What is the intended purpose of manually ordering items on the Tickets tab?

We're having an internal discussion about the Tickets tab versus the Assignments page.

First, as a developer, I'm puzzled by the decision to use an unordered list on the Tickets page as opposed to making it tabular? Also, why is there no way to sort on this page other than manually?

Secondly, from a client's stand point what is the point of manually ordering these items? It doesn't notify anyone on our end so we can't manage priorities based on that, and the proper way to manage your queue should be through the use of the priority, status, and due date fields.

Lastly, it also seems odd to me that the tickets tab doesn't use the same functionality as the Assignments page, just showing a different set of information. Why have two different ways of dealing with the same type of data?

Is there some other reason for using a manually ordered list?

Thanks for the response Ilija, but as I said previously: Why even offer manual ordering? It has no relevance to the tickets other than being able to visualize them in a particular order. You can achieve the same level of control over ordering through a combination of the priority, status and due date fields.

This page would be much more functional given 1 of 2 scenarios:

1.) Dragging the tickets manually actually had some effect, like raising the ticket priority the closer it got to the top. At the very least it should notify the project leader so that they know the client wants things done in a particular order. (As an aside, I would suggest looking at the way Hulu.com lets you manage your queue - you can order by column AND drag and drop. In either case, the order isn't saved until you explicitly commit it.)

2.) Use the same functionality that is currently in use on the assignments page. NO MANUAL ORDERING. Just filtering and sorting. This doesn't explicitly order the tickets, but it gives you the same way of visualizing the tickets using relevant fields. This also encourages proper use of the priority, status and due date fields. If something is important, raise the priority and/or set an appropriate due date. If something is less important, lower the priority and/or mark it as on hold.