Cricket.com.au’s best Test team of 2024

Yashasvi Jaiswal (India)

M: 15 | 1,478 runs at 54.74 | 3x 100s | HS: 214no

India's bright young batting star was only 22 for all but four days of 2024 but played with the composure and class of a veteran. Jaiswal's back-to-back double centuries in February ensured a home Test series win for India over England, while the left-hander's stunning 161 in Perth was also decisive. His runs tally is the most by an Indian opener in a calendar year and his 36 sixes is a new worldwide benchmark for a calendar year.

Ben Duckett (England)

M: 17 | 1,149 runs at 37.06 | 2x 100s | HS: 153

It was another impressive year for Duckett, the England opener who prides himself on rarely leaving the ball. While his two hundreds (153 in Rajkot, 114 in Multan) both came in losing causes on the subcontinent, they were also high-quality hands, emphasised by the fact none of his teammates reached 50 in either of those defeats. Duckett's strike-rate of 87.04 through the year also reaffirmed his key role in England's aggressive approach.

Joe Root (England)

M: 17 | 1,556 runs at 55.57 | 6x 100s | HS: 262no

Root added another six centuries in 2024 – made in four countries – to his remarkable career record. That included twin hundreds for the first time, against Sri Lanka at Lord's, and a monster 262no in Multan that helped England engineer a stunning win over Pakistan. In lists like this, England's sheer volume of Tests can give their players a leg up, but Root's incredible consistency with the bat (and 11 wickets to boot) in what is the seventh-most prolific run-scoring year on record, earns him his place in this XI.

Rachin Ravindra (New Zealand)

M: 12 | 984 runs at 42.78 | 2x 100s | HS: 249

Ravindra narrowly edges out his teammate Kane Williamson for this middle-order spot, chiefly for his heroics in New Zealand's landmark series win in India. An aggressive 134 from 157 and then a nerveless 39no earned him player-of-the-match honours in that first Test and he backed it up with a crucial 65 in the first innings in Pune. To kick off the year, he went large with 240 at home to the Proteas.

Harry Brook (England)

M: 12 | 1,100 runs at 55.00 | 4x 100s | HS: 317

Brook added emphatically to his extraordinary away record this year with series-defining centuries in Wellington and Christchurch against the Kiwis, and a remarkable 317 in England's win in Multan. The New Zealand hundreds summed up the devastating brilliance of England's attacking ace; the visitors were 3-26 in the first Test and 3-45 in the second when he came to the middle and proceeded to change the course of the match, blasting 123 (115) and 171 (197) to help his side to their finest series win of the year.

Kamindu Mendis (Sri Lanka)

M: 9 | 1,049 runs at 74.92 | 5x 100s | HS: 182no

The revelation of 2024. Mendis began the year as a once-capped bits-and-pieces number seven known best for his ambidextrous bowling, and ended it by reaching 1,000 runs in the same number of innings (13) as Bradman. A century in each innings against Bangladesh in March was just the start; he added a fine 113 v England in Manchester and made two more tons against the Kiwis in Galle. By year's end the 26-year-old was batting five and regarded as one of Sri Lanka's key men.

Alex Carey (Australia) (wk)

M: 9 | Dis: 46 (42c, 4st) | 440 runs at 33.84 | 3x 50s | HS: 98no

Carey's 46 dismissals were comfortably the most by a wicketkeeper in 2024 and better still they came at the rate of 2.55 per innings – the equal-fourth best in a calendar year this century. The 33-year-old took a career-high 10 dismissals in Christchurch while his fourth-innings 98no in the same game was rivalled only by Williamson's excellent 133no v South Africa in terms of this year's standout run-chase performances, and the best by an Australian in a generation. According to Opta Stats, Carey's 96 per cent catch success rate (42/44) was the best of any 'keeper to make at least nine catches in Tests last year.

Matt Henry (New Zealand)

M: 9 | 48 wkts at 18.58 | 10wm: 0 | 5wi: 4 | BBI: 7-67 | BBM: 9-161

One of Test cricket's great improvers. His first 31 Test wickets cost him 51.54 apiece. Since mid-2021 though, he averages 22.28, with more than half his victims since then coming in 2024. Henry was NZ’s best bowler in home series against Australia and England but his crowning moment came in Bengaluru when he took 5-15 to skittle India for just 46, setting the tone for the astonishing boilover.

Jasprit Bumrah (India) (c)

M: 13 | 71 wkts at 14.92 | 10wm: 0 | 5wi: 5 | BBI: 6-45 | BBM: 9-91

One of the greatest calendar years by a bowler ever; not since Dale Steyn's 74-wicket 2008 has a pace bowler been as prolific and not since Imran Khan's 1982 (62 victims at 13.29) has one taken them at a better rate. Yes, he has torched Australia amid of the greatest tours by a visiting quick of all-time, but he also cleaned up England with 19 poles in four Tests on unhelpful home surfaces as every other seamer went around the park. As the only member of this side to have skippered their team in 2024 (leading India to victory in Perth) Bumrah also gets the captaincy reins – a job he could well see more of in future.

Josh Hazlewood (Australia)

M: 15 | 35 wkts at 13.60 | 10wm: 0 | 5wi: 2 | BBI: 5-31 | BBM: 9-79

An underrated year for the paceman amid several injury concerns. A nine-wicket Test against the Windies in Adelaide preceded a supreme tour of New Zealand, while he was his side's best bowler in their defeat to India in Perth. His sub-14 bowling average is the greatest by an Australian in a calendar year since World War Two.

Keshav Maharaj (South Africa)

M: 15 | 35 wkts at 19.20 | 10wm: 0 | 5wi: 2 | BBI: 5-59 | BBM:8-164

The lone Protea in this team despite them topping the World Test Championship table, which has guaranteed them a berth in next year's final. Maharaj’s year began on a Newlands Test pitch where he didn't bowl a single over; it got better from there, proving a throughline in South Africa’s consecutive Test series wins over West Indies, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.