Confusion over Bangladesh’s position in ICC ODI ranking

Confusion over Bangladesh’s position in ICC ODI ranking

After Bangladesh Cricket Board president Nazmul Hasan’s claim on Monday to have gained the 5^th position in ICC ODI ranking for Bangladesh, there has been buzzing a lot of confusion. Bangladesh Cricket team is currently ranked No. 7 in the ICC ODI ranking and with International Cricket Council updating the ranking list on May 2^nd they are expected to retain their 7^th position. However BCB President has claimed that Bangladesh Cricket team is ranked 5^th in the papers delivered by ICC on Monday.

ICC ODI ranking for a team is calculated from that particular team’s performance in last three years. So Bangladesh’s ODI ranking to be released on May 2 by ICC would get the calculations from the year 2013-14, 2014-15 and 2015-16. However it is important to note that the performance of last two years only cares 50% weightage in ranking while the ongoing year’s performance counts a full 100%. Thus in case of Bangladesh, year 2013-14 and 2014-15 would carry only 50% weightage. The same three year span will be used to calculate the direct qualifying teams for the world cup 2019. The last date for direct qualification into World Cup 2019 is September 30, 2017 where the host country England and the top 7^th ranked teams will directly qualify for the event.

With no matches of the season 2016-17 played yet, Bangladesh can only be ranked fifth calculating his last two years’ performance where in 2016 he has beaten Pakistan, India and South Africa at home. But BCB president Nazmul Hasan who returned from Dubai on Monday has told that ICC Chief Executive announced on Sunday the latest ICC ODI ranking in which Bangladesh is ranked 5^th with 101 rating points.

“At the ICC meeting yesterday (Sunday), the highlight for us was the ODI rankings,” Nazmul said. “There it was disclosed that Bangladesh are No. 5. We always hovered around No. 9 or 10, and then we rose to No. 8 and 7. We are just one point above England and Sri Lanka who are in No. 6 and 7 with 100 points.”

However the current ICC ODI ranking places them on 7^th position with 98 points, causing a lot of mix-up.

“I saw this ranking before I went to the meeting because they always sent the papers before the meetings,” he said. “I thought they had made a mistake. I thought, ‘It was No. 7, when did they become No. 5?’ Said Nazmul Hassan.