Australia has held top spot since August 2001 and was second only for eight months out of the last 13 years
Australia last suffered a clean sweep on home turf in 1886-87; five defeats in this calendar year is worst for 23 years
South Africa will reclaim number-one sport in the Reliance Mobile ICC Test Champ
ionship table from Australia if it wins the third and last Test, starting in Sydney from 3 January.Australia has held the top spot since August 2001 when the current means of calculating the leading side in Test cricket was introduced and has indeed been number-one for all but eight months out of the last 13 years when South Africa led the championship table for three months in late 1999 and for five months in 2001.
As the ICC Test Championship is only updated at the end of each series, South Africa’s six-wicket win in Perth and nine-wicket victory in Melbourne will not yet be reflected on the table. But if the Proteas win in Sydney, it will put both teams level on 123 ratings points but Graeme’s Smith’s side will be placed higher by a fraction of a point.
In this case, just five ratings points would separate the top three teams in the world with India sitting in third place on 118 ratings points. In the middle, only eight ratings points separate fourth-placed Sri Lanka from sixth-placed England.
However, all the talk of South Africa regaining the number-one spot for the first time in almost seven-and-a-half years will go out of the window if Australia wins or draws the Sydney Test.
If Australia wins, it will retain the number-one spot on 126 points while South Africa will be second on 121 ratings points while a draw will keep Australia ahead of South Africa on 124 ratings points but the difference will be reduced to just two points as compared to the pre-series gap of 13 points.
South Africa’s win in Melbourne has also kept Graeme Smith’s side on course for a clean sweep over Australia, something which the most dominant side in recent years last suffered way back in 1886-87 when Arthur Shrewsbury’s England beat Percy McDonnell’s Australia by 13 runs and 71 runs in the two Tests played in Sydney.
Besides the 1886-87 series, Australia has only lost all the Tests of a series on three occasions with the last being 26 years ago. In that instance Kim Hughes’ side was beaten 3-0 by Imran Khan’s men in Pakistan in 1982-83. The other series in which Australia lost all the Tests was in South Africa in 1969-70 when Ali Bacher inspired his side to a 4-0 win over Bill Lawry’s Australia and in England in 1886 when Allan Steel’s Englishmen beat Henry Scott’s Australia 3-0.
In addition to this, Australia’s Test defeats this calendar year now amount to five, a number not suffered by an Australia side since 1985.
Reliance Mobile ICC Test Championship (as of 30 December)
Rank Team Rating
1 Australia 130
2 India 118
3 South Africa 117
4 Sri Lanka 108
5 England 103
6 Pakistan 100
7 West Indies 81
8 New Zealand 81
9 Bangladesh 0
ICC MEDIA RELEASE