Strauss, Hoggard and Harmison

[flanflinger]

PWC now has all these guys in their respective Top 10's

While Trescothick, Flintoff(Bowler) and Giles are in the top 20.

Vaughan slipped out of the top 30, but has now headed into the Top 30 again, Thorpe remains at 24.

This means we have 7 out of 11 players in the Top 30, possibly our strongest showing for years!!

Australia of course have 10 players in the Top 30!! (Clarke, Lehmann and Katich are the only players not in their respective Top 30's)

The ratings are now official and are no longer sponsored by PWC, but by the ICC and LG

http://www.icc-cricket.com/db/ARCHIV...19JAN2005.html

[John]

My congratulations to Hoggard a bowler who I thought had been pushed out of Test cricket by Australia a few seasons ago. Has worked at his game and proved me and proably a few other pundits wrong.

[Maranello]

To get into the Top 10 batsmen with only a few Tests...remarkable. Considering the gult of run-scoring these days and the number of 'quality' batsmen, doubly remarkable.

PS: Good to see a properly educated man reaching the top echelons of professional sport

[flanflinger]

Also as he has not played 40 innings, this is not a full rating....

[Andy Mellon]

Originally Posted by Maranello

PS: Good to see a properly educated man reaching the top echelons of professional sport

Don't tell me he's the New Derek Pringle!?!

[Milo]

A couple of poor test matches and Hoggard could be back at number 15. Let's not get too excited. Thorpe has dropped almost 10 places on the back of two poor tests. This shows the useless nature of them. He plays remarkably well for 12 months, scoring important hundred on top of important hundred (averaging over 70 in the process) and then loses all those places in almost one match.

This said, Let's remember Harmison only lasted one test match at number one - if these players can consolidate their position for a number of matches then they might actually mean something.

[flanflinger]

Thanks Milo,

Typical English cynicism and negativity.. Half-full or Half-Empty?

Why not celebrate our success rather than knock it?

[Milo]

I'm not knocking the success, far from it, I have been very pleased with England's performance (especially given the fact that only a few players are actually contributing). If we can get the whole team playing relatively well then we should have a pretty useful team.

What I am knocking is the rankings, the way that players can fluctuate upon one test performance (hence my point about Thorpe) and the way in which some get excited about players bursting in or out of a top 10 which signifies very little. We had this entire debate when Harmison hit number one - and look what that meant for future prospects, absolutely nothing.

[Rahul_Dravid_is_No.1]

the true test is if you can stay there for a while. not get there, and just go out. kallis is now back at number 2.... he will have to stay there longer if he can truely be considered better than the great man (you know who im refering to)

[Zainub]

PS: Good to see a properly educated man reaching the top echelons of professional sport

You're right M, I miss Ed Smith (my goodness me, he had some accent!) and Saeed Anwer (not a lot of people know but he was qualified engineer, that too from Karachi's best university, NED) and Jonty Rhodes (buisness graduate, works now in Standard Bank, sponsor of one of the South African domestic competetions, if I'm not wrong i.e.!)