India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s excellent performance in Sri Lanka has taken him to the top spot in the International Cricket Council’s ODI rankings for batsmen, displacing South African Graeme Smith.Dhoni, who won the player-of-the-series award scoring 193 runs in the five-match tournament, had been on top of the batting list for a week in April 2006. Sachin Tendulkar was the last Indian to head the batting chart following the tri-series in Australia in March earlier this year. In the latest list, Tendulkar has dropped three places to ninth after missing the series in Sri Lanka because of an elbow injury. Yuvraj Singh, who scored just 72 runs in the series, dropped three places and shares 18th position with England’s Ian Bell who has jumped seven places after good performance in the first three ODIs against South Africa so far. Besides Dhoni, Suresh Raina is the only other India batsman to have improved his ranking. The 21-year-old scored 157 runs in the series and was rewarded by rising 18 places to 35th position. Sri Lanka’s highest ranked batsman remains Kumar Sangakkara, who is in 15th place after dropping two places, while Sanath Jayasuriya is in 17th after rising one position. Captain Mahela Jayawardena has climbed two places to 24th. In the bowlers’ list, Zaheer Khan became India’s highest ranked bowler at 14th place. The left-armer took nine wickets in the series and has stormed into the top-20, jumping eight places. Off-spinner Harbhajan Singh improved his ranking by six places and is now placed 23rd. Muttiah Muralitharan and Chaminda Vaas have dropped in the bowlers’ rankings but Ajantha Mendis rocketed 25 places to 48th after finishing as the leading wicket-taker in the series with 13 wickets. Rankings Top-10 batsmen of Reliance Mobile ICC rankings 1 MS Dhoni Ind 2 Graeme Smith SA 3 Ricky Ponting Aus 4 Mike Hussey Aus 5 Mohd Yousuf Pak 6 S. Chanderpaul WI 7 Kevin Pietersen Eng 8 Andrew Symonds Aus 9 Sachin Tendulkar Ind 10 Matthew Hayden Aus Top-10 bowlers: 1 Nathan Bracken Aus 2 Daniel Vettori NZ 3 Shane Bond NZ 4 Stuart Broad Eng 5 MG.Johnson Aus 6 M. Muralitharan SL 7 Chaminda Vaas SL 8 Brett Lee Aus 9 Kyle Mills NZ 10 Andre Nel SA Top-5 all-rounders 1 Andrew Flintoff Eng 2 Shoaib Malik Pak 3 Jacob Oram NZ 4 Shahid Afridi Pak 5 Jacques Kallis SA Thaindian news
