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Lara starts the year on top Wisden CricInfo staff - January 1, 2002
At the end of a year in which his greatness finally re-emerged, Brian Lara tops the Pricewaterhouse Coopers batting rankings and is close to his highest-ever rating. Lara has 905 points, 20 ahead of Andy Flower and just 12 short of his zenith, which came after his one-man show against Australia in 1998-99. Only 14 batsmen have had a rating in excess of 900 in Test history, and Lara and Steve Waugh are the only men to do so since Viv Richards was in his pomp. Waugh, after a relatively poor trot, is sixth but heads a four-pronged baggy-green assault on the top ten, alongside Matthew Hayden (eighth), Adam Gilchrist (ninth) and Damien Martyn (tenth). After his extraordinary year Hayden enters the top ten for the first time, a fair effort given that this time last year he was 68th. Another big mover is Kumar Sangakkara, the feisty Sri Lanka wicketkeeper, who is up to 15th, having been 72nd at the turn of the year. Unsurprisingly, the biggest mover over the last 12 months in the bowling ratings is Harbhajan Singh. He has tailed off a little since his superhuman displays against Australia but still lies in 14th, up 51 places over the year. Glenn McGrath tops the bowling ratings, a fraction ahead of his fellow metronome Shaun Pollock. Those two and Muttiah Muralitharan are head and shoulders above the rest, though Chris Cairns's Bangladeshi demolition job moves him up to sixth. Darren Gough stays in fifth despite losing points for missing the trip to India, and Allan Donald stays fourth despite losing points for being thrashed round Melbourne. Jacques Kallis's impressive resistance in Australia helped move him up to 4th in the batting - in PwC terms, his stock has never been higher - and he is the only man to feature in the top 20 of both the batting and bowling tables. His fellow allrounder Lance Klusener has slipped to 50th in both tables after a dreadful run of form. Generally it's been a better time for batsmen than bowlers. Five of the top 15 batsmen (Kallis, Hayden, Martyn, New Zealand's Mark Richardson and Sangakkara) have achieved their highest rating to date, but the highest-rated bowler to have done so is Pakistan's young legspinner Danish Kaneria, in 36th. The PwC Ratings
Batting For the full tables click here
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