South Africa opener Lizelle Lee has clinched the top spot in the recent ICC Women’s ODI Ranking after her terrific performance with the bat against India in the ongoing five-match ODI series.
The 28 y/o right-hand batter hit 83*, 132*, and 69 in the first, third and fourth ODI respectively, taking her total score to 288 in the series, with one match remaining. She is also the only South African to top the ICC ranking table, ever. Lee had moved up from number 11 to number 8 last week, and after the 4 ODIs against India, she has jumped up 7 places to take the No.1, bringing down England’s Tammy Beaumont to second.
With Lee and Beaumont being at the top two positions, Australian skipper Meg Lanning and West Indies captain Stafanie Taylor have fallen one place each to take the 3rd and 4th spot respectively. Wicket-keeper batsman Alyssa Healy and New Zealand vice-captain Amy Satterthwaite have slipped down one place too, taking the 5th and 6th position respectively. Indian opener Smriti Mandhana has maintained herself at the 7th spot whereas South African opener and stand-in captain Laura Wolvaardt has slipped 2 places down to the 8th spot. Indian ODI skipper Mithali Raj has also retained the 9th spot after completing 10000 International career runs and 7000 ODI runs and Australian cricketer Ellyse Perry has shifted to No. 10.
Apart from the top 10 batters in the list, India’s top-order batter Punam Raut has jumped 8 places up to take the 18th spot as she posted a total of 253 runs in the ODI series against South Africa (with one game remaining) hitting two half-centuries and one ton. She is also the fourth-best Indian on the list after Harmanpreet Kaur at no. 15.
South Africa’s Lara Goodall, who also showed great wit with the bat, has jumped up 28 places to take the 48th position.
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I’m a Senior Masters student pursuing Journalism and Mass Communication. An all time Cricket enthusiast. I could never play the game but always loved watching it, and now writing about it!