Australia with the spoils of victory Photo Reuters

It might not be at the forefront of the mind of anybody involved in the match, but New Zealand and England will be playing for important points in the ICC Test Championship when they begin their three-Test series in Christchurch on Wednesday.

The concept of the championship is a good one, but it will not really command great attention until the full cycle of home and away series have been completed to give a true indication of relative positions. Having said that, should the Australians not manage to win the series currently taking place in South Africa and there is a change at the top, there will be a sudden surge of interest in the table.

Australia and South Africa are almost in a league of their own, but the outcome of the New Zealand v England series will have interesting repercussions among what might be termed the also rans.

England won the last series played in New Zealand in 1996/97 and, according to the way the calculations are made, they need to win again to retain the two points held in the current table. This is where it all becomes a bit complicated and far from straightforward. It is why India did not shoot up the table when they beat Zimbabwe and why Australia need to win in South Africa to retain first place.

Because there have not been home and away series between all the countries, the system takes account of last series played and adds the points won then. Even though the teams did not know they were playing for ICC Test Championship points at the time. So, a team with 10 points from 10 series has an average of 1.00. If, however, two points were gained from a series that is now superseded by one in which that team gets one point for a drawn series, their average is now 9 points from 10 series, or 0.90. It's very simple. I'm told!

Anyway, England lie fourth at the moment but, should New Zealand take the series, they would leapfrog not only England but also Sri Lanka in third place. The Kiwis' average would be 1.19 as opposed to Sri Lanka's 1.14. England, on the other hand, would drop down to fifth equal with the West Indies.

Just to cover everything, a drawn series from which both sides take one point would see New Zealand move into fourth place while England would drop to fifth. So, while enjoying the cricket, all you have to do is arm yourself with a calculator and a complete record of Test series going back over the last decade or so, and you too can keep your neighbour informed of the exact state of play in the ICC Test Championship table. It might be safer to rely on CricInfo to tell you what happens when the series is all over!

The table, as it stands, reads:

Team	      Played   Won     Lost   Drawn   Points   Average
Australia       13      9       2       2       20      1.54
South Africa    16     11       3       2       24      1.50
Sri Lanka       14      7       5       2       16      1.14
England         15      7       6       2       16      1.07
New Zealand     16      7       6       3       17      1.06
West Indies     14      6       7       1       13      0.93
Pakistan        16      4       7       5       13      0.81
India           14      4       7       3       11      0.79
Zimbabwe        16      3      11       2        8      0.50
Bangladesh       4      0       4       0        0       -

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