ICC Test Championship

The ICC Test Championship is an international cricket competition organized by the International Cricket Council for the ten teams with test status. The competition is run as a ranking list that includes all international tests that are held as part of the regular schedule. The home or away status is not taken into account.

Basic principle

After each test series, the teams involved are assigned a number of points that is determined by a mathematical formula based on the strength of the teams and the series result. The points are weighted averaged over a period of three years. The resulting 'rating' is used to create the ranking list.

The score for a team that has won a series is greater than the team's current score, so that victory increases its score. The opposite is true for the losing team of the series. A tie leads to the fact that the less rated team benefits, the better rated team has to accept losses in their rating. An 'average' team that loses and wins evenly and has a mix of stronger and weaker opponents has a rating of around 100 points with this system.

The ICC awards a scepter as a trophy to the team that has the highest rating. The trophy is passed on when a new team moves up to the top of the ranking.

Current ranking

ICC Test Championship
Rank	team	Games	Points	Rating
1	India	45	5211	116
2	New Zealand	36	3959	110
3	Australia	40	4320	108
4th	England	50	5253	105
5	South Africa	36	3537	98
6th	Sri Lanka	46	4191	91
7th	Pakistan	33	2795	85
8th	West Indies	33	2675	81
9	Bangladesh	27	1636	61
10	Afghanistan	4th	195	49
11	Zimbabwe	13	215	17th
12	Ireland	3	0	0
Source: ICC, March 2, 2020

Historical ranking

World rankings for the top eight teams from 2003 to June 2011

The ICC provides the ratings for the end of each month back to June 2003. The previous table winners have since been as follows:

team	begin	The End	Months	Highest rating
Australia	June 2003	August 2009	74	143
South Africa	August 2009	November 2009	3	122
India	November 2009	August 2011	21st	130
England	August 2011	August 2012	12	125
South Africa	August 2012	May 2014	21st	135
Australia	May 2014	July 2014	3	123
South Africa	July 2014	January 2016	18th	130
India	January 2016	February 2016	1	110
Australia	February 2016	August 2016	6th	118
India	August 2016	August 2016	0	112
Pakistan	August 2016	October 2016	2	111
India	October 2016	today		130
Source: Source: ICC, March 2, 2020

The ICC also applied the rating system retrospectively and published the results up to 1952. For the years before there are no tables because the games only took place irregularly and the participating nations were few. The first in the table at that time were:

team	begin	The End	Months
Australia	January 1952	May 1955	41
England	June 1955	February 1958	33
Australia	March 1958	July 1958	5
England	August 1958	December 1958	5
Australia	January 1959	December 1963	60
West Indies	January 1964	December 1968	60
South Africa	January 1969	December 1969	12
England	January 1970	January 1973	37
Australia	February 1973	March 1973	2
India	April 1973	June 1974	15th
Australia	July 1974	January 1978	43
West Indies	February 1978	January 1979	12
England	February 1979	August 1980	19th
India	September 1980	February 1981	6th
West Indies	March 1981	July 1988	89
Pakistan	August 1988	September 1988	2
West Indies	October 1988	January 1991	28
Australia	February 1991	April 1991	3
West Indies	May 1991	July 1992	15th
Australia	August 1992	January 1993	6th
West Indies	February 1993	August 1995	31
India	September 1995	November 1995	3
Australia	December 1995	July 1999	44
South Africa	August 1999	December 1999	5
Australia	January 2000	February 2000	2
South Africa	March 2000	March 2000	1
Australia	April 2000	July 2001	16
South Africa	August 2001	August 2001	1
Australia	September 2001	May 2003	21st
Source: Source: ICC, March 2, 2020

In summary, the following teams have topped the ranking since 1952:

team	Months	Highest rating
Australia	326	143
West Indies	235	135
England	106	125
India	87	130
South Africa	61	135
Pakistan	4th	111
Source: Source: ICC, March 2, 2020

trophy

Since 2001, the first in the table has received the so-called ICC Test Championship mace . It is worth £ 30,000.

ICC World Test Championship

The managing director of the ICC, Haroon Lorgat , had proposed in July 2010 that a tournament between the four best teams should be held every four years for a world championship in test cricket. The first suggestion was that this tournament would be held in England instead of the 2013 ICC Champions Trophy . However, this plan was postponed as the ICC saw itself bound by existing contracts for the broadcast rights. Since then, the first edition of the tournament has been included in the future planning of the tournament calendar in 2017. However, this was canceled and replaced by the 2017 ICC Champions Trophy . On October 13, 2017, it was decided to introduce a test league, the ICC World Test Championship 2019-2021 . This should let the best nine test teams (i.e. excluding Afghanistan, Ireland and Zimbabwe) play against each other in a fixed format from 2019 within two years. The two best teams should then host a final in April 2021.

See also

Portal: Cricket  - Overview of Wikipedia content on the topic of cricket

• ICC ODI Championship
• ICC T20I Championship

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Brydon Coverdale: Entertainment guaranteed with Test mace on the line ( English ) Cricinfo. November 8, 2012. Retrieved February 27, 2013.
2. ↑ Reliance ICC Test Ranking ( English ) International Cricket Council. December 30th, 2018. Archived from the original on September 24th, 2012. Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved January 4, 2019. 
3. ↑ Historical Rankings ( English ) International Cricket Council. March 3, 2013. Archived from the original on January 20, 2013. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved March 3, 2013. 
4. ^ Retrospective Rankings ( English ) International Cricket Council. March 3, 2013. Archived from the original on January 20, 2013. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved March 3, 2013. 
5. ^ Retrospective Rankings ( English ) International Cricket Council. March 3, 2013. Archived from the original on January 20, 2013. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved March 3, 2013. 
6. ↑ Will Swanton: Waugh receives ICC Test trophy ( English ) Cricinfo. July 4, 2001. Retrieved March 3, 2013.
7. ↑ Lorgat hints at Test championship in 2013 ( English ) Cricinfo. July 16, 2010. Retrieved March 3, 2013.
8. ↑ Daniel Brettig: Test Championship could be delayed until 2017 ( English ) Cricinfo. October 11, 2011. Retrieved March 3, 2013.
9. ↑ Tariq Engineer: No Champions Trophy after 2013 ( English ) Cricinfo. April 17, 2012. Retrieved March 3, 2013.
10. ↑ No Test Championship, Champions Trophy to continue: ICC ( English ) Zee News. February 8, 2014. Retrieved October 13, 2017.
11. ↑ Daniel Brettig: Test, ODI leagues approved by ICC Board ( English ) Cricinfo. October 13, 2017. Retrieved October 13, 2017.

Web links

• ICC Test, ODI and T20I Championship Rankings on Cricinfo