West Indies face tough examination in New Zealand

The West Indies will be looking to the genius of Brian Lara to kick-start their faltering tour of New Zealand when the Test series between the two sides gets underway in Auckland on Thursday.

Lara, the leading run-scorer in Test history, missed the recent ODI series which the men from the Caribbean lost 4-1 and his ability to score heavily and quickly could add an extra dimension to the West Indies' chances of being competitive.

His value to the team is backed up by the LG ICC Player Rankings for batsmen. Lara is third in the list, with only Australia captain Ricky Ponting and Jacques Kallis of South Africa ahead of him.

The only other player from either the West Indies or New Zealand in the top 20 is the visitor's captain, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, another indication of how crucial Lara's contribution could be to the series.

Below that duo is the top-ranked New Zealand batsman, captain Stephen Fleming, in 22nd place, with team mate Nathan Astle three spots further back. After them come the West Indies duo of Chris Gayle and Ramnaresh Sarwan, in 28th and 29th places respectively.

Interestingly, New Zealand's third-highest ranked batsman in the LG ICC Player Rankings is Lou Vincent, in 35th place and with a career-best haul of rating points.

But winning a Test match is not just about scoring runs; it is also, usually, about taking 20 wickets and on that basis New Zealand certainly appear to have the advantage.

They have four bowlers in the top 30 of the LG ICC Player Rankings with Shane Bond, fit and firing again, in 12th position, as well as Daniel Vettori (22nd), Chris Martin (24th) and James Franklin (29th).

The West Indies, by contrast, are not in such a positive position. Their three highest-ranked players are Corey Collymore (joint 18th), Pedro Collins (27th) and Jermaine Lawson (33rd) and none of them are on the tour.

Their highest-placed players in New Zealand are Dwayne Bravo (40th) and Fidel Edwards (41st), while Gayle is 46th in the bowling list.

In the all-rounder table, Vettori is fifth with the potential to move up while Gayle and Bravo are 11th and 12th respectively.

The LG ICC Player Rankings for bowlers are currently headed by Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralidaran ahead of Glenn McGrath and Shane Warne of Australia while the all-rounder list is topped by Kallis with England's Andrew Flintoff in second spot.

The West Indies go into the three-match encounter with only three series wins away from home in their last ten overseas tours and all of them have come against the only two sides below in them in the LG ICC Test Championship table.

They beat Zimbabwe 1-0 in series in 2001 and 2003 and enjoyed a 2-0 victory over Bangladesh in 2002 but other than those successes there has been little for the West Indies to get excited about on their travels in recent years.

One crumb of comfort for Chanderpaul's players will be that New Zealand are by no means invincible in their own backyard.

In the last four years they have lost home Tests to England, Pakistan, South Africa and Australia (twice) so the West Indies are not without hope in this series.

Neither side can improve their placings in the LG ICC Test Championship table but a clean sweep by New Zealand can lift their rating from 100 to 103 and so close the gap between themselves and fourth-placed Pakistan to five rating points.

On the other side of the coin, if the West Indies turn around their ODI form and win the series it will drop New Zealand below both sixth-placed South Africa and Sri Lanka, currently in seventh spot.

The West Indies are a long way adrift in eighth position but a series win - or even a draw - would go some way towards starting to reduce the gap between themselves and Sri Lanka which is 23 points at the moment.

The schedule for the New Zealand - West Indies Test series is as follows:

9 - 13 March - First Test, Auckland
17 - 21 March - Second Test, Wellington
25 - 29 March - Third Test, Napier

Full details of the current LG ICC Test Championship and how future results will impact on the table, as well as the LG ICC Player Rankings can be found here