Virat Kohli to David Warner: The Top 10 Fastest Runners in Cricket

The perception of good cricket had long been limited to perfect batting stances and execution, where mastering the basics brought more accolades than winning a match. That changed significantly as the competition grew fiercer every decade and athleticism became paramount. Skills like acrobatic fielding and fast running between the wickets gained prominence. Below we discuss the top 10 fastest runners in cricket.

With limited-over cricket getting more relevant, batsmen had to find a way to put pressure on bowlers who had every weapon in their locker to check big hits. Thus, converting “singles into doubles” was invented, where even the best of deliveries would fetch runs and keep the scoreboard ticking.

While former India captain Virat Kohli executed this skill magnificently, world cricket has seen several such supreme athletes who are lightning-fast runners. Having quick feet is an asset that makes fielders cherishable as well. A fast runner often has quicker acceleration, which is more handy in today’s white ball cricket where most games go right down to the wire. The top 10 fastest runners are mentioned below:

Top 10 Fastest Runner in Cricket

1. Virat Kohli

The greatest white-ball player to ever grace the game of cricket, Virat Kohli has set the standards extremely high with unconventional batting. Boasting a fitness level very few athletes around the world could attain, let alone cricket, Kohli thrives through his running between the wickets and is easily the fastest runner in cricket today.

Having 50 centuries and 72 half-centuries in ODIs is an otherworldly task and one needs to keep scoring runs with relative ease to achieve it. It was under Kohli’s captaincy that BCCI introduced the Yo-Yo test for team selection and it turned out to be a brilliant decision. While a cut-off score of 16.1 was the standard, Kohli was once known to clock scores of 19-21 on the Yo-Yo test.  
 

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Kohli has hit 1294 boundaries and 151 sixes in ODIs so far, which amounts to 6082 runs. This means the king of cricket has scored a whopping 7766 runs in singles, doubles and triples in ODIs alone, out of his current tally of 13848 runs.

Kohli's knock of 82* off 51 balls against Australia in the 2016 T20 World Cup was a perfect example of his batting quality as his innings was littered with incisive boundaries, perfectly timed sixes and lightning runs between the wickets alongside MS Dhoni at the other end.

2. AB De Villiers

The former South African captain was perhaps a prototype of his kind of a cricketer. Not only could De Villiers cross the boundary rope almost at will, but he was also equally capable of taking the safer route. Had he batted at the top of the order, his tally of runs would have skyrocketed given his insane fitness and ability to pace an innings. His 22 Test hundred and 25 ODI tons are a testament to that. 

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Apart from running between the wickets, De Villiers is also known for his lightning-quick reflexes in all parts of the field. Blessed with an athleticism that is so cliche among South Africans, De Villiers was excellent as a wicket-keeper in his initial days before he decided to take on the mantle from Jonty Rhodes in the later and most of his national career. From taking absolute blinders in the inner circle to saving tons of runs at the boundary rope, De Villiers was easily one of the fastest runners during his time.

3. MS Dhoni

Virat Kohli might have brought about a revolution in the Indian squad about fitness, but it was his mentor Mahindra Singh Dhoni who had planted the seed. Assuming captaincy at a time when the Indian team was filled with veterans, Dhoni’s first move was to select his playing eleven based on fitness. He was a brilliant runner between the wickets, who could squeeze in an extra single at the slightest of callousness. 
 

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Despite his ability to hit big shots in the most unplayable of deliveries, Dhoni relied on singles to pace his innings and his partnership with Kohli and Yuvraj Singh at crucial junctures have been part of the Indian cricket team folklore. Dhoni has over 10,700 runs in ODIS and only 10 centuries in the 50-over format, which highlights his ability to keep the scoreboard ticking at all times through sheer stamina and pace.

 4. Ravindra Jadeja

India’s best fielder by a distance and among the fittest of cricket players around the world, Ravindra Jadeja is next in this debate. A left-arm finger spinner who could come in handy with the bat in the lower order, Jadeja had cemented his place across all three formats of the game by sheer fitness. 
 

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Whether he can build an innings on singles and doubles relentlessly, or bullet throws from the inner circle, Ravindra Jadeja is the best utility player a cricket team can have.      

5. Ricky Ponting

Australia’s most successful captain at the World Cups and arguably the most prolific batsman of his era, Ricky Ponting also liked to build his innings on singles and doubles. Taken in the same breath as Rhodes in the early 2000s, Ponting was lightning quick on the field and pulled off some astonishing catches. 
 

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Known for having the most ideal temperament for the ODI format, Ponting exhibited both patient as well as blistering knocks during his time. He has 13,378 runs in Tests and 13,704 runs in ODIs.

6. Dwayne Bravo

Widely believed to be the most complete T20 cricketer once, former West Indies skipper Dwayne Bravo was built differently from his compatriots. While Chris Gayle, Andre Russell, Marlon Samuels and others are heavily built, Bravo used his superior athleticism to dominate the field. 
 

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Beaming with relentless energy at all times of the game, Bravon was a brilliant fielder in the outfield as well as a fast runner between the wickets in the death overs. His ability to become the number one death bowler in T20s after batting and fielding only points to his unique fitness.

7. Hardik Pandya

The Indian all-rounder completed a brilliant comeback in the recently concluded 2024 T20 World Cup after a dismal IPL, where Hardik Pandya was heavily criticized. The Baroda lad had burst into the limelight with his athletic displays for Mumbai Indians before the national team call-up came. Having the ideal athlete’s lean figure, Pandya is handy with the bat, and ball, and is a fast fielder, who can easily cover boundaries. 
 

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While Pandya mostly deals in boundaries from the lower middle order, he has also displayed his ability to stay at the crease and match Kohli’s pursuit during India’s iconic win over Pakistan in the 2022 T20 World Cup.     

8. Brendon McCullum

Like AB de Villiers, former New Zealand captain Brendon McCullum was also a prototype under his approach to cricket. An aggressive individual who could bat and field with equal intensity, McCullum started his career as a wicketkeeper before moving into the outfield and remained equally brilliant.

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Possessing a muscular body that could send any ball over the rope, McCullum didn’t always rely on his strength as his stamina went a long way to help him hold his place and lead the New Zealand Test team.

9. David Warner

Yet another aggressive batsman who stands out for his insanely fast running between the wickets is former Australian cricket David Warner. Known to get more dangerous as his innings progress, Warner also thrives on singles and doubles to set in the game before going for the big shots.

Having played an opener for most of his career, for Australia as well as in the IPL, Warner mastered the art of scoring non-boundary runs even with field restrictions. December 2019 saw the southpaw displaying exceptional athleticism and stamina to score 335 runs in just 418 balls against Pakistan in an Adelaide Test match. Quite unbelievably, only 162 runs of his innings came through boundaries.
 

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While not as prolific as Kohli in scoring runs, Warner still ended his career with 22 ODI centuries and 26 Test centuries to his name. Apart from being a good runner between the wickets, he is also a terrific fielder in the outfield where speedy covering of the field is equally important.

10. Glenn Maxwell

Alongside Pandya, Australia’s Glenn Maxwell is highly regarded as one of the best clutch players in world cricket today and a lot of that has to do with his fitness. An unconventional batsman, who is capable of playing both the long game as well as hammering an unbeaten 201 against Afghanistan standing just on one leg, Maxwell is a special talent.  

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Coming down the order, time constraints mostly force Maxwell to score in boundaries and sixes. However, he has shown his ability to build innings and hold the guard when the team is under pressure. Like most Australians, Maxwell is also an outstanding fielder with numerous acrobatic catches to his name.

Cricket was one of the least athletic sports in the world once which had scope for the likes of Inzamam-ul-Haq, Arjuna Ranatunga, Moin Khan and many others to flourish despite not being the fittest of the lot. That perception has changed drastically over the last two decades with the above list of runners being the primary pioneers.