New Delhi: India’s master batsman Sachin Tendulkar has been fallen to the 23rd position as per the latest ICC rankings. Sachin, who began the Sri Lankan series with 13th position, was dropped to his lowest ranking in 15 years after the disappointing performance against Sri Lanka which concluded in Colombo on Monday.

Tendulkar ended up the series scoring 95 runs at 15.83. He drops six places after scores of six and 14 in the third and final Test which Sri Lanka won by eight wickets to clinch the series 2-1.

This is the lowest ranking of master blaster since late 1992 after spending over 15 years in the top 20 apart from a very brief spell at the end of 2006.

Sachin is just 76 runs short of Brian Lara, the Carribean striker, who enjoys the position of leading run taker in test cricket. Tendulkar’s drop is the only bad news for India batting as others have made good upward progress.
Virender Sehwag has become the highest-ranked Indian batsman after his come back to the top 10 for the first time since March 2006. Sehwag, who knocked an impressive 344 runs in the series, has lifted one place to 10th with Pakistan’s Younus Khan firmly within his sights.

VVS Laxman, with 25 and 61 not out in the series decider, has jumped up three places to 15th position while Rahul Dravid shares 16th place with England’s Alastair Cook. Dravid improves his position by two places after scores of 10 and 68 while Cook made a jump of four places following his contribution of 39 and 67 in The Oval Test.

Saurav Ganguly has shown a hike in ranking by one place and now sits in 25th position while opener Gautam Gambhir, who was the second leading run-getter for his side with 310 runs, is in 37th place after jumping 12 places.

Among Sri Lankan’s, Kumar Sangakkara has just missed out on reclaiming the top slot from the West Indies’ Shivnarine Chanderpaul. The 30-year-old from Matale, who was pushed down to fifth after the second Test in Galle, has jumped to second position after hitting a superlative 144 in Sri Lanka’s first innings score of 396. But a knock of just four in the second innings, when Sri Lanka were chasing 123 for victory, derided him the top slot.

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