Afghanistan were facing defeat against Nawshera at stumps onthe opening day of the two-day Quaid-i-Azam Trophy Grade-IImatch at Peshawar’s Arbab Niaz Stadium. Put into bat,Afghanistan were dismissed for 125 in 31.4 overs. Nawsherareplied with 224 for nine declared which left the debutantsto face nine overs for the day in which Afghanistan lostboth the openers to finish with 20 for two.They still require 79 runs to avoid follow on. Afghanistancricketers, according to information, attracted a largenumber of foreign media covering US-led air raids on thecountry in response to Sept 11 terrorist attacks on New Yorkand Washington.However, eye-witnesses said the day’s proceedings went onuntroubled. “In fact, it was a very peaceful day. There werearound 250 spectators and just four policemen. Though therewere no fences to stop spectators enter the field, they(spectators) glued to their seats and only appreciated if awicket fell or a boundary was struck,” eye-witnesses said.Afghanistan skipper Allah Dad Noori was not a media-shyperson when he answered the queries of the scribes indetail. “We are here to prove that we are not terrorists butpeace loving people. The international reputation we aregetting is incorrect,” he told reporters. However, themedium-pace bowler and middle-order batsman expressed hissurprise over New Zealand Cricket (NZC) and Board of Controlfor Cricket in Sri Lanka (BCCSL) decision to cancel the tourto Pakistan.”Their decision amazes me. Our country is being bombardedbut we are here playing cricket. There is no security threateven in Peshawar which is kilometres from Kabul border,” hesaid. However, when inquired how may of its players crossedthe border for the match, Noori said: “None. We all arerefugees and migrated to Peshawar during the time Russiainvaded Afghanistan in the 1980s.”Noori said his team assembled on Oct 5 at Peshawar and sincethen had been training at the Academy ground. Reverting tothe day’s play, in Afghanistan’s 125 in 31.4 overs, Nauroztop scored with 32 that included four boundaries. Abid Gul(26), Shafi-ur-Rehman (18 not out) were the other notablerun-getters.For Nawshera, Gohar Ali picked three wickets for 29 runs,Imran Durrani two for 39 and Rizwan 2-16. When Nawsherabatted, they declared at 224 for nine after being 212 forsix at one stage. Naveed Khan was the main scorer with 69that included nine boundaries. Akbar Khan struck seven foursin his 54 while Mohammad Asif (39) and Azam Khan (20) werethe other contributors.Afghanistan’s left-arm spinner Rahmat Wali was the pick ofbowlers with four for 22. Off-spinner Mohammad Alam (threefor 46), Abdullah (one for 46) and Allah Dad Noori (one for64) were the other wicket-takers.

Paula Flannery has won the job of captaining the Canterbury women’s team this season.The CLEAR White Fern from last year’s CricInfo Women’s World Cup victory has been named as the result of last season’s captain Lisa Astle being unavailable.Flannery brings a wealth of experience to the captaincy role for the State Canterbury Magicians. Her tenacious approach, and determination to dominate resulted in her selection in the CLEAR White Ferns.Flannery is the youngest of six children and comes from a strong Central Otago sporting family. Before turning her hand to cricket she played both softball and hockey. In hockey she represented Canterbury in 1994 and 1997 and New Zealand Under-21 in 1994.Backyard cricket with her brothers instilled in her a passion for the game.She has been a consistent performer in the strong Canterbury women’s side since being selected in 1995/96. She has dominated club cricket batting over a number of seasons with the Lancaster Park-Woolston Club.Selected for New Zealand A in 2000, her performances caught the eye of the selectors who then selected her in the CLEAR White Ferns team, which was victorious in winning the prestigious World Cup.She was selected for the White Ferns Tour to India, which was subsequently cancelled. Flannery is delighted with the appointment and expressed an acknowledgement of the thanks to her employer A J Day Opinion Trust for all the support they have given allowing her to achieve her cricket goals.The State Canterbury Magicians squad is as follows: Paula Flannery (captain), Haidee Tiffen (vice-captain), Nicola Payne, Fiona Fraser, Emily Travers, Sarah Burke, Hannah Rae, Helen Daly, Beth McNeill, Kirsty Craig, Vanessa Lord, Jo Strachan, Maria Fahey, Selena Charteris, Delwyn Brownlee, Rebecca Steele, Jane Maley. Coach: Vicki Burtt, manager: Kay Gilray.

Take 28 wickets in one game caught between wicket-keeper and point and what have you got?Some pretty serious deficiencies in batting techniques, application and concentration, that’s what.Some very good bowling also comes into the equation. But it is difficult to believe that Blenheim’s Horton Park pitch was full of more demons than your average spooky movie.Central Districts won’t mind that, they won the State Championship game with Northern Districts by 78 runs in little over two and a half days.They finished their own second innings with 157 after adding another 10 runs this morning.That left ND a target of 179 runs to win with nearly two days to do it.But the omens were not good. No-one had managed to dig in and dominate in this game where the top score by an individual batsman was 44 by CD No 10 Michael Mason in the second innings.James Marshall was out in the first over of ND’s chase for a duck. Matthew Hart and Mark Bailey put on 33 for the second wicket, but once Hart was out for 8, the best partnership ND could muster was 21 for the ninth wicket. They were all out for 100.No-one was prepared to publicly blame the pitch. They did admit the quality of the bowling had been good, and there was a general feeling that the batsmen will have their revenge on drier more batsman friendly wickets after Christmas.But what had to be of concern were the defiencies of approach of the batsmen. No-one really seemed prepared to dig in for the challenge, to tire out the bowlers, and then to punish them as they lost their control.Whether that might have worked is difficult to know because if one batsman had dominated there is no saying how quickly he would have run out of partners.Ben Smith, the CD captain, said the experience his side had in Auckland last week when they were on the receiving end of a similar type of loss as ND suffered in this game, had helped CD’s approach.”Our bowlers were exceptional with the ball, they kept the ball in good areas.”There was a lot of assistance in sideways movement and we thought from the start of the game that the team that bowled the best would win,” he said.”Two wags of the tail also helped,” he added.From 128/7 in the first innings, CD’s tail lifted them to 181, then in the second innings the side went from 91/8, to 157.Smith said from his own point of view he was disappointed not to contribute to the win with the bat, but he had been given a great opportunity to lead the side and was delighted to have the chance.The CD top order were all looking and feeling good at the crease and while their confidence was low, they didn’t feel out of sorts, he said.While David Kelly was on top of the Championship run scoring aggregate, it was likely Mason was second.”You’ll have to check that,” he said.But he was right.”We have to have three or four batsmen score 600-700 runs because with bowlers like we have we can be there at the end. Our destiny is in our own hands,” he said.Robbie Hart admitted ND had been undone by “some very good bowling.””They made the most of the conditions, and they used them really well. They bowled with a lot of skill and patience, especially Andrew Schwass and Mason.”But in seven and a half sessions we lost 40 wickets in the game,” he said.Hart said ND did have the advantage, especially when Scott Styris and Hamish Marshall were batting during their match-high partnership of 60 in the first innings, but they had failed to use it.The CD second innings last wicket partnership between Mason and Hamilton had also been crucial.”They take their four seamers into games, they are all specialists, who are prepared to do the hard work.”And that was what this game was all about, doing the hard work, and CD’s bowlers certainly did that.

The Rest Elevens of all the four provinces were announced atthe conclusion of the two-daytrials held Sunday and Mondayin different cities.The selected teams will take part in the Quaid-i-Azam TrophyGrade-I National Cricket Championship, starting Jan 2.The PCB is setting up training camps for all thefour teamsfrom Dec 27 to 31 according to the following schedule:For Sindh Rest XI at PCB Academy Ground, Karachi.For Balochistan XI at National Stadium, Karachi.For NWFP Rest XI at the Arbab Niaz Stadium, Peshawar.For Punjab Rest XI at PCB Academy Ground near GaddafiStadium, Lahore.The squads announced by the PCB CricketManagementCommittee are:Restof Punjab XI: Saeed Anwar Jr (Multan), KashifNaveed (Sahiwal), Asad Ali (Vehari), Hasnain Abbas(Khanewal), Sufian Munir (Gujranwala), Aamir Bashir(Multan), Mohammad Ali Niazi (Multan), Mubashir Ishaq(Khanewal), Ishtiaq Qadir (Khanewal),Zeeshan Khan (Multan),Kamran Ali (Multan), Shabbir Ahmed (Khanewal),Farhan AhmedAbbasi (Multan), Abdur Rauf (Okara), Samiullah Khan(Mianwali), Mir Usman (Azad Jammu and Kashmir), Azhar Abbas(Khanewal), Owais Anwar (Khanewal), Mohammad Ali (Gujrat),Mohammad Fazil (Multan), Zulfiqar Babar (Okara), Wasim Majid(Vehari).Test leg-spinner Mushtaq Ahmed and Rizwan Ahmed are includedas guest players.Rest of Sindh XI: Shahid Qambrani (Dadu), AkhtarBangash (Dadu), Naveen Kumar (Jacobabad), Adnan Ameer(Thatta), Feroze (Thatta), Hanif-ur-Rehman (Nawabshah),Nasrullah Memon (Shikarpur), Kamaluddin (Sukkur), Ali Nawaz(Larkana), Niaz Ahmed (Badin), Javed Liaquat (Dadu), ShahidHussain (Nawabshah), Mohammad Siddiq (Larkana), Abdur Rahim(Larkana), AbidAli (Nawabshah), Nasim (Mirpurkhas), KashifPervez (Mirpurkhas), Kashif Ali (Dadu), Razaullah (Sukkur),Khalid Hussain (Shikarpur), Rizwan Qureshi (Thatta).Restof NWFP XI: Adnan Raees, Imran Husain,AhmadSaid,Sajid Shah, Noor-ul-Amin, Yasir Shah (all from Mardan),Asghar Ali (Dera Ismail Khan), Mohammad Bilal (Bannu), MajidAli (Haripur), Umair Khan (Haripur), Akbar Badshah, NaveedKhan, Mohammad Asif, Imran Durrani, Gohar Ali (all fromNowshera), M. Ibrahim, Mohammad Shafiq, Shakeel-ur-Rehman,Riaz Afridi, Imran Khan, Haji Badshah, MohammadAslam (allfrom FATA), Mohammad Saeed (Abbotabad), Rashid Mansoor(Kohat).Balochistan XI: Aqil Baloch (Quetta), Ali Ahmed(Quetta), Sabir Hussain (Quetta), Jehanzeb (Kalat),Azizullah (Pishin), Naseem Khan (Quetta)), Mohtashim Ali(Quetta), Sadiq Shah (Quetta), Manzoor Ahmed (Quetta),AbdulHameed (Kalat), Patris Masih (Sibi), Abdul Wajid(Sibi), Mohtashim Rasheed (Sibi),Mohammad Asif (Sibi),Faisal Irfan (Quetta), Mohammad Khan (Quetta), Arun Lal(Quetta), Anwar Ali (Quetta), Ibrahim Aslam (Loralai),Sanaullah (Quetta), Hameedullah (Pishin), Naseebullah(Pishin), Naseer Khan (Quetta), Mian Nafees (Sibi).

Hampshire CCC plan to break with tradition once again – by wearing football-style shirts in the County Championship this summer.Chairman Rod Bransgrove unveiled the plans at yesterday’s historic Annual General Meeting – the first AGM since the club was transformed from a members’ club into a limited company.Then he told the 300-strong attendance of plans to ensure that Robin Smith’s men wear names and numbers on their backs in Hampshire’s first season back in Division One of the CricInfo County Championship.Last summer, Lancashire CCC took the unprecedented step of sticking names and squad numbers on their championship shirts as well as their one day tops.And Bransgrove believes that that is the way forward as Hampshire prepare for their second season at the Rose Bowl, which will have a capacity of 10,000 as well as a new pavilion this summer.He said: “The feedback suggests it’s difficult to see who’s fielding the ball or who’s taking catches without the aid of names or numbers, so I think it will be to the benefit of the game as a whole and certainly to the benefit of the spectators.”It will be our intention to have names and numbers on the shirts as long as we can do it in a costeffective manner.”The ECB are more than happy for other first class counties to adopt the shirts in the four day game.And Lancashire chief executive Jim Cumbes has confirmed that the venture was a success at Old Trafford last year.”We received a very positive reaction when we pioneered the idea with fleece style shirts,” he said. “Apparently we had numbers pinned to players’ shirts for one season in the 1950s which was very popular with fans. It’s strange that it’s taken more than 40 years to come back.”Vic Isaacs, Hampshire’s scorer for 28 years, added: “It would certainly make my job easier.”Recognising players has always been a problem since helmets came in and numbered shirts improved the game from the spectators’ point of view in the Sunday League.”

England batsman Michael Vaughan, the star performer in the side’s 33-run win over New Zealand in the National Bank Series in Auckland on Saturday will be struggling to be fit by the time of the first Test at Christchurch starting on March 13.Vaughan fell heavily on his shoulder in the fourth One-Day International in Auckland on Saturday night and was forced to leave the field.Vaughan had an x-ray in Dunedin yesterday and while it revealed no serious damage, he will be out of action for 10 days. He suffered a partial dislocation and the hope in the England camp was that he would be available for the first Test match.That rules him out of tomorrow’s series-deciding One-Day International against New Zealand in Dunedin.He will definitely miss the first three-day game of the tour against Otago starting in Queenstown on Saturday and possibly the second game, against Canterbury in Christchurch, starting on March 7.

Bing Crosby might have been dreaming of a white Christmas, but Steve Waugh was still dreaming of a whitewash after the first day’s play in the fourth Ashes Test at the MCG. Waugh won the toss and then sat back as Matthew Hayden and Justin Langer each compiled hundreds and, in the process, broke a 95 year-old record. By the close, Australia had reached 356 for three with Langer unbeaten on 146 and Waugh relieving pressure on his own place in the side with an innings of 62 not out.Australia, already three-nil up in the series, made two changes from the last Test in Perth. Leg-spinner Stuart MacGill replaced the injured Shane Warne, while Martin Love made his Test debut at the expense of Darren Lehmann who was unable to shake off his leg infection. With Alec Stewart failing to recover from his bruised hand, James Foster was included to keep wicket for England with resulting changes to the composition of the rest of the side. They opted to play an extra batsman with John Crawley returning in place of Alex Tudor while Andrew Caddick was recalled for Chris Silverwood.This left England’s attack looking thin, with only four recognised bowlers in Caddick, Steve Harmison, Craig White and off-spinner Richard Dawson. The same paucity could not be detected in the Australian batting line-up as Hayden and Langer made full use of a pitch promising plenty of runs when Waugh won the toss.Hayden has been in unstoppable form during the series, but he did offer the odd moment of hope to England’s bowlers who far from disgraced themselves during the morning session. In the first over he hooked Caddick just over Harmison’s head at long leg for a boundary and another opportunity went begging when Crawley failed to sight the ball at deep backward square leg and it bounced in just front of him before going over the rope.The Queenslander, averaging 94 in the first three Tests, was also inconvenienced in the ninth over of the morning when struck a blow on the knee by Caddick. However, he took only a short time to recover before going on to pass the milestone of 3,000 Test runs including 400 in the current series. He also survived a convincing shout for lbw when Dawson was introduced into the attack for a single over just before lunch.The score had reached 88 without loss at the interval before the Australian batsmen cut loose in the afternoon session, adding a further 147 runs. Hayden and Langer, drawing inspiration from one another, broke the ground record of 126 for an opening partnership in Australia-England Tests established in 1907/08 by Monty Noble and Victor Trumper.When Hayden went to his hundred off 138 balls with a somewhat fortunate shot to the fine leg boundary, it was his third in the series and twelfth in Tests. He acknowledged the applause of a crowd in excess of 64,000 but perished 11 balls later when he was caught at mid-off by Crawley off the bowling of Caddick.Langer’s hundred came up in three balls less than Hayden’s as he took a six and a four off consecutive balls from Dawson. Not for him the nervous nineties as the man who has been forced to play second fiddle to his opening partner emerged in his own right. He displayed his composure when three wickets fell in relatively quick succession at the other end.After he had lost his opening partner, Langer watched as Ricky Ponting chopped a ball from White onto his stumps and then, ten overs later, saw Damien Martyn edge a ball from the same bowler low to first slip where Marcus Trescothick held on to a good catch. That reduced Australia to 265 for three and there was a glimmer of hope for England.That was extinguished by Langer and a defiant innings from Waugh. There has been much speculation that the Australian captain’s international career is drawing to a close, but he obviously has other ideas. He did survive an awkward moment when it seemed that he had edged the sixth delivery with the new ball from Caddick low to Butcher at slip, but the third umpire ended lengthy deliberation in Waugh’s favour.His fifty came from only 49 balls and now he will want to at least double that personal tally before leading Australia to an unassailable first innings total. He and they are well on the way and England’s depleted attack will not be looking forward to trying to stop them with any confidence.

Rob Nicol’s Auckland team-mates have a variety of nicknames for their 18-year-old colt, but after his tenacious display on the second day of the State Championship match against Otago at Colin Maiden Park today they should strike a new one – “Mr Valuable.”Two matches ago Nicol and his young team-mate Reece Young staged a late first innings rally of 153 runs which took Auckland to a first innings lead and eventually outright victory against Canterbury.Today Mark Richardson gave Auckland a flying start with a neat 100 in pursuit of the modest Otago first innings total of 241, but a middle-order collapse had Auckland sliding to 178/6, and with the tight-fisted Otago bowlers slowly stealing the initiative.Four hours later Nicol strode from the field in triumph. His first first-class century with 106 not out. A 110-run seventh-wicket stand with Brooke Walker (27) had rescued Auckland from disaster and took them to 309/8 – a handy 68-run stand for the Championship leaders and a new and promising hero in the Auckland camp.Chris Drum, the senior Auckland bowler, afterward spoke of the warm admiration the old sweats of the Auckland side have for their young team-mate.”Rob is a tremendous young fellow, so keen to learn,” said Drum. “He sits quietly in the dressing room, he does not have a lot to say but you can see he is absorbing all he can find out about cricket – he is a great listener.”Funnily enough,” said Drum, “Rob seems to attract nicknames. One of them is ‘Mr Key’, because as a chap who bats, bowls, fields and has tremendous enthusiasm he is really a key man.”Another is ‘Tom’ because the lads reckon he looks like Tom Moody, the Australian, when he bowls.””All the lads like Rob, and epsecially the hard-working bowlers like myself. When he is batting so long and so well, we can sit for longer with our feet up.”When the talk is about hard-working and hot bowlers, then Otago had several at the head of the queue.There was little assistance in the sun-dried pitch for the Otago seamers, David Sewell, James McMillan and Craig Pryor, but they toiled manfully and for a time seemed to have Auckland on the rack.Nathan Morland and Rob Smith, the spinners, worked just as hard – Morland usually with the advantage of bowling into some rough at the eastern end of the pitch. Morland finished with two for 64 from 31 overs, 26 of them in succession, while Smith tried hard without much luck.Pryor finished with the fine figures of four wickets for 65 on a ground where his famous father, the late Alby Pryor, used to loll beneath the boundary trees watching his young son carving his early career in Auckland.Alby’s ghost would have smiled as he watched Pryor defeat the odds offered by an amiable pitch and dismiss Matt Horne (0), Aaron Barnes (five) and Llorne Howell (0) – all of them caught by the wicket-keeper Martyn Croy – in a brilliant spell before lunch.Richardson escaped that noose and worked away sensibly and steadily as he worked himself into the steady, accurate style needed for the test matches just around the corner.Neither Richardson, Nicol nor Walker who scored 27 (in 191 minutes) smashed the cover from the ball.Richardson was there for just under four hours, faced 188 balls and hit 17 fours. Nicol has already batted five hours for his 106 not out, and Walker hit only three fours from the 144 balls he faced.But it said much for the classical style of Richardson, the surprising maturity of the 18-year-old Nicol, and the magnificent stamina and spirit of the Otago bowlers that ther game was often absorbing and seldom dull.

The second phase of the Quaid-i-Azam Trophy National Cricket Championship will now commence from Wednesday (Jan 22) instead of Monday (Jan 20) with the eight pre-quarterfinals matches starting at various centres.Likewise, the quarterfinals will now be played from Jan 28, instead of Jan 26, according to Cricket Management Committee (CMC) which met at Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore on Friday evening with its chairman Iqbal Qasim presiding.The dates of semifinals and the final have also been changed. Now the semifinals will take place from Feb 3 with Feb 5 being declared rest day because of Kashmir Day. Originally, the semifinals were scheduled to commence from Feb 1.The five-day final will be played from Feb 17 at Gaddafi Stadium. Previously it was slated to begin from Feb 6.CMC, in a sensible move, has also made widespread alterations in the original list of venues to avoid incomplete matches owing to fog which virtually played havoc with preliminary round ties in Punjab.For example, now the Group-I winners will face the Group-II runners-up in the round of last 16 at National Stadium, Karachi instead of Gaddafi Stadium. In all, five matches of the knock-out stage will be played at different venues than previously announced centres.The first four teams of each of the four groups have qualified for the last 16 round.The schedule of matches is as follows:Pre-quarterfinals (Jan 22-25):Match 1: National Bank v Habib Bank at National Stadium, Karachi (Umpires: Salim Badar and Athar Zaidi. Match referee: Mahmood Rasheed).Match 2: Pakistan Customs v Wapda at KRL Stadium, Rawalpindi (Umpires: Aleem Dar and Nadeem Ghauri. Match referee: Khateeb Rizwan).Match 3: Allied Bank v KRL at UBL Sports Complex, Karachi (Umpires: Shakeel Khan and Riazuddin. Match referee: Munawwar Agha).Match 4: PIA v Bahawalpur at Pindi Cricket Stadium, Rawalpindi (Umpires: Mohammad Nazir Junior and Mian Aslam. Match referee: Khalid Niazi).Match 5: Faisalabad v Sialkot at Bahawalpur Stadium, Bahawalpur (Umpires: Siddique Khan and Rasheed Bhatti. Match referee: Saadat Ali).Match 6: Lahore Whites v Sargodha at Arbab Niaz Stadium, Peshawar (Zafar Iqbal Pasha and Ehtesham-ul-Haq. Match referee: Ishtiaq Ahmed).Match 7: Pak PWD v ZTBL at Aga Khan Gymkhana Ground, Karachi (Umpires: Afzaal Ahmed and Islam Khan. Match referee: Sadiq Mohammad).Match 8: Rawalpindi v Multan at Multan Cricket Stadium, Multan (Umpires: Asad Rauf and Zamir Haider. Match referee: Pervez Akhtar).Quarterfinals (Jan 28-31):First match: Winners of Match 1 v Winners of Match 3 at National Stadium, Karachi (Umpires: Islam Khan and Athar Zaidi. Match referee: Ilyas Khan).Second match: Winners of Match 2 v Winners of Match 4 at Pindi Cricket Stadium, Rawalpindi (Umpires: Iftikhar Malik and Rasheed Bhatti. Match referee: Abdul Sami Khan).Third match: Winners of Match 5 v Winners of Match 7 at UBL Sports Complex, Karachi (Umpires: Afzaal Ahmed and Riazuddin. Match referee: Fahimuddin Alvi).Fourth match: Winners of Match 6 v Winners of Match 8 at Arbab Niaz Stadium, Peshawar (Umpires: Siddique Khan and Iqbal Butt. Match referee: Farrukh Zaman).Semifinals (Feb 3-7):First semifinal: Winners of first match v Winners of third match at National Stadium, Karachi (Umpires: Salim Badar and Shakeel Khan. Match referee: Anwar Khan).Second semifinal: Winners of second match v Winners of fourth match at Mian Aslam and Athar Zaidi. Match referee: Azhar Khan).Final (Feb 17-21): At Gaddafi Stadium, Lahore (Umpires: Riazuddin and Asad Rauf. Match referee: Ehteshamuddin).Final Points Table(At the conclusion of the league phase.Tabulated under played, won, lost, drawn, points):Group-INational Bank 5 2 0 3 24Wapda 5 1 0 4 21Faisalabad 5 1 1 3 15Sargodha 5 1 1 3 15Servis Industries 5 0 2 3 3Lahore Blues 5 0 1 4 0Group-IIAllied Bank 5 4 0 1 51Bahawalpur 5 2 1 2 26Pak PWD 5 1 0 4 18Multan 5 1 2 2 12Karachi Whites 5 0 1 4 9Dadu 5 0 4 1 0Group-IIIPakistan Customs 5 1 0 4 18Habib Bank 5 1 0 4 12Lahore Whites 5 1 0 4 12Sialkot 5 0 1 4 6Sheikhupura 5 0 1 4 3Gujranwala 5 0 1 4 3Group-IVPIA 5 4 0 1 48KRL 5 3 0 2 42Rawalpindi 5 2 2 1 24ZTBL 5 1 2 2 15Karachi Blues 5 1 3 1 12Peshawar 5 0 4 1 3Note: Bahawalpur were docked one point for non-submission of captain’s report on umpires

SYDNEY, Feb 3 AAP – Steve Waugh today supported the suggestion one-day internationals could be played at Sydney’s major Olympic venue after unveiling the pitch for cricket’s first game at Telstra Stadium.Both NSW captain Waugh and Blues paceman Stuart Clark suggested the manufactured pitch would produce plenty of runs for the ING Cup clash with South Australia on Sunday week.Although a renowned cricketing traditionalist, Waugh had no objections to one-day internationals being played at Telstra Stadium rather than the SCG.He said one-day matches didn’t have the same tradition as Tests where the established venues were concerned and therefore couldn’t see any reason why they shouldn’t be moved to other grounds.”It’s a great venue, players want to play at the best possible venues and this looks fantastic,” Waugh said from the middle of Telstra Stadium today.”They want to play in front of big crowds, so if it fits the bill, then why not?” said Waugh, who watched Olympic events at the stadium in 2000.NSW Cricket Association chief executive officer and former Australian representative David Gilbert suggested it was common sense to play some one-day internationals because its capacity was almost twice of the SCG.However, the Australian Cricket Board is contracted to playing one-day internationals at the SCG for the next couple of seasons.Waugh said the dimensions of Telstra Stadium reminded him of Adelaide Oval and said he thought the Olympic arena would be “one of the great venues to play cricket”.The centre wicket developed by Strathayr Turf Systems weighs approximately 32 tonnes with the pitch containing the same Oberon Creek soil used in most Sydney pitches, including the SCG.”The pitch looks good. It’s nice and flat, that’s the main thing with one-day cricket,” Waugh said.”It’s obviously a while to go before the match, but I think if they roll it and get a bit of hardness, there should be plenty of runs there.”Waugh described the outfield as “fantastic” and said the first game at the venue would be “a great experience for all the players, it’s something we will never forget.”Already used to playing on drop-in pitches in international cricket, especially in Melbourne, Waugh had no reservations about such wickets and didn’t approach them any differently to standard strips.”In some ways you are almost guaranteed a good quality pitch because they are looked after and have been worked on for a long while and all they’ve got to do is drop it on, so there’s no problem at all from a playing point of view.”