Pakistan's Rizwan, Babar Become Biggest Threat To World No 1 Suryakumar Yadav In T20 Batters Rankings

Suryakumar Yadav is currently struggling in the ongoing Indian Premier League with scores of 15, 1 and 0 in Mumbai Indians' first three games.

Source: Twitter

Struggling in IPL 2023, Mumbai Indians' (MI) and India batter Suryakumar Yadav still sits atop the latest ICC Men's T20I Batter Rankings. Surya scored a golden duck vs Delhi Capitals (DC) in his last IPL game, which was his fourth in last 6 outings and is under huge pressure.  A golden duck means getting out on the first ball of the innings. The MI player has struggled to get going in IPL after flurry of failures for India, not so long ago. His rough patch started in the ODI series vs Australia wherein he scored 3 consecutive golden ducks. Needless to say, the poor IPL and ODI outings has no bearing on the T20I rankings. 

Suryakumar is leading the chart with 906 rating points ahead of Pakistan duo of Mohammed Rizwan (811 points) and skipper Babar Azam (755), South Africa's Aiden Markram (748) and Devon Conway of New Zealand (745). Virat Kohli remained static at the 15th spot.

Pakistan's Mohammad Rizwan is second in the rankings while Babar Azam has moved to third spot. The Pakistani captain is the biggest threat for Surya. Both Rizwan and Bbaar can make huge jump in the rankings if the duo shine in the upcoming five-match T20I series vs New Zealand which starts on Saturday.

Another Golden Duck for #SuryakumarYadav. His last 7 innings in any format:

0, 1, 15, 0, 0, 0, 8 pic.twitter.com/z8dxpAT1oH — Nawaz __ (@Rnawaz31888) April 11, 2023

Surya's dip in form a concern for MI

After the DC vs MI clash at Feroz Shah Kotla ground in Delhi, Suryakumar was spotted having a conversation with head coach of Capitals Ricky Ponting. Surya was dismissed by Mukesh Kumar again and he looked rightly dejected as he walked back to the dressing room. Ponting, despite being the opposition team's coach, seemed to have passed on some supportive words to the struggling batter.

Despitr Surya's poor returns this season, MI captain Rohit Sharma in the post-match ceremony that he is going to be retained in MI's upcoming games. Rohit had said. "Don't need to make drastic changes, that's really important."  

His poor form is definitely a concern for MI but the only way he can come out of it by batting more in the games to come. Surya has been MI's match-winner in many seasons and deserves all the backing right now by captain, management and the owners.