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ICC Test rankings

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 Rediff Cricket Ratings Rediff Cricket Ratings
June 4, 2002

India seventh, could climb to sixth place

M J Manohar Rao and Srinivas Bhogle

The Rediff test cricket ratings remain unchanged after the India-West Indies five-test series. India (39.44) stay seventh, West Indies (34.74) stay eighth.

Things could have been so different! If India's fragile batting tail had survived even 15 minutes more, the fifth test would have been drawn and India's RBI would have gone up to 40.68 (1.24 points more! -- since the West Indies have such a wonderful home record in test cricket, even a drawn test against West Indies in West Indies fetches valuable points).

The current (as on June 3, 2002) home-away point tally of test playing teams is shown, below, in Table A.
-- How the rankings work...

TABLE A: Test Score Card (as on Jun 3, 2002)
A W A Y
Aus Eng Ind NZ Pak RSA SL WI Zim
H

O

M

E		 Australia 4 / 5
3.5 / 5
 1 / 3
3 / 3
 3 / 3
1.5 / 3
 2 / 3
3 / 3
 2 / 3
3 / 3
 1 / 3
3 / 3		 2 / 4
5 / 5
 1 / 1
-
England 1.5 / 5
1 / 5
 1 / 3
2 / 3
 1.5 / 3
1.5 / 4
 2 / 3
1 / 2
 2 / 5
3 / 5
 2 / 3
0 / 1		 2 / 6
3.5 / 5
 1 / 2
1.5 / 2
India 0 / 3
2 / 3
 1 / 3
2 / 3		 1 / 3
2 / 3
 2 / 4
1 / 3
 0.5 / 2
0 / 2
 1 / 3
1.5 / 3
 2 / 5
1.5 / 3		 1 / 2
2 / 2
New Zealand 1.5 / 3
0 / 3
 2.5 / 4
1.5 / 3
 1 / 3
2 / 3
 0 / 1
1.5 / 3
 0.5 / 3
1 / 3
 1 / 3
2 / 2
 0.5 / 2
2 / 2
 2 / 2
0.5 / 1
Pakistan 0 / 3
1 / 3
 1 / 2
1 / 3
 2 / 3
2 / 4		 1.5 / 3
1 / 1
 1 / 2
1 / 3
 2.5 / 3
1 / 4
 1 / 3
2 / 2
 1.5 / 2
1 / 3
South Africa 0 / 3
1 / 3
 2 / 5
3 / 5
 2 / 2
1.5 / 2
 2 / 3
2.5 / 3
 2 / 3
1 / 2
 1.5 / 3
2.5 / 3
 3 / 5
5 / 5
 1 / 1
2 / 2
Sri Lanka 0 / 3
2 / 3
 1 / 1
1 / 3
 1.5 / 3
2 / 3
 0 / 2
2 / 3
 3 / 4
0.5 / 3
 0.5 / 3
1.5 / 3
 0.5 / 2
3 / 3		 2 / 3
3 / 3
West Indies 0 / 5
2 / 4
 1.5 / 5
4 / 6
 1.5 / 3
3 / 5
 0 / 2
1.5 / 2		 0 / 2
2 / 3
 0 / 5
2 / 5
 0 / 3
1.5 / 2
 1.5 / 2
2 / 2
Zimbabwe -
0 / 1
 0.5 / 2
1 / 2
 0 / 2
1 / 2
 0.5 / 1
0 / 2
 2 / 3
0.5 / 2
 0 / 2
0 / 1
 0 / 3
1 / 3
 0 / 2
0.5 / 2

The corresponding (unchanged) ranking table, Table F, appears below.

TABLE F: Final Rankings (as on Jun 3, 2002)
Country Performance index (RBI) Rank
Australia 74.60 1
South Africa 56.85 2
England 45.46 3
New Zealand 43.90 4
Pakistan 43.33 5
Sri Lanka 42.36 6
India 39.44 7
West Indies 34.74 8
Zimbabwe 18.54 9

India must now look ahead to the four-test series against England in England. A series win here, or even a drawn series, would be very useful. Table G, below, looks at all the possible scenarios in the India-England series.

TABLE G: INDIA VS ENGLAND: ALL POSSIBLE SCENARIOS
Points break-up (1 point for win, 0.5 for draw, 0 for loss) India's new performance index (RBI) England's new performance index (RBI) Remarks
India: 0, Eng: 4 36.26 46.65 Ind: 7, Eng: 3
India: 0.5, Eng: 3.5 37.47 46.24 Ind: 7, Eng: 3
India: 1.0, Eng: 3.0 38.61 45.81 Ind: 7, Eng: 3
India: 1.5, Eng: 2.5 39.67 45.30 Ind: 7, Eng: 3
India: 2.0, Eng: 2.0 40.67 44.71 Ind: 7, Eng: 3
India: 2.5, Eng: 1.5 41.59 44.07 Ind: 7, Eng: 3
India: 3.0, Eng: 1.0 42.44 43.36 Ind: 7, Eng: 5
India: 3.5, Eng: 0.5 43.22 42.59 Ind: 5, Eng: 7
India: 4.0, Eng: 0.0 43.93 41.75 Ind: 3, Eng: 7

Table G does not take into account the outcome of the unfinished England-Sri Lanka series but, generally speaking, it seems probable that India will stay seventh, and England third. There are some scenarios, e.g. India win 3-0 or 4-0, where India can climb to the fifth or even the third position, but these appear practically impossible. So it does look as though the only way that India can do better than seventh, is if Sri Lanka play some horrible test cricket henceforth in the ongoing series against England.

As we write this, Sri Lanka have just lost the second test at Edgbaston, and look extremely unlikely to bounce back with a win in the third and final test. So only the two scenarios listed below must be considered likely (see Table H).

TABLE H: SRI LANKA VS ENGLAND: LIKELY SCENARIOS
Points break-up (1 point for win, 0.5 for draw, 0 for loss) SL's new performance index (RBI) England's new performance index (RBI)
Eng: 2.5, SL: 0.5 39.31 47.27
Eng: 2.0, SL: 1.0 40.53 46.68

Looking at Tables G and H, we note that if England beat Sri Lanka 1-0, then India must draw its forthcoming series against England to climb to the sixth place (40.67 > 40.53). If England beat Sri Lanka 2-0 (i.e. win both the second and third tests), then India will only need three draws out of four, or one win and one draw, to gain the sixth place (39.67 > 39.31).

M J Manohar Rao is professor and director, Department of Economics, University of Mumbai, Mumbai; Srinivas Bhogle is scientist and head, Information Management Division, National Aerospace Laboratories, Bangalore.

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