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The former India captain says India are “lucky” to have bowlers who can take wickets in the middle overs in what he expects to be a high-scoring World Cup

PTI18-May-2019Rahul Dravid has said the presence of wicket-taking bowlers in India’s line-up will greatly benefit them in the middle overs of what is expected to be a high-scoring World Cup.”I believe, having experienced some of the conditions in England last year with the A-team tour, it would be a high-scoring World Cup,” Dravid, the former India captain who now coaches the A team and Under-19s, said. “And in a high-scoring World Cup, having bowlers who can take wickets in the middle will be very important. I think India is lucky in that regard.”He added: “People like (Jasprit) Bumrah, Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal… (India have) got bowlers who can take wickets. Teams that are taking wickets through those middle overs in those high-scoring games have a better better chance of restricting the opposition.”India played their last international on March 13, after which the IPL kicked off. While the loss in that five-match series to Australia at home was unexpected, India have done well in ODIs over the last year, scripting a series win in South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.Dravid took into considerations these victories while talking about India’s prospects at the World Cup. “I think we have had a couple of really good years leading to the World Cup. For right reasons, we are No. 2 in the world (in ODIs) and that actually means that we have consistently produced some successful results in the last two and half years. We can be hopeful.”I think it’s going to be a tough World Cup. Every team comes well prepared and wants to compete. Everyone at the World Cup will be putting their best foot forward.”So having said that I would say India is definitely one of the favourites in the tournament and all of us can be hopeful. Hopefully we make the semi-final and from there on there are four very good teams.”Bowling is going to play a very big role in this World Cup and the team that bowls best, probably, will be closer to winning it.”Dravid showered praise on captain Virat Kohli. “Virat, you know he just keeps improving, keeps getting better. He is setting bars and standards that possibly we thought would never be achieved. Sachin (Tendulkar) scored 49-50 [49] hundreds in one-day cricket. People thought that this would take a lot of time to achieve, will it be ever achieved… And now Virat is 10 [eight] away from it or close to it.”One of the things about Virat is that even if he has a bad tour – it is not that he hasn’t had bad tours, he had a disappointing tour of England in 2014, he wasn’t as successful in Australia first time around, but every time he goes back, he goes back as a better player. He sort of reinvents his game to a point where he is constantly improving.”Dravid also had words of praise for World-Cup winning captain MS Dhoni. “The beauty about MS is that he plays these big tournaments and these big matches… he plays them and they mean a lot (but) – I tell the Under-19 boys – he is able to find a way to play it like it doesn’t mean a lot.”Obviously it means a lot (but) he is able to see a bigger picture in it and say I’m not defined by this particular game. It is a hard thing to do.”

Alastair Cook stands firm as Essex build on early breakthroughs at Chelmsford

David Hopps at Chelmsford14-May-2019In Chelmsford’s increasingly impressive Central Park, you can now cross the River Can by a new bridge that has been erected since Essex won the Championship in 2017, and those who made that crossing for the visit of Nottinghamshire relished a reminder of that success: Jamie Porter running in hungrily, passing the outside edge and taking wickets again.On such a glorious spring day, it was possible to believe both in the eternal popularity of both town planners and county cricket – and that is a sentence for which the overused word “unique” might not be inappropriate. To add to the joy, the County Championship now has our undivided attention until mid-July (give or take the odd global tournament), although one suspects there is less chance of sorting out the traffic jams on the A12.Under these blue skies, Nottinghamshire were dispensed with for 187 on a surface offering a good balance between bat and ball (perhaps 260 was par) and Porter claimed 4 for 75, this after managing only two expensive wickets in the first two matches of the season. His plucking-out of Ben Slater and Joe Clarke soon after lunch changed the shape of the day. Essex, by closing on 68 for 0, only trail by 119.Porter took 75 wickets at 16.82 when Essex won their first title for 25 years. England felt obliged to take a look, picked him in a Test squad or two without granting him a debut and gave him a Lions tour in India. Wisden made him Cricketer of the Year, but even allowing for his impressive consistency you felt they were honouring a valued county performer rather than an England bowler-in-waiting.Another 58 wickets at 24.63 followed last summer – his fourth successive haul of more than 50 wickets – as Essex made a poor title defence but stole into third place with the help of the Indian batsman Murali Vijay. Porter will have to maintain at least those standards for Essex to challenge this time around.The seam of the Dukes ball is less pronounced this year, the heavy roller is back, and there are more matches in midsummer: three changes in one which mean the ECB will not be able to draw any worthwhile conclusions but which we can presume mean bowlers like Porter, with a pace not much above 80mph, will have their work cut out to maintain their standards. At 25, he is young enough and resourceful enough to adapt to the challenge.Conditions on this occasion were more encouraging as the sun drew the moisture from the ground and Porter’s response was admirable. Ben Duckett was picked off lbw in his new-ball spell – Duckett’s third single-figure score in the Championship which might have explained his reluctance to depart. But Chris Nash took four boundaries off Porter in a single over before he fell clipping Sam Cook to square leg.Slater and Clarke then dug in in an obdurate stand of 80 in 33 which also met Simon Harmer’s offspin with great deliberation and which appeared to have got Nottinghamshire through the worst. Rewards looked unlikely to come easily.That perception changed with the loss of five wickets for 37 in 18 overs during the afternoon, with Porter at the heart of it. Slater, who had made 20 from 87 balls before lunch, moved dependably on to 45 before Porter moved one away to have him caught at the wicket; Slater is proving himself a solid signing without the big scores that will get him noticed.Clarke’s drive, to be bowled through the gate for 45, was more fulsome. Porter had been rewarded for a probing spell. Tom Moores followed to him later when an uninhibited blow got no further than cover and, from 155 for 7, the tail was rounded up with a kamikaze moment or two.Nottinghamshire’s assistant head coach, Paul Franks, felt that their innings increasingly suffered from a hangover from their Royal London Cup campaign which only ended on Sunday with a semi-final defeat against Somerset at Trent Bridge.”It was a really tough day on a pitch which we read as being pretty good for batting,” he said. “We have seen the ball do a lot and they bowled really well on it and put us under some pressure. We didn’t handle that pressure well at certain times.”There was a lot of loose stuff, a lot of stuff that comes off the back of a one-day competition which the lads threw themselves into wholeheartedly over the past few weeks and had 24 hours to turn it around.”Essex’s reply had extra interest in the duel between Stuart Broad and Alastair Cook. Cook might no longer be England captain, but he is a “Sir” these days, and is held in such high regard in High Places that it is surprising “Alastair” was not somehow fitted in to the new Prince’s name. His wicket still carries a certain cachet. Broad also had a former team-mate to subdue, and an approaching Ashes series to bear in mind. Cook stood firm; Broad would have to try again on the morrow.

Spinner can answer a glaring need on loan at Yorkshire as Essex trail by 372 runs

David Hopps04-Jun-2019Dom Bess’ short professional career has not been short of incident. As a teenager, he was a Somerset debutant thrown spectacularly into a Championship challenge which only failed on the last day of the season. At 20, he became the first hunch of the national selector, Ed Smith, when he was given a Test debut last season against Pakistan only to be stood down after two Tests.He now finds himself on a month’s loan at Yorkshire where his effervescent manner and all-round talent can again create a good impression. Just to confirm, however, that life for Bess is rarely straightforward, his chances of registering a second first-class hundred departed against Essex when he ran out of partners on 91.Bess, though, might still have a role to play with the ball, answering Yorkshire’s glaring need, if only briefly, for a Championship spinner of quality in the third game of an envisaged four-game loan spell. They will imagine that the heavy rain on the second afternoon, which restricted play to 36.3 overs, will leave enough unsettled weather around for their seamers to prosper on the third day when Essex resume on 18 for 1, so setting up Bess to play a central role in the later stages.Somerset’s coaching team of Andy Hurry and Jason Kerr deserve considerable credit for sanctioning Bess’ loan spell at a potential Championship rival, recognising that his career development, at 21, should be the priority. As the spin-bowling understudy to the excellent Jack Leach, his opportunities are limited, especially when the ECB takes a dim view of the sort of sharply turning pitches on which they almost pipped Middlesex to the title in 2016. He has 89 first-class wickets at a touch under 30 and needs to add to them.England will be grateful, too, because understudies to Moeen Ali, whose form remains unpredictable, are not exactly jostling for attention. Bess’ positive attitude sits well with England. In his days as the head of ECB’s development programme, Hurry would have been anxious for Bess to be playing regular county cricket and it is admirable that those values have survived more pressing responsibilities at Somerset.Yorkshire would be foolish not to hope that Bess’ involvement might be more long lasting. As an Exeter lad, his loyalties to the south-west are strong, but it will have its limits. Few seriously imagine that Adil Rashid will suddenly discover a renewed fondness for Championship cricket and, Rashid apart, Yorkshire have long struggled to produce spinners of quality. Headingley, too, for all its maverick ways when the clouds roll over, now regularly produces surfaces on which spin can play a part.Bess has shown a liking for this Essex attack. His only other first-class century came for the MCC against the champion county in 2018, following their title win the previous September. At 289 for 6 overnight, Bess’ share was only 30, but he played tidily against some lacklustre Essex bowling, shrewdly picking off 15 boundaries when the opportunities presented themselves. “I think everybody was expecting it to rain,” said Anthony McGrath, Essex’s coach.Bess said: “I never felt in. It was still doing a bit, and I nicked a couple. You have to ride your luck sometimes. I’d have loved to have got my first hundred in the Championship, but it was just nice to be in there facing a lot of balls and just playing cricket. There is certainly a lot there for our bowlers. I think we’re in a great position.”Jonny Tattersall offered sound support as they extended their seventh-wicket stand to 90, but Tattersall was caught at the wicket, attempting an improvised guide against Ravi Bopara, Jamie Porter removed Steve Patterson and Ben Coad with the new ball as Essex finally perked up and last man Duanne Olivier lasted only four balls as he edged Sam Cook to second slip.Yorkshire had time to take one wicket before rain ended play at 2.15pm when Sir Alastair Cook fell for two at first slip – pushing at a full-length ball from Ben Coad that left him and gave a 25th catch of the season for Tom Kohler-Cadmore. Pomp and ceremony might have been the order of the day in London as Donald Trump continued his State visit, but there was no grace and favour for Sir Alastair in the county that knows only too well that Geoffrey Boycott has never been knighted.Neither Labour nor Tory Governments have quite dared take the plunge when it comes to ennobling Boycott. Perhaps they should put it to a referendum. It would be something to divide the country again once Brexit is settled.

Simon Harmer lifts leading wicket-taker tally to 49 as Essex defeat Nottinghamshire

Jon Culley at Trent Bridge03-Jul-2019The result at Taunton was not the one their supporters had been hoping to hear but Essex are still in there fighting. It took them a little longer than some cynics among the home crowd were gloomily predicting but by a little under 40 minutes after lunch a fifth victory in six was in the bag.Ben Duckett, batting at six after earlier problems with an injured thumb, and the Indian Test player R Ashwin, whose tireless contribution to his county debut at least raises a glimmer of hope for the team marooned at the bottom of the Division One table, led such resistance as there was but Essex were never likely to let this one slip, having reduced Nottinghamshire to 100 for 5 on the third evening, still 206 runs behind.Their next two fixtures, ahead of the Twenty20 hiatus, are both at Chelmsford, where they have won their last four. The leaders Somerset, who suffered their only defeat so far when they visited the County Ground two weeks ago, know there is no cushion should they stumble, especially since the return fixture against Essex, enticingly, is the last one of the season.Simon Harmer, who raised his tally to 49 as Division One’s leading wicket-taker by taking 4 for 35 from a marathon 40 overs on a flat pitch, believes the title is for Somerset to lose.”We can’t really be worried about other results,” he said. “We need to focus on winning every game that we play.”But if we do that we are going to put as much pressure on Somerset as we can and after the start they had to the season I think the title is theirs to lose.”We beat them last week and we still have to play them again, so hopefully it comes down to that last game of the season at Taunton. With the brand of cricket we are playing, they are going to be the ones looking over their shoulders.”Beating a Nottinghamshire side that have struggled to give any opponent a decent game this season might not look especially significant, but head coach Anthony McGrath says Essex will draw plenty from how the four days unfolded.”For one thing, it was our first win away from home,” he said. “We have been on a roll at home. Our attack has had favourable conditions at Chelmsford, so to win here on a flat deck and get 20 wickets is a big, big effort and hopefully it will give us confidence going into the rest of the year.”I was really pleased with the way be bowled in the first innings. The way Notts were going at 120-odd for two it looked like they were on for a big score but we wrestled the initiative back and bowled them out for just over 200 and that was key.”And then, the way we batted … the batsmen have come in for some criticism this year so to put 500 on the board with the attack Notts had was really pleasing. The pitch was slow but with Ashwin, Broad, Ball and Fletcher it is a class attack and, credit to Notts, they never gave in.”I was really pleased for the batsmen because they have had a bit of criticism. I’ve thought that Nick (Browne) has looked really good in the last few weeks and to score that 160-odd, Ravi as well, and the other batters chipping in, confidence wise it will hold them in good stead for the last few games.”Like Harmer, McGrath was bullish about the title race, having seen his side respond in exactly the way he wanted after the chastening defeat against Hampshire in the opening round suggested they might struggle.”We looked at this period as one in which we needed to get a run together with Somerset getting points on the board early on,” he said. “We had to win the game against Somerset at our place because if they would have won they would probably have opened up too much of a gap.”With them winning again this week it was important we struck back. It keeps it interesting.”Inevitably people will talk about the final game and both teams will hope they are still alive by then and it makes for a really exciting conclusion to the season.”For Nottinghamshire, the soul-searching continues. Relegation is never a fate to contemplate lightly but as the top division expands to 10 teams next summer, not to be one of that group will be a particularly difficult pill to swallow. Yet to drag themselves off the bottom at this stage will require them probably to win four of their last six fixtures.Steven Mullaney, a captain still adamant that he is the best man in the dressing room to lead the team through the tough weeks ahead, admits the team is feeling the loss of the voices of experience he can no longer call on to share the weight on his shoulders.”I don’t like to make excuses but we have had a big shift in recent years, losing players like Chris Read, Michael Lumb, James Taylor, Brendan Taylor, Greg Smith,” he said. Add to that list the names of Alex Hales and Harry Gurney, who have both absented themselves from the red-ball game.”Of the players we have brought in,” he continued, “I don’t think anyone is doubting how good the likes of Ben Duckett, Joe Clarke and Ben Slater are, but it takes a while for a side to gel and we are trying to work out as we go along how it works best. When you are not playing well, doing that seems a bit harder.”But as captain, I still love the job and I’m as passionate as I was when I was appointed that I’m the right person to do it.”It is quite right that when things are not going your way you are under the spotlight with the coaches but I have no ego. I don’t want power or anything like that. I just believe that tactically I’m pretty sound.”There’s no big problems in the dressing room. It’s just that out in the middle we need as individuals to be making better decisions at key moments.”

The quick bowler has matured through a series of injury setbacks and is primed to make a telling impact on the Ashes

Daniel Brettig in Southampton27-Jul-2019If Cameron Bancroft and Marnus Labuschagne were among the last players settled upon by the national selectors for this years Ashes tour, James Pattinson has revealed that he may well have been the first.The broad grin that appeared on the face of the selection chairman Trevor Hohns when asked about Pattinson’s return to Ashes ranks was perhaps the most spontaneous moment of an otherwise highly orchestrated squad announcement in Southampton, and Pattinson was himself able to outline how, as far back as the end of the Sheffield Shield final, that he was advised that he need only keep himself fit and keep bowling as he had done in recent months to assure himself of a spot.It was a revelation at odds with the tense way in which the 25 players in Hampshire were advised of how the squad had been cut back to 17, via 25 individual meetings with Hohns at the team hotel, but also spoke volumes for how highly Pattinson is regarded as a bowler of high pace, accuracy, hostility and movement both through the air and off the pitch. Having been robbed of a significant contribution to the 2013 Ashes by injury, his time looms now.ALSO READ: Bancroft, Wade and Mitchell Marsh earn Ashes call-ups“I feel like I have a lot to offer the Australian cricket team and that’s what I’m excited about,” Pattinson said. “I remember Cracker [Hohns] ringing me after the Shield final this year asking what are your plans? We want you fit for the Ashes. That’s when I knew I was a chance of getting back into the Australian set up and since then we’ve kept in constant communication about being managed. Knowing that you’re wanted and feel like you can make a difference to the team. I think I can do that given the chance.”When I have played for Australia I’ve made good impact. Being a bit older and wiser, knowing your game a bit better, I definitely feel I can impact Tests and not just that but influence players around me to try and push them on as well. I had a meeting about two months with JL [Langer] and Cracker when I got a contract and they said if I’m fit and bowling well then I’d be every chance of being in the Ashes. There was constant communication between myself and my county team and Cricket Australia about bowling loads because I knew how much this was a really important series so I didn’t want to burn myself out.”Pattinsons was just 23 years old six years ago when he bowled the first ball of the 2013 series at Trent Bridge, and made an impact with both the ball and the bat in a match Australia lost by only a handful of runs. But the strain of back-to-back Tests was compounded by a batting collapse in the first innings at Lord’s that had Pattinson bowling again within hours, leading to a tear that brought the fast bowler to tears and pushed him away from Ashes cricket for the next three whole series.James Pattinson gave Australia’s batsmen the hurry up•Getty Images

“Because I was in such a really good space going into that, when you’re 23 you don’t really think about too much you just crack on and do it all,” he said. “That’s the great thing about being young, you just do it and you don’t really worry about the outcome. For me, it was just a good experience to be involved in that series. I was bowling the first ball for my country at 23 so it was pretty exciting.”I came into that series in a really good space so to get injured was quite disappointing – it probably hit me harder than it has before. Even the setbacks after that, that one was probably the hardest one to take just because I didn’t think it was going to happen, I wasn’t thinking about getting injured. That’s the thing you learn, you know that when you get older the chances of getting injured are always there and you have to do rehab, you have to be really diligent with all that sort of thing otherwise you leave yourself really open.”The onset of maturity has been seen in Pattinson’s personal life – fatherhood for one – but also his bowling and his attitude to it. Looking at the abundance of pace bowling riches on offer to Tim Paine’s team, Pattinson said he had no qualms about being rested from parts of the series if it meant that the best bowlers for a given match and circumstance were on the park at the critical moment, reflecting on how his state coach Andrew McDonald emphasised the long game.”Realistically if you have a big workload and with my history with my back, backing up has been one of the hardest things I’ve had to do especially after bowling 50 or 40 overs,” he said. “I’ve been working closely with Andrew McDonald and the Vic physio since I’ve been coming and one his messages to me was ‘I want to try and get you to 35 and not 30’ and that’s something that really hit home with me, that I want to try and be around for the next six years and not one year.ALSO READ: How Wade became too good for Australia to ignore“I’ve been through all this surgery to try and do that. As big as an Ashes series is you have to think of it long term. I think it’s something a lot of people have been waiting for. Especially Cricket Australia, who has invested a lot into us a young fellas. We were all playing pretty much the same age group together and they’ve always wanted to have a lot of these bowlers up and running at the same time. They’ve got that now so it gives them a great choice of variety of bowlers. It also gives them the option of resting players. It’s five Tests with two tour games in six weeks then straight into an Australian summer.”James Pattinson appeals successfully for the wicket of Alex Carey•Getty Images

This is not to say that Pattinson has got here without hiccups. The coaches, selectors and sports scientists held their collective breath when Pattinson was briefly sidelined for Nottinghamshire by a side strain early in the county season, but experience of previous injuries helped him to manage the ailment successfully without letting it escalate.”It was a funny one because I didn’t feel anything bowling and woke up the next morning feeling a little sore coughing,” he said. “I had the same thing in the Big Bash and I decided to play the next game and I ripped it off the bone. If anything you can learn from your mistakes. That was a good one. We got it early and I missed a couple of games. For someone who has gone through extensive injuries and time off the field, you’re talking up to a year at a time with back injuries, those little injuries you can take them a bit better. That’s the bonus of being a bit older now – you know your body a bit better. If you get them early you could just miss two-three weeks like I did there. As I’m getting older I think I’m learning a bit which is good.”Learning has also applied to Pattinson’s bowling craft, as he underlined by repeating the mantra “good areas” multiple times when speaking ahead of the warm-up match in which he had the ball on a string through figures of 4 for 35 from 23 overs. “The best thing with international cricket and playing different teams is you’re exposed to all sorts of people of great quality, he said. “I’ve worked closely with a guy called Andy Pick who is a bowling coach at Nottingham who is really good.”I was over here in 2013 and picked up a few things there. I bowled closely with Stuart Broad for half a dozen games. You just learn by looking at those blokes and seeing how they go about it. A really big help for me is Sidds [Peter Siddle], who’s played a lot of cricket over here and done really well too. So to have him in the squad and players like that to bounce ideas off and communicate with is great.”The faith placed in Pattinson by the selectors is shown in how calm and quietly confident he appears, in contrast to the ebullience of his wicket celebrations. Pattinson, for so long the coming man, knows his time is now, and his place is right here. “I’m here now, I’ve got the chance,” he said. “I’m still 29 so the great thing was I experienced Test cricket at such a good age so it holds me in great shape now.”I’m not someone who hasn’t played before, it’s something I’ve done at a young age. I’m a bit more experienced having setbacks and going through a lot of emotions at a younger age it holds me in good shape a bit older and a bit more relaxed.”

Three days after being skittled for 40 in a Championship defeat to Essex, Kent grab defeat from the jaws of victory

ECB Reporters Network23-Aug-2019Kent Spitfires suffered their second batting calamity of the week as they tossed away a winning position to lose their Vitality Blast South Group qualifier to Surrey by one run at shell-shocked Canterbury.Just three days after being skittled for 40 in a County Championship defeat to Essex, Kent grabbed defeat from the jaws of victory to suffer their fourth reverse and their first on home soil in this year’s T20 tournament.Chasing 172 at a tough asking rate of 8.6 an over for their seventh win of the campaign, Kent openers Zak Crawley and Daniel Bell-Drummond smashed 19 off Jordan Clark’s third over.Clark’s misery was compounded when he dropped Bell-Drummond off a skier at cover in the next over from Jade Dernbach as Kent’s openers posted 50 in five overs.Crawley raced to his maiden T20 fifty with two fours and three sixes as the Spitfires pair posted their century stand in 9.5 overs as Kent swept 26 runs ahead of Surrey’s midpoint score.Bell-Drummond reached his 19th career T20 half-century from 32 balls and with seven fours but their stand was finally broken for 115 when Mohammad Tahir had Crawley stumped for 59.With 18 required from 12 balls, Bell-Drummond went for 64 when his sliced drive against Dernbach flew to backward point to heap pressure on Alex Blake and Heino Kuhn.Blake upper-cut his third ball to deep point leaving Sam Billings and Kuhn to score 12 off the last over from Sam Curran, but it was Curran who held his nerve by conceding nine off the bat to give Surrey a surprise fourth Vitality Blast win.After a forceful start, Surrey stumbled mid-innings when Kent took pace off the ball, then plundered quick runs at the death through a barrage of Will Jacks sixes on their way to posting 171 for 7.Aaron Finch, who hit 83 here last July at a strike rate of 218.42 – only for the match to be abandoned to rain – clattered 18 off the second over of the night from Kent T20 debutant Matt Milnes but, with 25 to his name, miscued a Fred Klaassen slower ball back to the bowler.Surrey reached 49 for 1 by the end of the Powerplay, after which Spitfires brought on first-team debutant Marcus O’Riordan, a 21-year-old off-spinner whose excellent opening over cost only five runs.Kent turned to spin at both ends with the introduction of left-arm spinner Imran Qayyum who had Curran caught at cow corner with his second ball.Surrey lost further impetus when Bell-Drummond yorked Mark Stoneman, Qayyum squeezed one between the bat and pad to bowl Ben Foakes and then had Ollie Pope stumped by Ollie Robinson as Surrey raised their 100 in the 15th over.Qayyum finished his four overs with 3 for 22, after which Hardus Viljoen returned to pluck out middle stump via a bottom edge as Clark aimed to cut.Jacks clattered eight sixes late in the piece on his way to 63 off 27 balls before biffing Klaassen’s last ball of the innings into the hands of long off, even so, Surrey’s total appeared a little below par.

England right-hander comes in as a replacement overseas player after Amy Satterthwaite was ruled out of the tournament

Alex Malcolm09-Sep-2019The Melbourne Renegades have signed England opener Tammy Beaumont as their replacement for absent skipper Amy Satterthwaite ahead of the new Women’s Big Bash League season starting in October.Beaumont played for the Adelaide Strikers in second and third seasons of the WBBL but did not play the last one. She was named in Wisden’s Five Cricketers of the Year for 2019 and produced her sixth ODI century during the recent Ashes series in England.Beaumont, 28, joins England team-mate Danielle Wyatt and New Zealand’s Lea Tahuhu as the overseas players at the Renegades after Satterthwaite was ruled out of the tournament after recently announcing she was pregnant.”I’m thrilled to be heading back to the Big Bash,” Beaumont said. “I’ve played against a lot of the talent in the Renegades line-up so it’ll be nice to be playing alongside them this time. The Renegades are a side on the rise and the Big Bash is such a tough competition so I’m looking forward to testing myself against some of the best players in the world.”

Former Australia seamer commits to Hove until end of 2022 season

ESPNcricinfo staff09-Oct-2019Jason Gillespie will remain as Sussex head coach at least until the end of the 2022 season, after agreeing a contract extension.Gillespie, who won the County Championship with Yorkshire in consecutive seasons in 2014 and 2015, moved to Hove at the start of the 2018 season but has so far been unable to oversee the side’s return to Division One.However, Sussex have enjoyed more success in one-day cricket, reaching the knockout stages of the Vitality Blast in both of his seasons in charge, including to the final in 2018.His stature as a coach, including his links to the BBL franchise Adelaide Strikers, has also been helpful in attracting a high calibre of overseas players, including Alex Carey, Mir Hamza, Travis Head, Rashid Khan and Ishant Sharma.”I’m absolutely delighted to extend my time at Sussex,” said Gillespie. “I absolutely love the place and everyone at the club has been fantastic since I joined.”I really feel we’re moving in the right direction, which is really pleasing. I can’t fault the efforts of all our players and coaches. We’re all on the same page; everyone wants what’s best for the club, and I feel we’re progressing in reaching those aims.”We’ve had some really good times together, and we’ve had some challenging times, but we’re all clear about what we’re setting out to achieve and focussed on improving and developing to keep us moving forward.”That’s a pretty special thing to be part of. I want to thank the club for the opportunity to carry on being part of that and for showing faith in me. I’m determined to repay that faith by keeping things moving in the right direction and hopefully having some success down the track.”Rob Andrew, Sussex Cricket’s chief executive added: “We are delighted to announce that Dizzy [Gillespie] has extended his contract through to 2022. There is going to be a lot of change in cricket over the next couple of years and we wanted some continuity through this period.”We still have a lot of work to do to improve the men’s side and we were disappointed not to achieve promotion to division one of the County Championship this season. It is where the club aspires to be.”We have been more consistent in our performances in T20 and 50-over cricket in the last couple of years but need to find that consistency in Championship cricket as well. Dizzy and his coaching team will be working hard to move the club forward and we are delighted he has chosen to help us on this journey.”Meanwhile, Reece Topley has left Sussex after turning down a “long-term contract offer” and deciding “that his future lies elsewhere”, the club said in a statement on their website.Topley, who played 10 ODIs and six T20Is for England between 2015 and 2016, joined Sussex after leaving Hampshire in 2018 following back surgery.”As a free agent and following back surgery, the 25-year-old was helped back to fitness by Sussex’s medical and coaching staff earlier this year before joining the county for the remainder of the 2019 season in July,” the statement said.”Sussex Cricket is disappointed not to have been able to convince Reece to re-sign for the club. Nevertheless, we would like to thank him for his contributions to the team during the season and to wish him well at his new club.”

Karnataka, Baroda, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Mumbai, Haryana have qualified for the Super League; four more teams will join them

Saurabh Somani17-Nov-2019The closing stages of the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy’s league phase have been enlivened by a tight race for the Super League and two prominent names making a comeback, Prithvi Shaw and Bhuvneshwar Kumar. Sunday was to be the last day of the league stage for all five groups, but reschedules have meant there will be seven matches from Groups C, D and E played on Monday. The top two teams from each group will qualify for the Super League, to be followed by semi-finals and the final.Shaw smacks half-century on comeback
Having served out his eight-month ban for consuming a banned substance, Shaw returned to action for Mumbai in the familiar environs of the Wankhede Stadium with 63 off 39 balls at the top of the order in a Group D match.Assam had to bear the brunt of a Mumbai side smarting from a shock defeat against Meghalaya in their last match. Mumbai piled up 206 for 5 after being asked to bat, while Assam could muster only 123 for 8.But while Aditya Tare, Shaw’s opening partner, was the game’s top-scorer, smashing 82 off 48, Shaw was the cynosure. It was his first knock at a representative level since the IPL Qualifier for Delhi Capitals against Chennai Super Kings on May 10.He came through the test well, though Assam’s bowling didn’t pose the greatest challenge, hitting six fours and three sixes in his knock. Shaw will now need to build on a successful start to his comeback to challenge for a spot in the Indian team again. In his absence, Rohit Sharma and Mayank Agarwal have established themselves as unquestionably the first-choice openers in the Test team.Bhuvneshwar Kumar in his delivery follow-through•AFP

Bhuvneshwar makes a solid comeback
Injuries, and team dynamics, have meant Bhuvneshwar has slipped from being a three-format India player to one who is looked at primarily for limited-overs cricket. Even with the white ball, Deepak Chahar’s emergence as a swing bowler of considerable skill has meant Bhuvneshwar’s absence hasn’t quite been an unfillable void.Before the T20I series against Bangladesh, chief selector MSK Prasad had said, “Bhuvneshwar Kumar might come in the next series.”Bhuvneshwar took some strides towards an international comeback, making a steady if understated return to competitive cricket. He played his second match in three days for Uttar Pradesh, in Group B. His comeback game was against Manipur on November 15 in Thumba, where he took none for 13 in three overs. Against Kerala in Thiruvananthapuram on Sunday, he bowled his full quota of four overs and took 1 for 23.Kerala made 119 for 8 in 20 overs, before Uttar Pradesh, set a revised target of 44 in seven overs, ended on 42 for 4, losing by one run. That result had significant ramifications for who ended up qualifying.Karnataka, Baroda, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Mumbai, Haryana qualify
Karnataka, Baroda, Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan have already qualified for the Super League, with Groups A and B having completed all their matches.Some matches remain in Group D, but Mumbai and Haryana have qualified from that group. Mumbai are on an impregnable 24 points. Haryana have 20, with a match against Meghalaya left. Even if they lose, there is no other team on 20 points. Puducherry are on 16 and can equal Haryana on points if they beat Madhya Pradesh, but Haryana had won their head-to-head match against Puducherry.Both Karnataka and Baroda finished on 20 points in Group A, having five wins and one defeat each, and sailed through comfortably. The going was tighter in Group B. Tamil Nadu were the group leaders with 20 points, but Rajasthan, Vidarbha and Kerala all finished on 16 points each. They had all beaten each other once, which meant Rajasthan, with a net run-rate of 1.938, qualified ahead of Vidarbha (0.566) and Kerala (0.503).Two rain-affected matches that were decided by a margin of just one run played a part in deciding the Group B table. Vidarbha had beaten Rajasthan by a single run on November 12 despite Chahar’s heroics, and, on Sunday, Kerala beat Uttar Pradesh by the same margin. If Kerala hadn’t won, there wouldn’t have been a three-way tie and in that case, Vidarbha would have gone through by virtue of having won their head-to-head game against Rajasthan.Meanwhile, Rajasthan did all they could to qualify, destroying Tripura in a nine-wicket win. They first restricted Tripura to just 69 for 7 in 16 overs, and then smashed their way to 74 for 1 in five overs, ensuring their net run-rate would be high enough to take them through in case of a three-way tie – which is exactly what happened.Group C currently has out of eight teams on 16 points each, making the race very right. Two Group C games are still remaining. The winner of Maharashtra v Punjab will straightaway qualify, since they are two of the teams on 16 points. Railways, also on 16, will join in if they can beat Himachal Pradesh in the other game. Himachal have only eight points, though, so if they win, it could leave five teams on 16. Punjab have a net run-rate superior to all others, so if they lose to Maharashtra, they’ll still be in position to qualify – should Railways lose. The team with the second-highest net run-rate right now is an unlikely one: Chandigarh. It will be quite a story if they qualify.Jharkhand are on top of Group E, but both Delhi and Jammu & Kashmir are close behind, and the latter two have matches in hand. The next two teams are Gujarat and Odisha, who will also be in action on the final day, which makes Group E’s scenario uncertain till the end.

The 16-year-old speedster is likely to be released from the senior team set-up

Umar Farooq03-Dec-2019Naseem Shah, the 16-year-old Pakistan fast bowler who made heads turn during the recent senior-team tour of Australia, is expected to return to the national Under-19 ranks and link up with the rest of the squad as they prepare for the Under-19 World Cup early next year in South Africa.”He is my main weapon and I need him there at the World Cup,” Ijaz Ahmed, the head coach of the Pakistan Under-19 team, told ESPNcricinfo. “He now has a taste of international cricket and now, at the home [Test] series against Sri Lanka, we are mainly banking on spinners. Pakistan have [Mohammad] Abbas and Shaheen [Afridi] to lead the fast-bowling attack according to the conditions.”I feel he [Shah] for now should only be used in conditions like in New Zealand, England, etc, when needed. For now, we have a very important event coming up in South Africa and he is very handy for me and I will ask Misbah [ul-Haq, the chief coach and selector] to release him.”Shah was named in the original World Cup squad, and ESPNcricinfo understands that he will be released to prepare and take part in the tournament.Shah, who has just seven first-class matches under his belt, made an impact during Pakistan’s two-Test series in Australia. He had been all the talk even before he landed in Australia, with footage of his exploits in a short domestic career going viral. He didn’t bowl in the first innings of the Pakistanis’ tour game against Australia A following the death of his mother, but impressed during an eight-over burst in the second innings, bowling with pace and picking up the wicket of Marcus Harris.He made his Test debut in the first game, in Brisbane, and sent back David Warner with a brute of a short ball that the batsman, then on 154, could only edge through to the wicketkeeper. Shah had found Warner’s edge earlier too, but was denied the wicket as he had overstepped. He was dropped for the second Test, in Adelaide.