robinson, playing his first Test back, jumped 15 places to 11th. Tongue went up 16 to 17th, and his 698 points are a career best.

Sri Lanka’s Asitha Fernando and Prabath Jayasuriya each moved up five spots, to 15th and 16th, on the strength of the first Test in Galle. Asitha took six wickets in that match and Jayasuriya seven. Sri Lanka lost it anyway.

Pant is back in the batting top ten

Rishabh Pant gained six places to equal seventh after scores of 39 and 66 in Galle, the second of them a quick fifty in India’s win. Harry Brook is still first, with Joe Root second, Steve Smith third and Travis Head fourth. KL Rahul moved up five to 30th.

Among all-rounders nothing moved at the top at all. Ravindra Jadeja is still first.

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