Dubai, 9 April 2008Jayawardena’s team can get back into fifth but West Indies is eyeing up England ; opportunity for Sarwan and Chanderpaul to get into top 10 batsmen
Sri Lanka can move back up to fifth place in the ICC ODI Championship with a good showing in its three-match series against the West Indies, which begins on Thursday in Port-of-Spain , Trinidad and Tobago .
If Mahela Jayawardena’s team wins the series 3-0 it could move ahead of Pakistan , depending on how Shoaib Malik’s team does in the rest of its series with Bangladesh .
But should Sri Lanka slip up badly against the West Indies and lose the series 3-0, it will fall below England into seventh position, a far cry from a year ago when the Sri Lanka one-day side made it to the final of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2007 in Barbados and was fourth in the ladder.
For its part, eighth-placed West Indies cannot overtake England even if it sweeps the series but it can get to within four ratings points of Paul Collingwood’s team and with a tough series coming up for England against New Zealand in June, the pressure would be on.
At the top of the ICC ODI Championship table South Africa still leads Australia by a fraction of a ratings point. Those two teams are 14 points clear at the top from New Zealand in third position and India , just behind in fourth spot.
From a players’ point of view there are five batsmen taking part in the West Indies v Sri Lanka series currently in the top 20 of the ICC ODI Player Rankings for ODI batsmen but not one is in the top 10.
The player most likely to remedy that situation is Shivnarine Chanderpaul who is in 11th position and just eight ratings points behind India ’s Mahendra Singh Dhoni in 10th.
Further back, in 14th position, Kumar Sangakkara will be keen to put behind him the personal disappointment of the recent Test series by scoring heavily in the ODIs. Such is the closely fought nature of that part of the rankings it is likely that a good performance for the 30-year-old would propel him into the top 10 too.
Further back, Ramnaresh Sarwan and Chris Gayle of the West Indies and Sri Lanka captain Jayawardena can also make good progress up the ladder. The batting list is still headed by South Africa ’s Graeme Smith, followed by Sachin Tendulkar of India in second position and Australia ’s Ricky Ponting in third.
As far as the bowling is concerned, veteran left-arm seamer Chaminda Vaas is the highest ranked bowler from either side in fourth position but Daren Powell in seventh spot and Jerome Taylor in 10th will be snapping at his heels.
Daniel Vettori of New Zealand is still on top of the bowling rankings, followed closely by Nathan Bracken of Australia in second position and New Zealand ’s Shane Bond in third.
LG’s four-year sponsorship of ICC Player and Team Rankings ended on 31 March and the new sponsor will be announced in due course.
Upcoming ODI fixtures:
10 Apr – West Indies v Sri Lanka , Port-of-Spain
11 Apr – Pakistan v Bangladesh , Faisalabad
12 Apr – West Indies v Sri Lanka , Port-of-Spain
13 Apr – Pakistan v Bangladesh , Lahore
15 Apr – West Indies v Sri Lanka , St Lucia
16 Apr – Pakistan v Bangladesh , Multan
19 Apr – Pakistan v Bangladesh , Karachi
ICC ODI Championship (as of 9 April)
Rank Team Rating
1 South Africa 127
2 Australia 127
3 New Zealand 113
4 India 113
5 Pakistan 109
6 Sri Lanka 107
7 England 105
8 West Indies 96
9 Bangladesh 46
10 Ireland 28
11 Zimbabwe 18
12 Kenya 0
ICC One-Day Rankings (as of 7 April before Pakistan v Bangladesh and West Indies v Sri Lanka series)
Batsmen
Rank Player Team Points Ave HS Rating
1 Graeme Smith SA 792! 41.11 792 v Ban at Dhaka 2008
2 S.R.Tendulkar Ind 777 44.33 887 v Zim at Sharjah 1998
3 Ricky Ponting Aus 770 43.40 832 v NZ at Hobart 2007
4 Mohd Yousuf Pak 752 43.07 777 v SA at Raw alp indi 2003
5 Matthew Hayden Aus 740 43.80 854 v Ind at Centurion 2003
6 Adam Gilchrist Aus 738 35.89 820 v SL at Dambulla 2004
7 Mike Hussey Aus 736 55.60 863 v NZ at Perth 2007
8 Kevin Pietersen Eng 735 48.18 834 v Aus at Antigua 2007
9 AB de Villiers SA 733! 37.66 733 v Ban at Dhaka 2008
10 MS Dhoni Ind 728 45.50 806 v WI at Kingston 2006
11 S.Chanderpaul WI 721 39.62 754 v SA at Durban 1999
12 H.H.Gibbs SA 718 36.53 750 v SL at Durban 2003
13 Michael Clarke Aus 717 44.04 756 v SL at Melbourne 2008
14 K.C.Sangakkara SL 716 36.03 760 v Ind at Rajkot 2007
15 Andrew Symonds Aus 713 39.68 778 v Ind at Nagpur 2007
16 R.R.Sarwan WI 692 44.55 798 v Ind at St Kitts 2006
17 Yuvraj Singh Ind 691 36.09 739 v WI at Port-of-Spain 2006
18 Chris Gayle WI 690 39.02 804 v Aus at Mumbai 2006
19 Jacques Kallis SA 688 45.21 816 v WI at Johannesburg 2004
20 M.Jayawardena SL 678 33.24 737 v WI at Colombo (RPS) 2001
Bowlers
Rank Player Team Points Ave Econ HS Rating
1 Daniel Vettori NZ 790! 31.87 4.18 790 v Eng at Christchurch 2008
2 Nathan Bracken Aus 770 21.89 4.37 806 v SL at St George's 2007
3 Shane Bond NZ 736 19.32 4.20 811 v SA at St George's 2007
4 Chaminda Vaas SL 699 27.26 4.19 861 v SA at Colombo (RPS) 2004
5 Kyle Mills NZ 683 26.66 4.65 694 v Ban at Queenstown 2007
6 Andre Nel SA 682 26.95 4.61 685 v Ban at Dhaka 2008
7 Daren Powell WI 673! 29.96 4.58 673 v SA at Johannesburg 2008
8 Brett Lee Aus 671 22.81 4.71 853 v SA at Melbourne 2006
9 M.Muralidaran SL 668 23.00 3.87 913 v NZ at Sharjah 2002
10 Jerome Taylor WI 660 27.17 4.74 688 v SA at Cape Town 2008
11 M.F.Maharoof SL 653 24.39 4.65 671 v Eng at Dambulla 2007
12 Brad Hogg Aus 636 26.84 4.52 687 v Ind at Nagpur 2007
13 Makhaya Ntini SA 635 24.12 4.46 782 v WI at Cape Town 2004
14= Andrew Flintoff Eng 634 25.10 4.37 755 v Ban at Dhaka 2003
Jacob Oram NZ 634 31.24 4.48 768 v Aus at The Oval 2004
16= Abdur Razzak Ban 632 24.29 4.07 711 v Eng at Bridgetown 2007
M.G.Johnson Aus 632* 25.41 4.80 659 v SL at Melbourne 2008
18 Lasith Malinga SL 621 25.58 4.80 687 v Ban at Colombo (RPS) 2007
19 Harbhajan Singh Ind 615 33.51 4.18 735 v WI at Bridgetown 2002
20 Peter Ongondo Ken 610 ! 25.14 4.34 610 v Ber at Nairobi 2007
All-rounders
Rank Player Team Points HS Rating
1 Shoaib Malik Pak 347 402 v WI at Brisbane 2005
2 Andrew Flintoff Eng 337 544 v SL at The Rose Bowl 2004
3= Chris Gayle WI 335 511 v Zim at Harare 2003
Jacob Oram NZ 335 353 v Eng at Auckland 2008
5 Jacques Kallis SA 334 505 v WI at Bridgetown 2001
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