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In the long history of cricket, there have been only a few players who have achieved the No.1 position in the ICC rankings in all three formats - Test, ODI, and T20I. Looking at their stats and numbers it won’t be a difficult task to rank these players based on their performances and their abilities to turn the match around with their match-winning performance.
Let's have a look at those players who achieved No.1 ICC rankings in all formats.
Players who achieved No.1 ICC rankings in all
1. Ricky Ponting
Ricky Ponting became the first player to achieve number one ranking in each format. He scored 98 runs in the first ever T20I match played between Australia and New Zealand in Auckland in February 2005 and achieved the number one ranking in the format. Although he couldn't remain at the top for long.
Apart from that, Ponting has been crowned as number one batter in the ODI format for three consecutive years from 2005 to 2007, Ponting also achieved the number ranking in Tests for the first time in 2003.
2. Matthew Hayden
Matthew Hayden is ranked among the most explosive opening batters in the world. He is also one of the few players to rank number one in all three formats of the game although not at the same time. The southpaw was the leading run-scorer of both the ODI World Cup and T20 World Cup in 2007 with 659 runs and 265 runs to his name respectively.
Hayden has 30 Test centuries to his name along with ten ODI hundreds. Apart from that, in his short T20I career, Hayden has good numbers with 308 runs to his name from nine innings at an average of 51.33 with four half-centuries.
3. Virat Kohli
Star cricketer Virat Kohli was first player from India to get the highest ICC ranking in every format of the game. Kohli had his best years as an international cricketer in the decade of 2010s. He first achieved the number one ranking in the ODI format in November 2013. After that, he went on to rule the 50-over format and remained as number 1 ODI batter in 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020 respectively.
Apart from the ODIs, Virat Kohli won player of the tournament in the 2014 T20 World Cup and the 2016 T20 World Cup respectively and also finished as number one batter in the shorter format in both the years. Talking about the Test format, Kohli was crowned as number one batter in the longest format in 2018 and 2019 respectively.
4. Jasprit Bumrah
Jasprit Bumrah is considered as once in a generation player and has achieved several milestones in his nine-year international career so far. Making his international debut in January 2016, Bumrah achieved the number spot in ICC T20I bowlers’ ranking in January 2018 for a short period of time.
After the T20Is, Bumrah also became the nightmare for the batters in the ODI format and was crowned as number one ODI bowler by the ICC rankings in 2018 and 2019 respectively. Bumrah was also crowned as number 1 Test bowler by the ICC ranking in 2023 and 2024 respectively and is still holding the spot in the format as of 2025.
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5. Shakib al Hasan
The former Bangladesh ODI captain is one of the greatest cricketers to emerge from his nation. Shakib al Hasan is the leading run scorer for his side in T20Is with 2382 runs from 116 innings. The left-arm spinner is also the leading wicket-taker for Bangladesh in all three formats having 233 wickets in Tests, 317 wickets in ODIs and 140 scalps in T20Is.
He further has the third most runs for his nation in both ODIs (7570) and Tests (4454) stamping his authority as a true all-rounder. Notably, the southpaw is the second player to rank number one in all three formats at the same time as he took the top spot in the all-rounder rankings across formats in June 2015.
