The Indian Premier League may only be 17 games old but its impact is already being felt in the Bartercard Power Rankings with four IPL teams bursting through into the top ten .With the worlds best players taking part the IPL can lay claim to not only having the biggest stars in the world but having the best team too, the Chennai Super Kings lead by Mahendra Singh Dhoni have swept all before them winning four games out of four to enter the rankings in first place.

The Super Kings have set the pace in the IPL winning all four of their games in commanding style, with Dhoni, Matthew Hayden and Michael Hussey forging a strong batting lineup the Super Kings have scored almost 800 runs.The impact of Dhoni’s men has been felt most by the Victorian Bushrangers who after 15 months at the top of the Bartercard Power Rankings slip down to second place just head of the Kings XI Punjab.The Kings XI captained by Yuvraj Singh have relied on their experienced bowling line up including Bret Lee and Sreesanth to restrict their opponents to low totals before cruising to easy victories.

The IPL’s strength is boosted further with Shane Warne’s Rajasthan Royals in 5th place followed by the Delhi DareDevils in 6th, the seismic shift in power to the sub continent is reflected by the fact that the Leicestershire Foxes are the only English County in the top ten.With the battle for Twenty20 supremacy underway in India the ICL has taken a back seat this month but the Chennai Superstars, winners of the inaugural ICL Twenty20 Championship last year, remain in the Bartercard Power Rankings top ten in 9th place.The Lahore Badshahs, last months surprise story have crashed back down to earth with a bump falling 12 places in the Bartercard Power Rankings form 3rd to 15th after suffering defeat in the ICL’s best of three Edelweiss 20s Challenge Final against the Hyderabad Heroes, the heroes 2-0 victory sees them end the month in 38th place.

In South Africa the Nashua Titans claimed their second Standard Bank Pro20 championship by beating the Nashua Dolphins by 18 runs, despite the win the Titans fall 9 places in the Bartercard Power Rankings to 27th.The ratings are based on a number of important factors including runs scored, totals chased, the loss of wickets and margins of victory. A teams rating is then worked out by dividing the points scored in each game by the number of matches played, the totals are then given to the nearest whole number.

Source : cricket20.com