Jang News - Pakistan up to third spot in ICC Test rankings

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s cricket team attained that top of the world feeling after winning the Abu Dhabi limited overs series against Sri Lanka on Tuesday that gave them the fourth position in the International Cricket Council (ICC) ODI team ranking.

Even more satisfying was the fact for them was that their name was at the third spot in the ICC Test team rankings. Pakistan having 108 points was at third place after Australia (1) and England (2).

Meanwhile in the top Test batsmen list, Pakistan’s Mohammad Yousuf is at the second spot after Ricky Ponting with 915 points.

Younis Khan is present at the ninth position while Inzamam-ul-Haq is struggling at the 11th spot with 735 points.

In the bowlers’ list, Mohammad Asif is the only Pakistani bowler who succeeded in making his place in the top-ten club. Asif is at 8th spot having 710 points while other Pakistani bowlers making good progress in the rankings include Shoaib Akhtar (11), Danish Kaneria (13) and Umar Gul (17).

The ICC Player rankings for Test batsmen confirm the assessment of England’s acting captain Andrew Strauss after his side’s draw with the West Indies at Lord’s that the home side has an exceptionally good stock of batsmen.

England’s top-ranked batsman, Kevin Pietersen, remains third in the list behind Ponting and Yousuf after his seventh Test hundred.

However two of his teammates are also now knocking on the door of places inside the top 10, Ian Bell and Paul Collingwood.

Bell is up three places to 14th position and has his best-ever haul of rating points following a first innings 109 not out while Collingwood rises one spot to 13th after his 111-run knock in London.

The West Indies, by comparison, has just one player inside the top 20. Former captain Shivnarine Chanderpaul, who hit an adhesive first innings 74-run knock, has climbed up one place to 19th in the table.

And below him, Chris Gayle (25th, up one), Dwayne Bravo (37th, up two), Daren Ganga (48th, up three and with a best-ever haul of rating points) and Denesh Ramdin (up six to joint 57th place and also with more rating points than ever before) are all heading in the right direction.

And the West Indies seam and swing bowler Corey Collymore is another player heading upwards, this time in the ICC Player rankings for Test bowlers.

Collymore, who captured four wickets in the drawn Lord’s match, is up one place to 10th position and has reached a career-high haul of rating points.

The same is true of England spinner Monty Panesar, whose best Test figures of 6-129 have catapulted him up seven places in that bowling list to 26th position.

Below that comes India’s highest-ranked Test bowler in the ICC Player rankings, spinner Anil Kumble, but he has slipped one place after the drawn first Test against Bangladesh in Chittagong in which he was unable to bowl a ball after falling ill with a virus during the match.

The highest-placed Bangladesh batsman is captain Habibul Bashar, in 30th place, while Rajin Saleh is up four spots to 53rd with his best-ever haul of rating points.