All posts by csb10.top

Tim O’Gorman and Peter Wright have been nominated to replace Jack Simmons, the former Lancashire player, as chairman of the ECB.Wright, currently chairman of Nottinghamshire, was proposed by Warwickshire and seconded by Surrey and Yorkshire, while O’Gorman was proposed by Derbyshire and seconded by Kent and Leicestershire.Ballot papers will be sent the chairmen of the 18 first-class counties and the MCC on Thursday and have to be returned by February 12. The winner will be then be recommended to the 41 members of the ECB for election.O’Gorman, 42, played 117 first-class games for Derbyshire and Don Amott, the Derbyshire chairman, feels this experience is important. “Our committee are firm in their belief that a candidate with experience as a professional cricketer should be nominated. That coupled with Tim’s enthusiasm to do the job makes him, we believe, the perfect candidate.”John Morris, the Derbyshire head of cricket, added: “Having played in the same Derbyshire team as Tim for many years, and then having continued to see his valuable work with the PCA, I believe Tim to be an outstanding candidate for the position.”

The next five days will give an indication of whether South Africa can recapture the form that took them to the top of the world rankings. A draw against England, who they were expected to dominate, will still be an underachievement but at least victory at the Wanderers would lift spirits ahead of a tough trip to India, the team who took their No. 1 crown.South Africa’s loss of form since they beat Australia down under has meant Graeme Smith has frequently had to respond to questions about his team’s position. Each time he has defended his players and believes they have it in them to reach those levels again. Although he didn’t say it, the hosts are still actually trying to work out how they are behind in what Smith termed “an epic series.””It’s fair to say we haven’t reached those heights,” he said. “When teams are so close it’s often the little things that matter in the big series and in the past we won those moments, but in this series we haven’t. It’s been a touch disappointing but we have played some good cricket. Tomorrow we have the chance to start retaining the trophy if we play well. That’s the goal for us.”In two out of three Tests we have come close, we have just lacked the final blow on the last day. You have to give credit to England’s resilience that they have shown; when they’ve been put under pressure they have handled it well. We’ve had good chats about taking us to another level and we haven’t really hit those heights after 2008. But the potential is still there and we need to find a way of hitting that point.”Smith wouldn’t concede that it had been mentally frailties or the pressure of playing at home which has seen South Africa pull up short of the winning line in recent matches and said it was down to the players to dig deeper. “We need to find a way to extract a bit more out of the players to enable the team to reach its potential.”Regardless of the outcome in Johannesburg this has been another South Africa-England contest that has enthralled throughout. Since readmission there hasn’t been a dull series between the two teams and England’s battling qualities have come as no surprise to Smith, even though the home side were very bullish before the tour began.”I’ve never played against England in an easy series,” he said. “Hanging on for two nine-down draws has made an epic series in many ways and people have really enjoyed watching.”It’s been great to be a part of it and we want our bit of victory in the next five days. It’s been great for cricket and having competitive teams play against each other really brings out the best in people.”While England have had the luxury of being able to name an unchanged team throughout – something that is set to continue for the final Test – South Africa have had injury problems this season. The latest is the loss of Friedel de Wet to a long-term back injury which means Wayne Parnell, the left-arm quick, is set for his debut.Parnell has already impressed during his one-day and Twenty20 appearances and some South African commentators believe he should have started this series while Robert Key, who captained him during a stint with Kent, has said he could become the new Wasim Akram. However, Smith was quick to calm the expectations over his raw quick.”He’s pretty inexperienced at first-class level so it will be interesting to see how he goes,” he said. “He’s had a taste of international cricket in the shorter format and maybe his youthful exuberance is something he can bring. It will be a big challenge for him and the expectation shouldn’t be that he will walk in and knock over seven tomorrow.”The home team have been at pains to point out they will play an attacking brand of cricket as they aim to save the series, but Smith doesn’t want them to get carried away. “I disagree with the terms like gamble that have been thrown around, it is about getting your basics right,” he said. “A good, positive mindset is crucial and we’ve spoken long and hard about that. The guys are really motivated.”

England: 193-9 (50 overs)
Otago: 195-8 (41 overs)

In the first practice match on their tour to New Zealand, England’s women have lost to New Zealand state side, Otago, having fielded four England players in the Otago line up.Coach, John Harmer, was keen for the whole squad to play in the one-day match and Otago retained their overseas player Clare Taylor (Yorkshire), who was joined by Claire Taylor (Berkshire), Arran Thompson (Lancashire) and Lucy Pearson (Staffordshire). Claire Taylor also kept wicket for the New Zealand side.England’s young bowlers Nicky Shaw (Notts) and Laura Spragg (Yorkshire) finished with the figures of 3-30 and 3-31 respectively, and Sarah Collyer (Somerset) top-scored for England with 44, followed closely by Captain, Clare Connor, who made 40.A second wicket partnership for Otago ensured they reached the England total with Clare Taylor and New Zealand’s leading all-rounder Rachel Pullar reaching 43 and 69 respectively.Pullar has confirmed that she will not take part in the first women’s quadrangular tournament due to family commitments.England Assistant Coach, Jane Powell said: The quadrangular series between hosts New Zealand, England, Australia and India begins on 27th January and sees England take on India at Lincoln University, Christchurch.

Trevor Bayliss, the Sri Lanka coach, has said that setting India a target of “150 on a wearing wicket” was probably the best his team could hope for at this stage, after the hosts took a 333-run first innings lead on the third day in Mumbai.”From a win point of view, it just doesn’t look right at the moment but, on day one when there was a bit in the track, we made 366 for 8 having lost a few wickets in the middle,” Bayliss said. “If our top-order batters can get us off to a good start and bat for a long time there is no reason why we can’t score 400 in a day tomorrow. It needs some very hard work and the players I am sure are capable of doing it. Who knows what the wicket will be like on day five?”Sri Lanka had to bat out three overs after India’s declaration on 726 for 9 and they reached 11 for no loss at stumps. Bayliss said the team was looking to their “three big players” and hoped for solid contributions from Nos. 3, 4, and 5 – the out-of-form Kumar Sangakkara, Mahela Jayawardene and Thilan Samaraweera.Bayliss, however, said that he was happy the way Sri Lanka fought back today to capture eight Indian wickets, in a manner similar to the second Test in Kanpur. “I was very happy with the boys – the same as the second Test when we faced 417 for 2 and we came back the next day, taking 225 for 8. It would have been quite easy to have gone for a lot more runs than we did, but we stuck to it and showed a bit of fight and character. We were just up against unbelievable batting from [Virender] Sehwag.””The guys tried most things, different fields, bowling different sides of the wicket but [no matter] where they put the ball he [Sehwag] was skillful enough to put it away into the gaps. It was one of those days you needed 20 fielders out there.”Muttiah Muralitharan, who had gone wicketless and taking a hiding on the second day, made a comeback of sorts on day three. He dismissed Sehwag early and went on to take three more wickets, finishing with 195 for 4. “Murali is very philosophical about things. During his career this is not the first time it’s happened to him,” Bayliss said. “For a guy who has taken so many wickets it has not happened to him very often. He realises that’s what happens in Test cricket on good wickets against very good players. Today Murali got four wickets and showed that he is still able to take wickets at this level.”After a day on which an edge from Rahul Dravid and a close lbw shout against Sachin Tendulkar were both given not out, Bayliss said he did not know why the umpire review system was not being used in this series. Tillakaratne Dilshan, too, was erroneously given out bat-pad in the first innings soon after reaching his century.”The question that’s got to be asked is, why the referral system is being used in every other series barring this one, when the ICC said that it should be used after October 1,” Bayliss said. “No one’s explained to us yet why it’s not being used when it’s being used everywhere else in the world. If Dilshan was able to go and make a big score in the first innings, things might have been a bit different.”

Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
How they were outMuttiah Muralitharan denied Virender Sehwag his triple-century•AFP

In the fourth over of the day, Muttiah Muralitharan got one to dip on Virender Sehwag. For a change Sehwag played in front of his body and scooped it back to Murali, who took the catch after a juggling act. Having added nine to his overnight 284, Sehwag became the fourth man to be dismissed in the 290s. And just after the standing ovation, the cricket came out of a trance. The ball started turning again, the bowlers bowled to a plan again, the scoring settled to a more human rate, and India moved – albeit slowly – to a big first-innings lead. Sachin Tendulkar, VVS Laxman and Rahul Dravid missed out on centuries, but MS Dhoni scored his third, and then left Sri Lanka just three overs to negotiate in the evening. Despite Dhoni’s late hitting, India scored only 283 runs today – Sehwag alone scored 284 yesterday.By the time Sehwag got out, he had put India 63 ahead. Dravid, after surviving an edge that the umpire missed, followed him, edging Chanaka Welegedara to the keeper having added 12 to his overnight 62. In between those wickets, though, Tendulkar played his shots, vertical-sweeping Murali twice just to the left of the keeper and pulling and driving against the turn for two other boundaries. By the time Dravid got out, Tendulkar had reached 22 off 26 but he slowed down after that, knowing he needed to make sure India batted just once.The slowing down was also because Rangana Herath and Murali found some rhythm. Murali even bowled a maiden – his first in 75 overs from the second innings in Ahmedabad. He kept VVS Laxman quiet by bowling from round the stumps, with a strong leg-side field, and India scored 49 runs in 18 overs between Dravid’s dismissal and lunch. In the last over before lunch, there was reason to cheer for Sri Lanka: the innings run-rate came below five.Post lunch, Tendulkar crossed 50 for the 97th time in Tests. Laxman opened up after a dry spell, taking 12 runs off one Welegedara over that included the drive from outside off to wide of mid-on. In the next over, though, Nuwan Kulasekara breached Tendulkar’s defence with an offcutter.Laxman continued punishing Welegedara and went from 27 in 64 balls to 50 in 79. But soon, looking for a big shot off Murali, he was done in by a doosra.The story of the first two sessions, though, was Herath. Easily the pick of Sri Lankan bowlers, he had the batsmen guessing, mixing his offbreaks and straighter ones to good effect. The carrom ball stayed in the batsmen’s minds too, but it seemed everyone – the umpires, his own keeper and slip fielders – had conspired against Herath.First the umpire had missed that edge off Dravid. Then Herath had a close lbw shout against Tendulkar when the batsman was 35. The umpire thought it would have missed leg, Hawk-Eye said it would have just hit. Then he had Yuvraj Singh groping as if blindfolded. When Yuvraj finally stepped out and missed another arm ball, Prasanna Jayawardene, arguably the best keeper to spin, couldn’t collect it. That miss cost them only 15, though, as Yuvraj sliced the same bowler to deep mid-off. But that wasn’t the end of Herath’s rotten luck: two balls later he got MS Dhoni to edge one and Mahela and Dilshan – at slip and second slip – saw it go through that little gap. And then, when looking to dismiss the tail early, he saw Prasanna drop Zaheer Khan.Murali, who was bowling with an injured right hand and using his feet to field, representing very much the beaten figure his team had been reduced to, enjoyed better luck. Harbhajan was bowled when going for a reverse-sweep, Kulasekara took a good tumbling catch to dismiss Zaheer.But again, Herath remained instructive of how the day went. Dhoni was on 50 when No. 11, Pragyan Ojha, walked in. Ojha contributed five to the unbeaten 56-run stand. Dhoni hogged the strike, choosing to score mainly in sixes. And he whiplashed Herath for five of them, three straight, one over midwicket, and the final one over long-on and out of the stadium. He also hooked Welegedara for one. In the whole record-breaking spree, the last one belonged to India: they scored their highest Test total, beating the 705 for 7 against Australia in Sydney.

India’s powerful batting line-up has often had to compensate for errant bowling and slack fielding in the past but the tables were turned in Mohali. MS Dhoni praised his bowlers for restricting Australia to 250; he said the fielding effort was India’s best in the last one-and-a-half years; but he criticised the batsmen for a lack of partnerships which ultimately led to a 24-run defeat in the fourth ODI.”It was a good effort by the bowlers to restrict them to a total like 250,” Dhoni said. “We got a decent start to our chase also. But subsequently, we failed as a batting unit. We should have batted the full 50 overs but that was not possible because we kept losing wickets at regular intervals.”Dhoni defended his decision to field, saying the dew factor would have made it difficult for the bowlers to grip the ball under lights. “Dew is a big factor that always plays on your mind. From overs 15-40, generally the spinners do the job for us. That would have been taking a risk. Of course, it can backfire as well, so it’s difficult to choose. But we knew in Mohali, the wicket would not break much and ball would come nicely onto the bat with a bit of dew. I think our bowlers did a great job and 251 is something we should have scored.”India’s chase had a terrific start with Virender Sehwag caning Mitchell Johnson for 30 runs off 14 balls. Australia began to fight back after Sehwag fell but India were on course while Sachin Tendulkar was batting. However, his dismissal for 40 – the highest score of the innings – was the beginning of the end as wickets fell frequently thereafter.”We badly needed some partnerships going,” Dhoni said. “We got the start but we could not take advantage of that. If at least one batsman got going, it would have made things easy.”Dhoni also said the younger batsmen like Suresh Raina, Ravindra Jadeja and Virat Kohli would need to learn how to overhaul a difficult target. “Raina today got out to a beautiful delivery, while Jadeja was run out after a mix-up,” Dhoni said. “Batting at No. 6 or 7 is not easy, since you don’t get much opportunity to bat. You cannot pace your innings either, for you have to play according to the platform given to you. Sometimes, you have to accelerate or keep a partnership going. They are still inexperienced and I hope they learn from their mistakes.”On the decision to send Kohli at No. 3, Dhoni said: “The best way to give someone an opportunity is to let him bat higher. At No. 6 or 7, you score 20-30 in quick time or can get out for 10-12 also. I think it’s important to give them a chance. Virat is a talented batsman, good on the field and brings in lot of energy.”India’s defeat in Mohali prevented them from taking Australia’s No. 1 ranking in ODIs and the gap between the teams is now three points. The next match is in Hyderabad on November 5.

England came out swinging, went down for the count, rallied briefly andwere then knocked clean out of the ring. After Tim Bresnan and Luke Wrighthad done a sterling job of rebuilding the innings, England were undone bysome magnificent batting, with Ricky Ponting and Shane Watson adding anunbeaten 252 for the second wicket, an Australian record. Where England’stop order had gone for broke, Australia played the percentages, andwaltzed into yet another major final.”We were definitely keen to go out and play our shots on a good wicket,and unfortunately it didn’t come off for us today,” said Andrew Straussafter the game. “It’s one of those things. If you live by the sword, youdie by it. It’s frustrating. When you lose six wickets for a 100 runs onthat sort of surface, you’re always struggling. I thought Tim Bresnanplayed exceptionally well and Luke Wright supported him. We weren’tcompletely out of the game at the halfway mark, but I did think it was awicket on which 300 was the par score. We were still quite light, andneeded three or four early wickets which we weren’t able to get.”Strauss admitted the late-order revival had given him a little hope.South Africa and India had faltered while chasing targets in Centurionearlier in the tournament, but there were no such blips for Australia.”You always hope that under lights, it [the pitch] might misbehave a bitmore,” said Strauss. “And to be fair, there’s pressure chasing a totallike that. In order to make that pressure count in your favour, you needearly wickets. We were able to get one, but Ponting and Watson playedexceptionally well.”England came into this tournament with the mantra that they wouldn’t “diewondering”. When asked whether that approach had been taken to extremes inthe semi-final, Strauss defended his players. “Any time you play a shotand it doesn’t come off, you can be criticised for that. I think as atemplate going forward, we’ve got to keep playing our shots. That’simportant. We’ve got to get better at our skills so that the percentagesare more and more in our favour. That’s what we have to work on.”I think it was refreshing to see the guys going out there and expressingthemselves. I think they enjoy playing that way a lot more. To cope withthese teams away from home, we need to do it more and more. There’sobviously a case for playing the conditions a little bit better. But todaywas a good wicket, and it was just one of those days when the shots didn’tcome off for us.”After being beaten out of sight in the one-day series against Australia athome, Strauss said there were quite a few positives to take out of atournament in which they beat both Sri Lanka and South Africa. “The sevenmatches against Australia, I think we went backwards,” he said. “But overhere, I think we’ve come forward a bit. I think the guys have gained someconfidence and they have gone out and played in the right sort of manner.”We always said that at the end of this is a bit of a watershed, and we havegot to look at where we are as a side and how we can improve. We have gotthe five one-dayers against South Africa which will be a nice way to startthat forward progress. We can take a lot from what we’ve done in thistournament. There’s been some excellent cricket played by us. But if we’rehonest with ourselves, we’re not close enough to the top two or threeteams in the world yet. We’ve got a lot of hard work to do if we want toget there.”There was little hesitation when he was asked which team he now fancied topick up the trophy. “It’s hard to look past Australia,” he said. “They’reon a great run, they’re the defending champions. They’ll be hard to beat.Pakistan are capable of anything. They can beat anyone on their day, andNew Zealand have got some good shot players as well. For me, Australia arefavourites, but there’s a lot of cricket still to be played.”England are the only major cricket-playing nation not to win a World Cupor an ICC Champions Trophy, but Strauss insisted that such facts had been farfrom the mind when he turned up for Friday’s game. “This was a greatopportunity for us to go some way to putting that right,” he said. “Wewere really excited about playing Australia today. We’d obviously come offsecond-best against them in England, but we felt that with the type ofcricket we were playing out here, we had a good chance of challengingthem. But they were too good for us today. Their bowlers bowled veryattacking lines and lengths, and asked some questions of our batsmen.That’s one of the things they’ve got going in their favour. They’ve got alot of variety in their bowling.”England’s next assignment will see them back in South Africa in November,and this Champions Trophy campaign would have gone a long way towardsfinalising a squad for that series. “We’ll have to sit down with theselectors in the next couple of days,” said Strauss. “I think we’ve gotsome fairly strong ideas of where we want to go as a side. There may beone or two changes. I can’t imagine that there’d be wholesale ones.”The guys go off and have a well-earned break, but in the back of ourminds we’ll know that the tour over here will be a tough one for us. It’llbe a good gauge for where we are as a side, both in Tests and one-daycricket.”

ScorecardSri Lanka A scripted a come-from-behind series win after prevailing in a low-scoring fifth ODI at the P Sara Oval. After restricting Pakistan A to 112, the hosts struggled with the bat but overcame the scare to win by three wickets. Sri Lanka took the series 3-2 after losing the first two games.All the Sri Lankan bowlers chipped in to bundle out the visitors within 35 overs. The openers Umar Amin and Khalid Latif began steadily, adding 32, before Farveez Maharoof struck twice in one over. When Amin fell, with the score on 60, the rest crumbled. The spin duo of Muthumudalige Pushpakumara and Malinga Bandara, the match-winners from the fourth game, hastened the collapse by sharing four wickets between them. Pakistan lost their last eight wickets for 62 runs and the collapse put tremendous pressure on the bowlers, especially with the series at stake.Their seamers gave them hope early on when the hosts got off to a shaky start, stumbling to 23 for 3. Mahela Udawatte and Gihan Rupasinghe ensured a steady flow of runs with a stand of 42 off 37 balls, before the seamer Abdur Rehman struck. He removed the pair in quick succession and later accounted for Pushpakumara, leaving Sri Lanka at 90 for 7. Lahiru Thirimanne eased the nerves and guided his side home in the 23rd over. Rehman was the most effective of the bowlers, taking 3 for 29.Pakistan had earlier claimed the two-Test series 1-0.

Matthew Hayden, the former Australia opener, has suggested scrapping the Champions Trophy and creating a two-month window for the IPL in order to revive spectator interest in the game.”Playing the World Twenty20 every other year is too much,” Hayden wrote in his column in the . “And why have the Champions Trophy when you’ve already got a 50-over World Cup?”The Champions Trophy was postponed to September 2009 and shifted to South Africa after teams expressed security concerns about playing in Pakistan last year. The ICC has been trying to rebrand the tournament as a short two-week elite tournament played at just two venues – Wanderers and Supersport Park.Hayden, who was appointed a board director by Cricket Australia earlier this month, listed down his suggestions after being challenged on air during by cricket writer Christopher Martin-Jenkins to come up with solutions to re-jig a jam-packed international calendar full of “meaningless matches”.England will be playing seven ODIs against Australia at the end of the Ashes and Hayden said five matches were enough for any bi-lateral series. He also said the 50- and 20-over World Cups should be played in the same cycle.Hayden, a key member of the Chennai Super Kings franchise, said no international cricket should be played during the proposed two-month window of the IPL, which according to him had brought the game to a “tipping point”. “The IPL has the ability to generate international fan bases in the same way as achieved by the English football’s Premier League. I believe some IPL matches should go on the road each year and be played in other countries, to make it a global competition. The sooner the world of cricket embraces the IPL, the sooner everyone can find ways to benefit from its massive potential.”Hayden also lent his support to the concept of a Test Championship that the MCC’s World Cricket Committee put forth last month. Hayden rejected the ICC’s Future Tours Programme and instead proposed a world series of the top eight teams on a rolling calendar with finals every two years. He said Zimbabwe and Bangladesh’s dismal Test records disqualified them from the Test championship. Bangladesh’s only three Test wins have come against Zimbabwe and a second-string West Indies side, missing senior players who were on strike. “When a team like Australia play a team like Bangladesh in a Test series, you’ve got problems. It can’t be fun for the underdogs and it’s no challenge for the favourites. Just as importantly, it’s not a good spectacle.”Hayden said the core of the Test championship would be the iconic series – the Ashes and India v Pakistan. “They should stay as five-match series. Aside from those ties, teams are pooled in two groups, with everyone playing each other and scoring points for wins, draws and series wins, and picking up bonus points for stand-out batting and bowling performances. The leading two in each group would progress to semi-finals and a final, the other would enter a rankings play-off system.”This way, every game means something – even the dead rubber at the end of a series between two lesser sides. Every Test fits into a bigger picture that adds up to a championship. It gives players something to aim for, fans a format they can follow, and commercial stakeholders with something that’s compact and exciting. By changing Test cricket into something more relevant and therefore more marketable, additional revenue is generated. More revenue in the sport is good for everyone, including players and the ability of the game to develop.”Hayden was also in favour of playing matches indoor to avoid losing days to rain or poor pitches like in Antigua. He said it was important to have a fixed global calendar for cricket that fans could identify with. “Football fans instinctively know if they’re in a World Cup year, or Euro Champs year. They know when seasons start when trophies are decided, give or take. Not so in cricket. A universal calendar is fundamental to all the above solutions. Once this is in place, competitions for each of the different formats of the game can be settled upon. Fans, broadcasters, sponsors, players – everyone will know where they stand.”

Scorecard
Pakistan A put on a gritty batting performance to deny Sri Lanka A a win in the first unofficial Test in Dambulla. Ahmed Shehzad’s 59 and an unbeaten 45 from Azhar Ali shut out the home team.Set 374 to win after Sri Lanka A declared on 271 for 5, Pakistan were in trouble straightaway when both openers – Khurram Manzoor and Umar Amin – fell without scoring. That brought together Shehzad and Ali, who frustrated Sri Lanka’s bowlers with 93 for the third wicket.Runs came at a crawl, with both batsmen content on playing safe. After Shehzad’s dismissal, Ali continued to keep the bowlers at bay till the end and was well supported by Fahad Masood, who took 50 balls for his 7. There was one more blip, with Pakistan reduced to 138 for 6 at one stage, but Sri Lanka ran out of time to bowl out the tourists.Suraj Randiv capped a successful match as he picked up three wickets in the innings to finish with match figures of 7 for 139.The second unofficial Test begins in Colombo on Thursday.