Kohli, Dhoni the only cricketers in ESPN’s World Fame 100

ESPNCricinfo: Virat Kohli, in irresistible form in Twenty20 cricket and the captain of the Indian Test team, has found himself in the top ten of the global sports fame list put together by ESPN.

Kohli was at No. 8 in the ESPN World Fame 100 rankings, which is otherwise dominated by basketball and football players. However, cricket and India had a second entry in the top 20, with MS Dhoni, India’s ODI and T20 captain, at number 13. (Read the full list on ESPN.in, ESPN’s new multi-sport destination for Indian sports.) 

Tennis player Sania Mirza was the third Indian on the list, at number 41.

The rankings for current sportspersons were based on a formula devised by Ben Alamar, ESPN’s director of sports analytics; it combined salary and endorsements with social media following and Google search popularity.

The list was led by Cristiano Ronaldo, the world’s top-earning footballer. Only LeBron James, the American basketball star, separated Ronaldo from fellow footballers Lionel Messi and Neymar, who both play for FC Barcelona, La Liga rivals of Ronaldo’s Real Madrid.  Tennis legend Roger Federer completed the top five.