Sports India

IT was their first series win in the Caribbean in 35 years, but it was not enough to prevent the visitors from dropping in the LG ICC Test Championship table.

According to the latest revision of the table, India has lost two points and therefore, due to the close points difference between the top six teams, and the shift has implications in the positions.

The slip means that India, the number three ranked test team prior to the start of the series against the West Indies, now sits in fourth spot, below Pakistan. India was expected prior to the start of the series to whip the lowly ranked West Indies team convincingly in both test and One Day International (ODI) series. That was not the case as the West Indies won the ODI series by a 4-1 margin and narrowly lost the test series by 0-1 margin in four tests, by 49 runs at Sabina Park.

Australia still leads the test rankings, with India now holding the number four spot, with the West Indies making marginal gains of two points to still hold the number eight spot. The regional side has 74 points, still 23 points adrift of Sri Lanka and New Zealand in sixth and seventh places respectively.

Indian captain Rahul Dravid enjoyed excellent form in the test series and this has allowed him to maintain his number two ranking. The consistency has allowed Dravid to move within ten points of number one ranked Australian captain, Ricky Ponting. Dravid finished with an impressive 496 runs at 82.66 while he crafted one hundred and four fifties, including two fifties in the crucial fourth test match which his side won by 49 runs. West Indies captain Brian Lara, despite only scoring 211 runs at 26.37, remains the highest ranked West Indies player, and the only one in the top 20. Other big movers for the regional side, according to the latest update, include Daren Ganga up 11 spots to 57 and Denesh Ramdin up 14 spots to 73. For the Indians, Virender Sehwag occupies number 16.

Indias Anil Kumble, with his 23 wickets in the recent series remains at number eight, while Corey Collymore with 15 wickets at 22.46 has moved up seven spots to number 10.