All posts by csb10.top

Despite being up against India’s formidable batting line-up, England captain Kevin Pietersen expects Graeme Swann to put up a good performance in the first Test which starts on Thursday in Chennai. “It’s a decision we’ve come to because we think it will spin,” he said. “We think he’s the best and most attacking option.”We know the Indians are not bad players of spin. But no matter how good you are, you still have to play well on the day. He’ll be right at the Indian batsmen. Krejza did well here, and I think Swann’s better.”He was confident of the spinner performing well and said he deserved his debut. “He’s ecstatic. It’s a huge moment for anybody, to win that first Test cap. As a spinner, bowling in India is a huge challenge. But we’ve seen how Shaggy [Shaun] Udal bowled here on the last tour. When it’s your debut game, you’ll be buzzing for four or five days.”Pietersen believed England had picked their best XI, though Matt Prior’s inlcusion may have raised a few eyebrows. “I told the boys it was one of the most difficults decisions to make. It’s a healthy situation when you have the likes of Shah, Amjad and Adil Rashid to put pressure on the places.”We’ve also changed the keeper because we feel Matty Prior’s a better option with the bat. He’s also improved his keeping. I don’t think he lost confidence during the one-day series. It was pretty tough for everyone. He wasn’t the only one.”Pietersen said the mood within the team was quite upbeat and they were looking to make amends after the 5-0 thrashing in the one-day series. “We’re the underdogs, but it’s been a distracting time for both teams. The boys are so excited now about playing. We hopped on a plane in Abu Dhabi and came here because the boys love playing cricket in India. At the end of the day, we’re professional sportsmen, and when you step on the field, you turn on a little switch and play to your best.”He said while Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Yuvraj Singh were the players to watch out for, though he suggested England might have a plan for Yuvraj. “There’s lots of pressure on Yuvraj as well. It’ll be interesting to see how he plays the short ball.”

ScorecardKumar Sangakkara and Chamara Kapugedera highlighted the huge gulf in class on show in Bulawayo as they both struck centuries in a 287-run third-wicket stand with the Sri Lankans closing on 450 for 3, a lead of 291 over the Select XI.The opening day was one-way traffic and the visitors became even more dominant as they piled on the runs at more than four-an-over. The top four all passed fifty and Sangakkara led the way as he compiled 174 off 273 balls. Kapugedera wasn’t far behind, ending the day unbeaten on 117 after Sangakkara fell moments before the close.Play began half-an-hour early to make up for the lost time yesterday and the openers, Mahela Udawatte and Upul Tharanga, were quickly into their stride and scoring at a good rate. The pair brought up their half-centuries in similar style with eye-catching cover drives off pace bowler Shingi Masakadza.Prosper Utseya provided the first breakthrough in the 14th over of the day when he bowled Udawatte and then removed Tharanga 12 short of his century when Stuart Matsikenyeri held him at mid-off.The Select XI had to wait a long time for their next success as Sangakkara and Kapugedara remorselessly piled on the runs. Utseya and legspinner Graeme Cremer got through plenty of overs, but were largely easy pickings for the batsmen while the pace bowlers couldn’t keep the runs down either.One over before the close Elton Chigumbura finally removed Sangakkara, but there is plenty of batting to come.

After a couple of tough days in unforgiving conditions against relentless opponents, two of Australia’s most inexperienced players were left to explain the worsening situation. Nobody wants to talk when things go badly, but it is unfair to add more pressure to boys in their first weeks as Test players.At the end of the first, debutant Peter Siddle spoke after picking up Sachin Tendulkar’s wicket. It was a bright spot on a torrid opening day for a man who looks like he’s most comfortable mucking around with his mates. Good on him.On display on Saturday was Cameron White, Australia’s newest Test legspinner who picked up Sourav Ganguly with a skied catch to mid-off and bowled Harbhajan Singh. Two breakthroughs don’t usually earn a post-play appointment to dissect the day and in situations where nobody stands out, or doesn’t want to speak about a negative position, the coach Tim Nielsen arrives.Nielsen’s views are of particular interest at the moment. Is it a couple of bad days or something more severe? Is Matthew Hayden the same player of a year ago? Why are the bowlers straying so often? Why are they so unsuccessful against the lower order? And with Troy Cooley in the dressing room, why aren’t they getting more reverse-swing?Both Siddle and White are not yet qualified – or confident enough, or willing to risk the wrath of their new team-mates – to discuss in detail things other than the brilliance of being part of the team. Which is fine. To an Australian cricketer nothing is better than wearing the baggy green for the first time and enjoying the occasion, without having to be grilled about issues they can’t expand on.Australia’s bowling on the second day was generally wayward, apart from the superb Mitchell Johnson, and they again let India’s lower order escape. When Ishant Sharma was dismissed by Siddle in the fifth over the hosts were 326 for 6, but a flurry of short-pitched balls at Mahendra Singh Dhoni resulted in a burst of match-changing runs. Dhoni and Sourav Ganguly batted well against tactics that were slow to change.Johnson did not add to his first-day wicket haul, but his 3 for 85 was far better than the returns of Siddle, Lee or White. He is growing with each spell and it was confusing to see him not taking the new ball. His partner Lee, who needed two stitches in his hand following a fielding accident, has taken only three wickets for the series and is struggling for impact in his first series in India.

“The wickets are pretty flat,” White said. “Brett hasn’t played much cricket over the past little while. With bowling, Brett will definitely improve. Like Matt [Hayden], he’s a proven performer so it’s probably only a matter of time.”White’s bowling is improving, but he knows he is a contributor rather than someone who scares the Indians. Dhoni was the one doing the frightening on Saturday, belting four sixes, including two off White, and almost slicing off the bowler’s hand with a powerful straight drive.”I thought I did an okay job for the team, I guess,” White said. “My role is probably a bit different to some of the other spinners. And Ricky [Ponting] probably uses me a bit differently too.”The batting of Hayden is threatening to become a serious concern for Australia. In the country where he started his renaissance eight years ago he is looking unrecognisable. His legs seem heavy, particularly in the early overs when the ball is moving, and he is returning from a long recovery from a heel injury.Thirteen runs in three innings is an unfamiliar lean spell and over the next couple of weeks Hayden, who will be 37 on October 29, will know whether time is ticking too quickly. “There’s nothing wrong with him,” White said. “Opening the batting is a very difficult thing to do. He’s got a couple of good balls and I’m sure during the series he’ll fight back and get lots of runs.”Australia, who are 367 behind, need a big contribution from White on the third day after they slipped to 102 for 4 at stumps. White, the No. 7, will wait until he gets to the crease before forming his plan. “It’s always hard to start against spin or reverse-swing,” he said. “Mentally, any batter has to get their head around that. Starting or building an innings will be the hardest part.”He said the opening hour on the third day would be crucial. “The first session will dictate the rest of the game,” he said. “It’s a big first session. The ball is reverse-swinging and spinning, it’s going to be very tough.”

The MCC, the independent governor of cricket’s laws, has recommended the ICC overturn its awarding of a draw for the disputed England-Pakistan Test at The Oval in 2006. Originally the match was ruled the first forfeit in the game’s history, but the ICC changed the result at an executive board meeting in July.The MCC world cricket committee, which includes current India captain Anil Kumble and former Test leaders Rahul Dravid, Michael Atherton, Shaun Pollock and Steve Waugh, met on Saturday and Sunday in New Delhi and decided “cricket is the worse for this decision”.The committee chairman Tony Lewis wanted confirmation from the ICC that the original outcome of the match should stand. “The ICC has no power under the laws of cricket to decide that results should be altered, whether it feels it’s ‘inappropriate’ or otherwise,” the former England captain Lewis said. “The ICC’s decision is wrong and sets a very dangerous precedent. Cricket is the worse for this decision.”Majid Khan, the former Pakistan captain, said the committee’s decision was unanimous “simply because the rule states that you can’t overturn a decision”. “The result should stay as is,” he said. When asked what the reaction to the decision would be in Pakistan, Majid said “we’ll wait and see”.The controversy began after tea on the fourth day of the fourth Test when Inzamam-ul-Haq, the Pakistan captain, refused to lead his team back on to the field following Australia umpire Darrell Hair and West Indian Billy Doctrove enforcing a five-run penalty for ball tampering. It was a decision that initially gave England victory and resulted in a suspension for Hair, who was reinstated after an employment tribunal hearing in October 2007, following protests from Pakistan. Hair has since stood down from elite-level umpiring.Inzamam, who is now retired and playing in the unofficial Indian Cricket League, was fined for four games for bringing the game into disrepute. The team was cleared of the original ball-tampering allegations.”The board’s decision was based on the view that in light of the unique set of circumstances, the original result of the match was felt to be inappropriate,” the ICC said in a statement in July. The ruling meant England won the four-match series 2-0 instead of 3-0.”As far as we’re concerned there is no record of any other result [but a forfeit],” Lewis said. “We’re not reversing the ICC result, we’re just saying they had no place to do that. We, MCC, wrote the rules in 1788 and the laws working party now is run by Robert Griffiths QC. Legally, there is absolutely no way the ICC can change the laws of the game, which it did do.”The committee also supported the umpire review system that was used in the recent Sri Lanka-India Test series and agreed to work with the ICC in ensuring the primacy of Test cricket. It also vowed to complete further research into trialling pink balls in the hope they could be used in day-night Tests.An increased focus on fostering spin bowlers was also discussed along with a recommendation that umpires should not give the players the option to leave the field for bad light. MCC’s 18-man world cricket committee is charged with improving the game and its governance. As the sport’s law makers, the MCC has the power to alter the rules while using its influence to urge the ICC to change its position.

Zimbabwe Cricket has moved quickly to set up an independent committee to investigate claims that former captain Tatenda Taibu and the board’s finance general manager Esther Lupepe were involved in a public row last week.The argument, which took place at a Harare travel agent, is believed to have resulted from ZC declining to pay expenses claimed by Taibu from him taking his wife and son on the tour of Pakistan earlier in the year. He claims that ZC agreed to underwrite those costs but is now refusing to honour that commitment.The committee was convened by Wilfred Mukondiwa, managing director Ozias Bvute’s deputy. Bvute is currently abroad.A source close to the board said that Mukondiwa is known as a fair but strict disciplinarian. He added that the committee, which has yet to be named, needed to be open and transparent because Lupepe is believed to be related to other board members.It appears unlikely that Taibu will be left out of the squad for the tour of Canada and Kenya when it leaves for Toronto on Wednesday.

Steven Mangongo, the Zimbabwe Board XI coach, has stressed the need for more international four-day games for cricket to develop in the country. His charges lost both four-day games and all three one-day matches against the visiting Pakistan Cricket Academy (PCA) recently after squandering the advantage on several occasions during the series.”It shows the boys are not experienced. When you get into strong positions you need guys that are experienced to kill off the game,” he told Zimbabwe’s . “Our guys don’t play enough longer-version games. The remedy here is to play more international four-day games. You must have consistency. If you only get to play again after six months it’s like you are starting afresh. We must be careful not to kill the momentum.”Mangongo was satisfied that both first-class matches went into the final day. “It shows that the boys can apply themselves. In the second game, we scored 300 runs plus in two innings after being bowled for less than 200 in the first,” he said. “In fact, we saw quite a few 50s from guys like Bornaparte [Mujuru], Timycen [Maruma], Regis [Chakabva] and Friday [Kasteni]. So you definitely can see on the graph that the boys are learning the demands of Test cricket.”One major difference between the PCA matches and previous home series was that the Zimbabwe Board XI side wasn’t packed with national team members, giving second-string players a taste of international cricket. “For a country to do well, you need variety. In the past we used to have national team players also playing in the A and Board XI sides. This tour was a positive change because almost all the guys were development players.”The other positive that Mangongo drew from the series was the performance of the bowlers in the one-dayers. “In all three games, we took out the top batsmen. In terms of strike bowling the boys did well,” he said. “What was disappointing was the batting, but in the last match we got into good positions twice. So there was improvement.”

Gary Stead, the former New Zealand opening batsman, has replaced Steve Jenkin as coach of the national women’s team. Stead, also a coach at the New Zealand Cricket High Performance Centre, takes over eight months before the World Cup in Australia.”With the ICC Women’s World Cup and Twenty20 just around the corner we were looking for the best quality coach as well as continuity moving into these tournaments,” Justin Vaughan, New Zealand Cricket’s chief executive said. “Gary is an outstanding coach and has been assisting with the coaching of the side. He is a natural fit for the position. I am confident that he is the right person to take the team forward and deliver results.”Stead played five Tests for New Zealand in 1999 before retiring from first-class cricket seven years later. He joined the high performance centre in 2004 and coached the Canterbury women’s team in 2007-08, when they won the State League.Stead said he was looking forward to his new assignment, with the women’s World Twenty20 in England to follow in June, after the World Cup. “This team has a very exciting period of cricket ahead with World Cup and ICC World Twenty20 in the next 10 months,” Stead said. “My focus will be for the team to win both of these.”I want to encourage the White Ferns to play an exciting style of cricket. There are some enormously talented players in this country and I believe I can assist in their game and match awareness to take them forward.”

The MCC has heavily criticised the ICC’s decision to alter England’s win in the forfeited Test against Pakistan at The Oval in 2006 into a draw, and will lobby for another reversal.The MCC is the body responsible for the Laws of Cricket, and secretary Keith Bradshaw felt the decision contravened the spirit of the game and its Laws. It is also reported that the MCC’s cricket committee is opposed to any alteration to Law 21, which states that the result should not be changed.”Cricket is the worse for this decision and it was opposed unanimously by the ICC’s cricket committee, on which I sit,” Bradshaw told the Times. Michael Holding, the former West Indian fast bowler, resigned from the ICC cricket committee following the verdict.The ICC ruling was termed as “unprecedented and dangerous” by Robert Griffiths, QC, who represented umpire Darrell Hair at his tribunal hearing against the ICC. “It had no power to do so under the Laws of Cricket and the decision is a nullity,” Griffiths, along with fellow barrister Stephen Whale wrote in the Times. “But it is deeply troubling that the ICC should take this unprecedented and dangerous step. It is historical revisionism of the worst kind.”Law 21(10) is unequivocal: once the umpires have agreed with the scorers the correctness of the scores, the result cannot be changed. The reasoning is vacuous. It was, officially, ‘based on the view that in light of the unique set of circumstances, the original result was felt to be inappropriate’. This is even though ICC board member witnesses admitted under oath at Hair’s tribunal that the umpires’ decisions were in accordance with the Laws.”The Test was awarded to England after Pakistan did not come out to field after tea on the fourth day, following accusations of ball-tampering. The result had off-field ramifications as well. Hair went on to be suspended from the ICC elite panel, and though that decision was overturned last year when he took his employers to the High Court in London, the initial decision formed the basis of Pakistan’s appeal for a change to the result.

West Indies’ buoyant mood after the Twenty20 may be dinted by the absence of some senior players for the opening match of the five-game series against Australia on Tuesday. Ramnaresh Sarwan and Shivnarine Chanderpual, who missed the success on Friday, are carrying niggling injuries alongside the wicketkeeper Denesh Ramdin.Gayle, the captain, is concerned with the groin complaint he picked up two months ago, but will ignore the discomfort to lead the team in St Vincent. “I never got any sort of injury like this before and speaking to people who had groin injuries, they say it does tend to take a lot of time,” Gayle said.”I thought it was going to be two weeks but it is two months now. I just have to blank it out and try and play with it and see how well I can contribute to the team. If it’s not working out then obviously I’ll have to sit out.”He said he would have to overcome fears of aggravating the injury when batting. “I want to go out there and be positive and block out the negatives,” he said. “You don’t want to take on too much at this particular time, you go out there a bit worried about the injury so you have to know how to pace yourself.”A decision on Sarwan (groin) and Chanderpaul (leg) will be left until the morning of the game. “We’ll see how they feel,” Gayle said, “and if they get a chance to play, we have to wait and see.” If Ramdin, the wicketkeeper, is not cleared Patrick Brown, the Barbados gloveman, will take over.”The team is carrying a few niggles so we have to be careful how we use the guys because guys are struggling, but we will try to come with the best combination and see how well we can cope with it against Australia,” Gayle said. “It is an opportunity for the likes of Andre Fletcher and Kieron Pollard, who have been around, to get a chance to play and try and prove themselves.”

Dwayne Smith, the West Indies allrounder, has joined Sussex for their Twenty20 Cup campaign after being signed as a replacement for the injured Mushtaq Ahmed. He is expected to make his debut in their opening match against holders Kent on Wednesday.”We are excited to have Dwayne join us,” Mark Robinson, Sussex’s coach, said. “We’ve had to move quickly on this following injury to Mushy, and at a day’s notice I feel very lucky, to have gained such a high-quality player.”Robinson said Smith’s addition will benefit the county when Luke Wright takes up his international commitments. “The fact that he bats, bowls and fields means he will, in theory, be a like-for-like replacement for Luke when he joins England.”Chris Adams, Sussex’s captain, also expressed confidence in Smith’s abilities. “I think it’s an exciting signing. I haven’t got a great knowledge of Dwayne but he is an outstanding one-day cricketer. He is a great fielder, hits the ball a very long way and he is an improving bowler,” he told the .Meanwhile, Adams said Mushtaq will re-join the squad for the County Championship. “The timing [of Smith’s signing] is right because Mushy needs three weeks of rest so he is ready to go for the Lancashire game in the Championship on June 29.”There’s no point in rushing him [Mushtaq] back, we need him back fully fit and refreshed and in the meantime we get an exciting young West Indian who will give us a great chance of doing well in Twenty20.”Smith joins the county after taking part in the Indian Premier League, where he represented the Mumbai Indians. He played four matches, but had limited success, with 45 runs and five wickets from four matches.