Proteas creep up to 2nd in Test rankings
South Africa have nudged past Australia into second spot behind India in the latest ICC Test rankings following their fortunate 1-0 away series victory over New Zealand.
The result, which gave South Africa a 1-0 series win, earned Faf du Plessis’s side two ranking points and helped the Proteas move one point ahead of Australia in second place.
South Africa will as a result end second on the ICC Test Team Rankings as at the 1 April cut-off date after the Hamilton Test ended in a draw according to the official ICC website.
In contrast, New Zealand dropped two rankings points and consequently slipped behind Pakistan into sixth place.
As New Zealand versus South Africa series was the last series to finish before the 1 April annual cut-off, South Africa’s number-two ranking has won it an award of $500K, while Australia has collected $200K. England, which ended up fourth, received $100K.
On Tuesday, India had retained the mace and pocketed $1 million following its 2-1 series win over Australia. It was India’s fifth successive series win in the 12-month period from 1 April 2016, following successes against the West Indies (2-0), New Zealand (3-0), England (4-0) and Bangladesh (1-0).
South Africa, in the same 12-month period, defeated New Zealand (1-0, both home and away), Australia (2-1) and Sri Lanka (3-0), while Australia lost to Sri Lanka (3-0), South Africa (2-1) and India (2-1) with its only series win being against Pakistan (3-0). Fourth-ranked England beat Sri Lanka (2-0), drew with Pakistan (2-2) and Bangladesh (1-1), and lost to India (4-0).
Following last year’s cut-off, Australia had started in number-one position on 112 points, followed by India (110), South Africa (109), Pakistan (106), England (102), New Zealand (96), Sri Lanka (89), West Indies (76), Bangladesh (47) and Zimbabwe (five).
The annual update of the MRF Tyres ICC Test Team Rankings will next be carried out on 1 May with the series results from 2013-14 not to be included in the calculations and outcomes from the 2014-15 and 2015-16 series weighted at 50 per cent.
ICC Test Team Rankings (as on 29 March, following the conclusion of India v Australia and New Zealand v South Africa series):
1 India 122 (+1)
2 South Africa 109 (+2)
3 Australia 108 (-1)
4 England 101
5 Pakistan 97
6 New Zealand 96 (-2)
7 Sri Lanka 90
8 West Indies 69
9 Bangladesh 66
10 Zimbabwe 05