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Home > Cricket > England's tour of India > Report


Dhoni jumps to second in rankings

April 16, 2006 18:05 IST

Mahendra Singh Dhoni's [Images] swashbuckling efforts with the bat against England [Images] have seen him move up to second place in the latest LG ICC [Images] ODI Player Rankings.

Dhoni began the series in fifth position in the listings but 177 runs at an average of 59, including 96 in Jamshedpur, has pushed him up the list and he is now just seven points behind Australia's Ricky Ponting [Images], who tops the rankings.

And Rahul Dravid's [Images] side, which completed a 5-1 ODI series win over England in Indore on Saturday, has jumped two spots to third in the ODI Championship table, their highest-ever placing.

India's triumph, which means they have won 17 of their last 22 ODIs, has seen them leapfrog New Zealand [Images] and Pakistan in the ODI Championship table and they are now just three rating points behind second-placed South Africa.

If India can win both their upcoming ODIs against Pakistan in Abu Dhabi, on Tuesday and Wednesday, they will reduce that margin to just one point. Australia is 13 points clear of South Africa at the top of the table.

Apart from Dhoni, Yuvraj Singh [Images] (ninth), Dravid (11th) and Sachin Tendulkar [Images] (18th) are the other Indians on the list of top-20 batsmen.

Virender Sehwag [Images], who scored 78 runs in five innings during the ODI series, has dropped seven places in the rankings and is now 28th in the batting list.

All-rounder Irfan Pathan [Images], like Dhoni, is another India player who has made progress up the LG ICC Player Rankings.

The left-armer is now fourth in the bowling list, behind Shaun Pollock [Images] of South Africa, Australia's Glenn McGrath and Shane Bond [Images] of New Zealand and he has eased up to third in the ODI all-rounder's table behind Pollock and England's Andrew Flintoff [Images].

Harbhajan Singh [Images], the leading wicket-taker in the ODI series, is up six places to seventh in the LG ICC Player Rankings for ODI bowlers while, further down that list, S Sreesanth [Images], who took  six for 55 in Indore, has moved up 32 places to joint 66th (alongside New Zealand's James Franklin) with his best-ever haul of rating points.

England can at least draw a crumb of comfort from their series loss as, although they ended it in seventh place in the LG ICC ODI Championship table, they were sixth on April 1 and that means they have qualified for the second stage of the ICC Champions Trophy in India.

The top six sides in the table on that date go through to that second stage while sides 7 � 10 (Sri Lanka [Images], the West Indies [Images], Zimbabwe and Bangladesh) will play in a preliminary, round-robin stage with the top two sides going forward.

The itinerary for the ICC Champions Trophy will be announced in due course.

Pakistan can overtake India and move into third place if they win both ODIs in Abu Dhabi on Tuesday and Wednesday.  Two victories would give them 116 rating points and drop India to 114.


Englands's tour of India: The Complete Coverage

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