Virat is No 1, Rohit is No 2, but guess who are 3, 4 and 5?
IMAGE: The Indian cricketers celebrate a South African wicket in the 5th ODI, February 14, 2018. Photograph: BCCI
These are indeed the best of times for Indian cricket, and certainly ODI cricket.
Srinivas Bhogle and Purnendu Maji list India's Most Valuable ODI players in the 2017-2018 season (32 matches so far).
The Most Valuable Player Index (MVPI) picks out batsmen who score a lot of runs at a high strike rate, bowlers who take a lot of wickets at a low economy rate, and fielders who take the most catches or participate in run outs.
MVPI expresses a player's overall batting + bowling + fielding performance in terms of a 'run equivalent'.
| Rank | Player Name | Runs | 4s | 6s | Strike Rate | Wickets | Economy | Matches | MVPI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Virat Kohli | 1,833 | 172 | 23 | 98.5 | 0 | 5.8 | 29 | 2,237 |
| 2 | Rohit Sharma | 1,463 | 135 | 52 | 97.2 | 0 | 0 | 27 | 1,701 |
| 3 | Shikhar Dhawan | 1,271 | 169 | 16 | 103.2 | 0 | 0 | 26 | 1,565 |
| 4 | Hardik Pandya | 468 | 27 | 27 | 114.7 | 30 | 5.4 | 31 | 1,464 |
| 5 | Jasprit Bumrah | 11 | 2 | 0 | 36.7 | 42 | 4.5 | 26 | 1,314 |
| 6 | Kuldeep Yadav | 23 | 4 | 0 | 62.2 | 39 | 4.8 | 20 | 1,037 |
| 7 | Bhuvneshwar Kumar | 172 | 15 | 3 | 79.3 | 29 | 5.1 | 27 | 1,026 |
| 8 | M S Dhoni | 692 | 53 | 13 | 81.3 | 0 | 0 | 32 | 993 |
| 9 | Yuzvendra Chahal | 1 | 0 | 0 | 9.1 | 37 | 5 | 20 | 950 |
| 10 | Kedar Jadhav | 330 | 35 | 5 | 95.1 | 10 | 5.2 | 25 | 705 |
| 11 | Ajinkya Rahane | 725 | 72 | 6 | 78 | 0 | 0 | 17 | 700 |
| 12 | Umesh Yadav | 2 | 0 | 0 | 66.7 | 14 | 5.4 | 8 | 366 |
| 13 | Axar Patel | 11 | 0 | 0 | 73.3 | 10 | 4.6 | 8 | 315 |
| 14 | Ravindra Jadeja | 26 | 1 | 0 | 70.3 | 4 | 5.2 | 7 | 271 |
| 15 | Shreyas Iyer | 210 | 22 | 3 | 96.3 | 0 | 2 | 6 | 257 |
| 16 | Manish Pandey | 171 | 17 | 1 | 88.6 | 0 | 0 | 10 | 206 |
| 17 | Ravichandran Ashwin | 1 | 0 | 0 | 33.3 | 5 | 5 | 6 | 179 |
| 18 | Yuvraj Singh | 162 | 18 | 2 | 89.5 | 0 | 5 | 8 | 179 |
| 19 | Dinesh Karthik | 183 | 16 | 0 | 69.8 | 0 | 0 | 8 | 168 |
| 20 | Shardul Thakur | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 5 | 5.8 | 3 | 123 |
| 21 | Mohammed Shami | 7 | 1 | 0 | 87.5 | 4 | 4.8 | 3 | 114 |
| 22 | Lokesh Rahul | 28 | 2 | 0 | 73.7 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 54 |
| 23 | Washington Sundar | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 6.5 | 1 | 15 |
MVPI: Most Valuable Player Index = Sum of batting, bowling and fielding points. Run outs are counted as 1 (wicket) for a direct hit, and 0.5 (wicket) if the fielder is an equal participant in a run out dismissal.
Most Valuable Players in the SA ODI series
'Rohit could score the 1st 300 in ODIs'
Why Sanjay Manjrekar became a commentator
Team India's 2018-19 schedule: Focus on ODIs as World Cup looms
Test cricket could die in India if...