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India chase second
place in LG ICC Test Championship
December 1, 2005
A winning Test series against Sri
Lanka could be enough to take India into second
place in the LG ICC Test Championship table.
If that happens, it will be the
first time they have reached those heights in the
four-and-a-half years since the official LG ICC
Test Championship was launched in May 2001.
Should India secure a 2-0 win in
their three-match series they will move ahead of
England unless Michael Vaughan's men are
victorious in their current Test against Pakistan
in Lahore.
And if England lose that Test then
Rahul Dravid's side will only have to win the Sri
Lanka series 1-0 or 2-1 in order to take second
spot.
In terms of points, this is how the
scenarios could play out for India over the coming
days and weeks:
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2-0 win for India
will be enough to take them second if England
draw in Lahore as that combination of results
will leave both teams on 115 points but India
will be ahead when the ratings are calculated to
three decimal places
-
1-0 or 2-1 win for
India will also see them go second if England
lose the Lahore Test. Both sides would then be
level on 113 points but again India would have
the edge when the ratings are calculated to
three decimal places
-
3-0 success for
India will lift them to 116 points, just 12
points behind current leaders Australia
Sri Lanka have
their own incentive to do well in the series that
begins in Chennai on Friday, and not just because
they are still smarting from a 6-1 loss in the ODI
series against India in October and November.
Even a drawn series will take them
into fourth place above South Africa and New
Zealand in a congested middle section of the
table.
If they win 3-0 they would even
leapfrog India into third spot while a 2-0 success
would draw the two sides level on 106 points.
The LG ICC Test Player Rankings
suggest India has the edge in batting power coming
into this series as they can boast three players
in the top ten positions while Sri Lanka has none.
Captain Dravid lies in fifth spot,
Virender Sehwag is seventh and Sachin Tendulkar is
ninth; Sri Lanka's highest placed player is
wicketkeeper-batsman Kumar Sangakkara, in 15th,
while their only other player in the top 20 is
Mahela Jayawardene in 19th.
Sri Lanka's captain Marvan Atapattu
languishes in 42nd spot while recalled former
India captain Sourav Ganguly is 39th.
At least, from Sri Lanka's
perspective, they can boast two players in the top
ten of the LG ICC bowling list with Muttiah
Muralidaran in second place, just 11 points behind
leader Glenn McGrath, and Chaminda Vaas in 8th.
India's best-placed bowler is Irfan
Pathan in ninth, with a career-best points tally,
while spin twins Anil Kumble and Harbhajan Singh
are 12th and 16th respectively.
The schedule for the India - Sri
Lanka Test series is as follows:
2 - 6 December - first Test,
Chennai
10 - 14 December - second Test, Delhi
18 - 22 December - third Test, Kanpur
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