With figures of 10-0-45-1 against West Indies, Andre Nel dropped to the sixth place in the most valuable player (MVP) list after Day 27. Sanath Jayasuriya regained his top position.

Jacques Kallis advanced to the fifth place with 81 in 86 balls and figures of 8-0-36-2. A B de Villiers too jumped up by 34 places to be placed tenth after his brilliant innings of 146 in 130 balls. Graeme Smith has dropped to No. 21 after another batting failure and an exceptionally generous bowling spell with figures of 5-0-56-2.

For West Indies it was another disappointing day. The highest ranked West Indian is now Daren Powell at No. 17. Sarwan is at 34, Lara at 43, Chanderpaul at 45 and Gayle at 51!

Ct: Catches taken | St: Stumpings | Rc: Runs conceded | Bb: Balls bowled | W: Wickets taken | M: Matches played.*Run outs are counted as 1 for a direct hit, and 0.5 if the fielder is an equal participant in a run out dismissal.

The Chernoff gallery of the top nine Super Eight players after Day 27 appears below.

Recall that batsmen have round faces and a short and wide nose. They smile more when they score more runs. Bowlers have tapered faces, a tall and thin nose, and bigger ears if they take more wickets. All-rounders have both batsmen's and bowler's features.

Here are the faces of the nine highest scoring batsmen in the Super Eight (total runs / scoring rate). If two players have scored the same number of runs, the player with the higher points appears first.

Here are the faces of the nine highest wicket-taking bowlers in the Super Eight (wickets / no. of runs conceded per over). If two players have scored the same number of wickets, the player with the higher points appears first.

And, finally, here are the faces of the nine most successful fielders in the Super Eight (fielding points | run outs / catches / stumpings. Fielders who take a lot of catches have wide eyebrows, and those that participate in run out dismissals have bigger eyes. Notice the large number of wicket-keepers in this list.

Finally, here is the average "value" contribution of each player in the Super Eight teams. Notice that, on the average, an Australian player contributes about 50 points to his team: if he is a pure batsman he contributes about 50 runs, if he's a pure bowler he contributes an equivalent of two wickets.

If we assume that the four teams with the highest average player "contribution" will make it to the semi-final, we are looking at the following semi-finalists: Australia, Sri Lanka, New Zealand and South Africa... something that the World Cup's Super Eight points table too has all but confirmed.

This list, the Chernoff faces and other charts have been prepared by my colleagues Debasish Ghosh and K Anil Kumar of Cranes Software International Limited using the SYSTAT software.