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Ganguly does a double in Wisden world rankings

A Sports Reporter

The latest Wisden cricket rankings are out. And guess which player has the distinction of making both the batting and bowling lists?

A certain Saurav Chandi Ganguly, who ranks 12th in the list of batsmen, and 17th in the list of bowlers. And this, mind you, has to be read in context of the fact that Wisden rates cricketers only on the basis of Test cricket. Thus, Ganguly's recent heroics in Toronto do not come under the purview of this ranking.

And meanwhile, another surprise. Any listing of the top five batsmen in the world will have Brian Charles Lara's name in there. Right?

Wrong -- cricket's self-proclaimed bible ranks him 24th. As against the 5th place he occupied this time last month.

The reason? Simple -- the rankings take into account performances of the last 24 months. And as of this month, the 1995 season is no longer part of the reckoning.

At that point in time, Lara was supreme. In the last couple of years, not so. He did well enough against New Zealand and India when those two countries toured the West Indies in the 24-month period in question, averaging 40-plus. But the tour of Australia was a personal disaster, with the master batsman managing a bare 296 in five Tests, at 32.89. And even during the recent Sri Lankan tour of the Caribbean, Lara managed just 120 runs in four innings, inclusive of a century (115, actually).

So -- out goes Lara.

A lesson in there for people who are ready to write off Sachin Tendulkar as a batsman, perhaps? For Tendulkar, in the same two year period, boasts an average of 51.10.

And while on Lara and Tendulkar, the Coopers and Lybrand ratings (last updated September 30), which takes into account the entire career when ranking contemporary players, has Tendulkar in third place, behind Steve Waugh and Graham Thorpe, with Shivnaraine Chanderpaul and Sanath Jayasuriya following the Indian ahead of Lara.

Another interesting sidelight: Guess which two teams have the most number of batsmen in the top 20? And no, Sri Lanka is not one of them. The answer to that one being, Pakistan and India. And while all four of India's top-20 ranked players are automatic choices -- Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Saurav Ganguly and Mohammad Azharuddin -- Pakistan loses out on Salim Malik -- dropped for the series against South Africa and, if the rumblings from the Pakistan board are any indication, perhaps at the end of his international career.

In the bowling department, Australia is easily pre-eminent, with no less than three in the top five, and five in the top 20.

And here, again, is a little quirk worth noting. Javagal Srinath, last month, was ranked 18th. This month, he has actually jumped up five places, to 13th. Keep in mind the fact that Srinath has not bowled a ball in anger since the beginning of March, his performance in the period September 1995 to end February 1997 has been so outstanding that he more than holds his own against more active contemporaries.

A sidelight relates to the fall, statistically speaking, of the standards of West Indies batting. In the all time rankings of contemporary batsmen, the West Indies occupy the top three positions with Jimmy Adams, Brian Lara and Shivnaraine Chanderpaul, in that order. In the current rankings, however, Lara is out of the top 20, Adams figures nowhere, Chanderpaul is down to number eight and the only other West Indian is Carl Hooper, at number 18.

The full rankings are given below:

Ranking	Batsman	Country	Tests	Inns	No	Runs	Average
1	S Jayasuriya	Sri Lanka	11	20	1	1333	70.16
2	Steve Waugh	Australia	19	31	5	1520	58.46
3	Ijaz Ahmed	Pakistan	12	20	2	978	54.33
4	H Tillekeratne	Sri Lanka	13	23	5	939	52.17
5	Brian McMillan	South Africa	14	24	8	823	51.44
6	Sachin Tendulkar	India	20	32	3	1482	51.10
7	S Chanderpaul	West Indies	12	20	2	918	51.00
8	A de Silva	Sri Lanka	15	27	2	1255	50.20
9	Rahul Dravid	India	16	26	3	1116	48.52
10	Matthew Elliott	England	11	19	1	866	48.11
11	Saurav Ganguly	India	14	22	1	960	45.71
12	Daryll Cullinan	South Africa	15	25	3	1001	45.50
13	Salim Malik	Pakistan	12	18	2	724	45.25
14	Alec Stewart	England	21	36	2	1533	45.09
15	Grant Flower	Zimbabwe	11	21	0	935	44.52
16	Moin Khan	Pakistan	13	19	2	746	43.88
17	Michael Atherton	England	22	38	4	1431	42.09
18	Carl Hooper	West Indies	12	21	3	755	41.94
19	Inzamam-ul Haq	Pakistan	14	24	1	950	41.30
20	Mohd Azharuddin	India	20	29	3	1069	41.12

Ranking	Bowler	Country	Tests	Overs	Runs	Wkts	Average
1	Allan Donald	South Africa	14	528.4	1395	71	19.65
2	Wasim Akram	Pakistan	11	401.1	997	50	19.94
3	Glenn McGrath	Australia	21	875	2309	113	20.43
4	Michael Bevan	Australia	11	173.1	562	26	21.62
5	Jason Gillespie	Australia	9	228.2	713	32	22.28
6	Curtly Ambrose	West Indies	13	436.4	1072	48	22.33
7	Mushtaq Ahmed	Pakistan	10	639	1704	73	23.34
8	Shane Warne	Australia	20	868	2084	88	23.68
9	Shaun Pollock	South Africa	10	283.5	719	30	23.97
10	Paul Reiffel	Australia	13	386.5	1088	45	24.18
11	Andy Caddick	England	8	480	973	38	25.61
12	Ian Bishop	West Indies	13	388.4	1177	44	26.75
13	Javagal Srinath	India	12	464.2	1383	51	27.12
14	Darren Gough	England	11	360.3	1155	42	27.50
15	M Muralitharan	Sri Lanka	14	715.1	1908	69	27.65
16	Heath Streak	Zimbabwe	8	304.1	806	29	27.79
17	Saurav Ganguly	India	14	112.5	373	13	28.69
18	Paul Adams	South Africa	9	342	1011	35	28.89
19	Chris Cairns	New Zealand	15	397.3	1239	41	30.22
20	Chaminda Vaas	Sri Lanka	14	508.5	1373	45	30.51