Now that the league stage of the ICC World Test Championship 2021–2023 is over and only the WTC final is left, we take a look at the players who have scored the most runs in this cycle.
The second ICC World Test Championship lived up to the hype, with games that will go down as all-time greats, bowlers getting huge hauls, and batters scoring a mountain of runs.
Nine batters have more than 1000 runs in this WTC cycle from 2021 to 2023, with only the final between Australia and India at the Oval on June 7 left to play. In the first edition, only six batters reached four figures.
Marnus Labuschagne, Joe Root, and Steve Smith, who scored the most runs in the 2019-21 cycle, were back among the top scorers this time. They were joined near the top by a Pakistani star who scored a lot of runs and two rivals who got their game back.
We look at who has scored the most runs in the current WTC cycle.
Joe Root (1915 runs, England)
Root is in the top five run-getters for the second World Test Championship cycle in a row. And unless the next player on the list, an Australia opener, has an innings (or two) of his life in the WTC final, Root is likely to stay on top with 1915 runs from 22 Tests.
The former captain of England took his good form from the last cycle into the current one. In the first three matches against India, he scored three centuries and a fifty. Unfortunately, Root didn’t get much help from the other players, and England went down 2-1 in the series before the last game was postponed.
Root’s next eight Tests as captain were a nightmare, so he decided to step down. However, he still did well with the bat during those tough times.
Root was the only English player in the top five run scorers in the 4-0 Ashes loss in Australia. He had 322 runs. Root scored two centuries in the series against the West Indies, but the team lost the series 1-0.
As the pressure of being captain eased and the new ‘Bazball’ era started, Root kept showing how good he was with the red ball.
Root scored three centuries (two against New Zealand and one against India) and a half-century in his first four games as captain under Ben Stokes.
Even though he wasn’t quite able to keep up that level of play at the end of the tournament, Root had scored enough runs to pull ahead of the other players in the run-scoring charts.
Usman Khawaja (Australia) – 1608 runs
Khawaja’s comeback to Test cricket was one of the most inspiring in recent history. He made the most of an unlikely recall at The Ashes to become a key part of Australia’s top-of-the-table performance in 16 WTC matches.
The left-handed opener had a dream come true when he scored two centuries (137 and 101*) against England in Sydney.
Khawaja’s good form followed him to Pakistan, where he scored 397 runs in three matches, more than anyone else. He had two centuries and as many fifties.
Even though Khawaja didn’t get big scores in the next few Tests, the 36-year-old was still a strong presence at the top of the order.
Khawaja did end the WTC cycle on a high note, with a career-best 195* against South Africa, followed by two fifties and a hundred on difficult tracks in India during the Border-Gavaskar series.
Babar Azam (Pakistan) – 1527 runs
Even though Pakistan and their captain had a forgettable WTC, Babar shone brightly for his team and once again showed the world why he is one of the best in the business over the course of 14 Tests.
In the first five Tests of Pakistan’s WTC campaign, Babar didn’t do as much as he usually does. He only hit three fifty-plus scores. But when Pakistan needed him the most, Babar stepped up and played the best innings of his Test career so far.
In the final innings, Pakistan was given a target of 506 runs on a tough pitch in Karachi. Babar led Pakistan from a likely loss to the edge of an impossible win before settling for a thrilling draw. Babar went out to bat after lunch on the fourth day, and he didn’t stop until after tea on the fifth day, just short of a double century. His score of 196 was the seventh-highest score by a single player in the fourth innings of a Test match.
Babar rode the momentum of that innings into his next few matches. In his next six Tests, he scored seven fifties and two hundreds. In the series against Australia, Sri Lanka, and England, Pakistan only had one win to show for it.
The top-order star saved Pakistan in the first innings on Boxing Day against New Zealand in Karachi. He put on another amazing show. Pakistan went from 110/4 to 438 thanks to Babar’s 161. He was joined by Sarfaraz Ahmed and Agha Salman.
Marnus Labuschagne (Australia) – 1509 runs
Labuschagne is one of two batters, along with Joe Root, to stay in the top five run-getters list from the last World Test Championship. Labuschagne has scored a lot of runs in 19 Tests in the current cycle, keeping him in the top five.
The energetic Australian started the WTC cycle well against old foes England. He finished the Ashes with 335 runs, which included a century in Adelaide and two fifties, making him the second-highest run-getter.
After a mostly quiet tour of Pakistan, Labuschagne had a dream run against Sri Lanka and the West Indies that included a double hundred and three centuries in three games.
Labuschagne made history in the first Test against the West Indies when he became only the eighth player in the history of Test cricket to score both 204 and 104* in the same Test match.
After that, he played well in the final Test against South Africa at home and in the Border-Gavaskar series in India.
After the dream double against West Indies, the 28-year-old moved to the top of the MRF Tyres Test Batting Rankings and has stayed there ever since.
Jonny Bairstow scored 1285 runs for England.
Bairstow’s 15-match season was both good and bad. The middle-order batter had a rough start to the WTC cycle, and he was dropped from the Test team before making a strong comeback. Then Bairstow was in the middle of a dream run when he got hurt in a strange way that stopped everything in its tracks.
Bairstow was left out of the first three Ashes games because he only had one score of 50 or more against India. He came back strong in the second game after he got back. In the last Test in Sydney, he scored a great 113.
When “Bazball” came on the scene, it was the start of a great run in Test cricket. Bairstow’s style fit perfectly with what Brendon McCullum and Ben Stokes brought to the team.
Bairstow got five more hundreds after that, including a run of four hundreds and a fifty against New Zealand and India over the course of five innings.
The 33-year-old was in the best shape of his life when he got hurt playing golf in Leeds. This ended his WTC run and kept him off the winning team at the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup in Australia.
