The West In­dies have a chance to join Aus­tralia at the top of the ICC Women's Cham­pi­onship ta­ble if they can blank Pak­istan when they go head to head in round four of the ICC Women's Cham­pi­onship, which starts in St Lu­cia to­day.

A 3-0 se­ries vic­to­ry would el­e­vate Stafanie Tay­lor's side, which cur­rent­ly lies a point clear of Eng­land in third po­si­tion, to the top of the ta­ble. A 2-1 win for the hosts would al­so see them progress and leapfrog sec­ond-placed South Africa, and in that sce­nario Sana Mir's team would al­so move up to fourth place. In the event of a 3-0 away vic­to­ry for Pak­istan, it would move in­to sec­ond place on 14 points.

In all, the sides will play four ODI's in St Lu­cia, with the open­ing game to­day the on­ly clash that will not count to­wards the ICC Women's Cham­pi­onship, which is a qual­i­fy­ing tour­na­ment for the ICC Women's World Cup 2017, which is be­ing par­tic­i­pat­ed in by Aus­tralia, Eng­land, In­dia, New Zealand, Pak­istan, South Africa, Sri Lan­ka and West In­dies.

The top four sides from the ICC Women's Cham­pi­onship will gain au­to­mat­ic qual­i­fi­ca­tion for the event, which is to be staged in Eng­land, while the bot­tom four sides will get a fi­nal chance of qual­i­fi­ca­tion through the ICC Women's World Cup Qual­i­fi­er in 2017. The tour­na­ment struc­ture sees each team play­ing the oth­ers in one home or away se­ries that will in­clude three ODIs over a two-and-a-half year pe­ri­od, so each side is guar­an­teed at least 21 ODIs over the tour­na­ment pe­ri­od.

In wel­com­ing Pak­istan to the Caribbean ahead of the start of the se­ries, West In­dies cap­tain Stafanie Tay­lor al­so out­lined her side's am­bi­tions to progress up the rank­ings."I would like to wel­come Pak­istan and we are ex­treme­ly ex­cit­ed as we look for­ward with an­tic­i­pa­tion to this up­com­ing se­ries," she said.

"The ICC Women's Cham­pi­onship has been an ex­cel­lent ini­tia­tive and it has giv­en the top eight coun­tries an op­por­tu­ni­ty to par­tic­i­pate against each oth­er. I know this se­ries will be com­pet­i­tive; ul­ti­mate­ly our aim is to move up the rank­ings and as such we plan to dom­i­nate at home, there­by achiev­ing a clean sweep."

Pak­istan cap­tain Sana Mir added: "We know that the West In­dies will be dif­fi­cult op­po­nents, but we trav­el with con­fi­dence and we're keen to get some points to en­able us to move up the ICC Women's Cham­pi­onship ta­ble. We have a good blend of youth and ex­pe­ri­ence and it will be a su­perb chal­lenge for our younger play­ers, es­pe­cial­ly in con­di­tions which are a whole lot dif­fer­ent than what we are used to.

"The West In­dies are a strong side with some out­stand­ing in­di­vid­u­als right across their team. You on­ly need to look at their stand­ing in the rank­ings to see that. So it will be a good test and one we're in­deed ex­cit­ed about it."

In the ODI rank­ings for bowlers, the top ten fea­tures three West In­dies play­ers with sec­ond-placed Anisa Mo­hammed hold­ing a 13-point lead over off-spin­ner Tay­lor. Shanel Da­ley lies in 11th po­si­tion and will be aim­ing to re­duce Dane van Niek­erk's 11-point ad­van­tage, while Tremayne Smartt (18th) is three ap­pear­ances short of the 50-cap mark and the on­ly oth­er play­er in­side the top 20.

Pak­istan duo As­mavia Iqbal and Ni­da Dar are tied for 22nd place, while the oth­er bowlers set to fea­ture in the se­ries are Shak­era Sel­man (22nd), Bis­mah Ma­roof (47th) and Anam Amin (48th), who trails Ma­roof by six points.

West In­dies head in­to the se­ries with the high­est ranked bat­ters with sixth-placed Tay­lor and De­an­dra Dot­tin (ninth). The high­est ranked Pak­istan bat­ter is Bis­mah Ma­roof (12th) whose next ODI will be her 75th ap­pear­ance for her coun­try. Oth­er bat­ters who are like­ly to fea­ture in the se­ries are Ky­cia Knight (28th), Nain Abi­di (31st) and Hay­ley Matthews (35th). In to­tal, 28 points and six places sep­a­rate Meris­sa Aguilleira (42nd), Sana Mir (44th) and As­mavia Iqbal (48th) who will all be eye­ing an im­prove­ment in their rank­ings.

Tay­lor con­tin­ues to lead the all-rounders' rank­ing and holds a strong ad­van­tage over Aus­tralia's Ell­yse Per­ry.

In­fo

Match Of­fi­cials: Gre­go­ry Brath­waite, Jacque­line Williams, Joel Wil­son

Squads

West In­dies (from): Stafanie Tay­lor (cap­tain), Meris­sa Aguilleira, Shamil­ia Con­nell, Brit­ney Coop­er, De­an­dra Dot­tin, Afy Fletch­er, Sta­cy-Ann King, Ky­cia Knight, Kyshona Knight, Hay­ley Matthews, Anisa Mo­hammed, Shak­era Sel­man, Tremayne Smartt

Pak­istan (from): Sana Mir (cap­tain), Nain Abi­di, Anam Amin, Sidra Amin, Di­ana Baig, Ni­da Dar, As­mavia Iqbal, Ma­ri­na Iqbal, Sa­nia Iqbal, Iram Javed, Bis­mah Ma­roof, Aliya Ri­az, Ra­biya Shah, Sumaiya Sid­diqui, Jave­ria Wadood, Ayesha Za­far