Sachin slips, Dravid enter top-10 in ICC rankings

Almost all the Indian batsmen save Rahul Dravid slipped in the latest ICC Test Rankings for batsman released on Tuesday.

The poor performance of their batsmen in England Test series affected their individual rankings with Sachin Tendulkar dropping a spot to 5th place.

However, Rahul Dravid, at the back of his 3 centuries and 461 runs, ensured a leap of four places to make it to the top-10.

Jacques Kallis firmly entrenched at the top of the ranking table. Ian Bell and Kevin Pietersen's star acts during the test series helped them to gain four and five places respectively.

While Bell is now 3rd in the list after Kallis and Sangakkara, Pietersen has also broken into the Top-10 and is now in 7th place.

VVS Laxman, who has had a terrible series, lost 5 places to be at 17th while Virender Sehwag also dropped a couple notches to be at 19th. Gautam Gambhir is now 31st.

In the bowling department, Zaheer Khan remained 7th despite bowling only 13.3 overs in the test series. Off-spinner Graeme Swann is now in top-3 with a leap of two places while Dale Steyn and James Anderson remained number 1 and 2 respectively.

While Stuart Broad maintained his 5th position, Tim Bresnan with his brilliant show is now 11th, having gained five places. India's Harbhajan Singh and Ishant Sharma dropped a place each to be 12th and 13th in the list respectively.

Dravid announces retirement from ODIs

Hours after he was chosen for the ODI series in England, veteran Indian batsman Rahul Dravid announced his retirement from both the Twenty20 Cricket International, 50-over format of the game.

However, he will play in the five-match ODI series against England, beginning on September 3 and continue playing Test cricket for India.

"I am honoured and privileged to be selected in the Indian one-day team," he said after India's warm-up match against Northamptonshire in which he did not play.

"Since I had not been picked for one-day cricket for the last two years, I was obviously a little surprised and to be honest, because I had not been picked," he said in the statement issued after the warm-up game.

He said he now wants to concentrate on Tests in the future though he had not informed about it to the BCCI before his selection.

"At the end of this one-day series, I would like to announce my retirement from one-day and Twenty20 cricket and concentrate only on Test cricket. I had not informed the selectors or the board of my desire to solely focus on Test cricket," he said.

"I am committed, as always to give my best to India in this one-day series and obviously the Test series that follows." Dravid last played an ODI against the West Indies during the 2009 Champions Trophy in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Dravid has made 10765 runs in 339 ODIs with an average of 39.43 with 12 hundreds and 82 fifties. He has not played any Twenty20 International match.

He recently became the second highest run-getter in Test cricket - 12576 runs from 155 matches - behind Sachin Tendulkar and also levelled Sunil Gavaskar's 34 Test centuries.

Dhoni in danger of one-match ban for Slow over-rate

Indian skipper MS Dhoni is facing the danger of a one test-match ban unless his side manage to increase their over-rate following slow bowling during England's 1st innings in the opening Test.

India recorded an over-rate of 13 overs per hour instead of the required 15, according to a report in the tabloid 'Daily Express'.

The ICC code of conduct states that the skipper of any team which is found responsible of bowling slow over-rates on three occasions in a 12-month period will face a one-match suspension.

India had failed to maintain the required over-rate during January's 3rd Test against South Africa and the recent match against the West Indies in Barbados.

Even if MS Dhoni escapes punishment at Lord's here, the threat will remain throughout the England Test series, the report said.