All posts by csb10.top

John Wright has missed out on a place on New Zealand’s selection panel, with the existing four-member group reappointed for at least a year. Glenn Turner, Richard Hadlee and Dion Nash will again join the coach, John Bracewell, in choosing national squads.Justin Vaughan, the CEO of New Zealand Cricket, did not rule out making Wright a selector in the future but before he could be seriously considered he would need to spend time familiarising himself with the domestic players. Wright begins work for New Zealand Cricket next week, although his exact role remains unclear.”Many key selection decisions need to be made in the short-term before John has had an opportunity to view many of the New Zealand player pool,” Vaughan said. “We felt he would be best to reacquaint himself with the players in New Zealand before any decision is made on whether he should be included on the panel.”Although the current selectors survived the review process, there has been a change to their tenures. A staggered system will mean selectors are offered two-year terms after which they can reapply, with no more than two members retiring in any given year to allow continuity in the decision-making process.Hadlee and Nash have initially been given one-year deals to begin the rotation, while Turner and Bracewell are on two-year contracts. “Richard, Dion and Glenn have the skills and knowledge we want in our selection panel, and we are very happy to retain their services,” Vaughan said.

The South African players were fined 5% of their match fees – Graeme Smith, their captain being fined 10% – for a slow over-rate during the second Test against West Indies in Cape Town.Roshan Mahanama, the match referee, imposed the fine after South Africa were ruled to be one over short of its target after time allowances were taken into consideration.In accordance with the ICC Code of Conduct regulations governing over-rate penalties, players are fined 5% of their match fees for every over their side fails to bowl in the allotted time, with the captain fined double that amount.South Africa won the match by seven wickets to square the series 1-1. The next Test, to be played at Kingsmead in Durban, begins on January 10.

Mickey Arthur, the South Africa coach, says he is “worried” about the addition of Paddy Upton to Gary Kirsten’s coaching staff for India’s home series against South Africa, since the mental-conditioning specialist possesses inside knowledge on his key players.Arthur hoped Kirsten, the retired South Africa opener and the team’s former batting consultant, would do well as India’s new coach “except against South Africa”, but suggested that he was not so sure about Upton.”I am worried about Paddy Upton,” Arthur told Cricinfo. “I hope that he will respect the confidentiality of his relationship with the players, which is similar to a doctor-patient relationship because he has worked on the mental approach of most of our top six.”Kirsten took over as India coach on March 1 and recommended Upton to the BCCI, which is finalising the paperwork for a full-time contract.Upton, closely associated with Kirsten’s academy in Cape Town, has worked with most of the current South Africa players, including Graeme Smith and Jacques Kallis. He was also South Africa’s biokineticist and fitness trainer in the mid-to-late 1990s, and a fitness trainer with the team from 1994 to 1998.”Gary is a genuine cricket man and I wish him all the best except against South Africa,” Arthur said. “Coaches analyse their opponents anyway so I not worried about his intimate technical knowledge of our players.”Arthur is currently in Bangladesh with his team for a two-Test series and three one-dayers. South Africa is expected to reach Chennai a few days after their Bangladesh tour ends on March 14, for the first of their three Tests against India.Asked to assess India’s performance during the recent Australia series, Arthur felt they had played particularly well. “They put pressure on Australia and seem to have developed a ruthless streak,” he said. Arthur, however, hoped that unlike in Australia, the forthcoming Test series would be “tough and uncompromising but played in the right spirit”.On the Indian Premier League, which follows the India series, Arthur said that while it was good for cricket, “there must be a window period for it in the international schedule.”

Experience prevailed over youth as the star studded ONGC team pipped PCAColts XI by two wickets in the 7th JP Atray Memorial cricket tournament atthe PCA Stadium in Chandigarh today.The PCA Colts piled up a huge total of 318 for the loss of four wickets inthe allotted 50 overs. However ONGC managed to overhaul this challengingtotal for the loss of eight wickets with one over to spare.The Colts team opened through Gaganinder Garry and Ankur Kakkar. Theopening pair started off slowly, scoring 45 runs in the first 10 overs.Garry was first to go as he has caught brilliantly at gully, trying to cuta short delivery.Yuvraj Singh and Kakkar were in good nick. Yuvraj, fresh from his inclusionin the Indian team for the Nairobi tournament, placed the ball neatly inthe gaps. His knock of 60 included 10 elegant boundaries. Trying to boostthe scoring rate further, he was stumped off the bowling of VirinderShewag. By then he had put his team in a strong position as they were 142runs after 26 overs for the loss of only two wickets.Kakkar carried on merrily at the other end and completed his 50 off 72balls. The brightest part of the innings came when Pankaj Dharmani andSanjay Kumar came together at the crease with the score at 190 at the endof 35 overs. The two added 96 runs off just 77 balls. Dharmani was in fullflow as he smashed an unbeaten 96 off just 76 deliveries. He hit 12powerful boundaries and a huge six. Sanjay Kumar gave him good support insmashing 50 runs off 45 balls.ONGC XI got off to a flying start as openers Gagan Khoda and Sandeep Sharmahammered 80 runs off just 56 balls. Sandeep was in fine form, slamming 50runs off just 29 balls which included nine hits to the fence. Khoda alsoscored at a run a ball for his knock of 34. After the fall of these twowickets, ONGC lost three more wickets cheaply and they were down in thedumps at 117 for five. Mithun Minhas and Shewag however took the team outof the woods. Both scored half centuries to take the team to the doorstepof victory. Towards the end Md. Saif took charge with an unblemished 52runs off 62 balls to clinch the issue in favour of his team. Yuvraj Singhand Vineet Kumar tried their level best to change the course of the matchin their favour, but despite capturing three wickets each for 47 and 66runs respectively, they could not. Shewag was declared man of the match.

All Today’s Yesterdays – August 18 down the years

August 17 | August 19

2000
An unforgettable victory for England at Headingley, and the first twoday Test in over 50 years. When West Indies began their second inningsmidway through the afternoon session, they were exactly 100 runs behindEngland. After 26.2 overs, they’d been demolished for just 61 – theirsecond double-figure score in three Tests – and England had beaten themby an innings for the first time since 1966. It was unforgettablydelirious stuff. The cherry on the icing came when Andy Caddick tookfour wickets in an over, the last three all castled by swinging yorkers.

1934
The end of one of the monumental partnerships. England needed only adraw at The Oval to retain the Ashes – but big Bill Ponsford made hislast Test a memorable one. His 266 achieved the rare feat of outscoringDon Bradman, who hit a mere 244. Their stand of 451, made in only fivehours, was then the highest for any wicket in Tests and is still in thetop four. England, understandably overwhelmed, lost by a whopping 562runs.

1920
One of the great wicketkeepers and characters was born. Extrovert andgenuinely brilliant standing back or close up, Godfrey Evans played in91 Tests for England, making 219 dismissals, both world records at thetime, and hitting two dashing hundreds. A vivid personality long afterhis retirement, with the most famous mutton-chop whiskers in cricket, hewas the Ladbrokes rep who quoted odds of 500-1 against England winningthe famous Headingley Test of 1981.

1974
Birth of Shiv Chanderpaul. When he made his debut against Englandat Georgetown in 1993-94, he was the first teenager to play in a Testfor West Indies since Elquemedo Willett in 1972-73. Chanderpaul’s slimframe encases the ideal temperament for a Test batsman – and West Indieshave missed it when his frequent injuries have ruled him out. He scoredonly two hundreds in his first 53 Tests, but improved that ratio bynotching three in four matches against India in 2002.

1926
After the humiliations of the early 1920s and the frustrations of thisrain-affected series, England made Percy Chapman captain, recalled the48-year-old Wilfred Rhodes, and regained the Ashes. On this the last dayat The Oval, pace bowlers Maurice Tate and Harold Larwood made the earlyinroads, after which Rhodes’s slow left-arm took 4 for 44. Australiawere dismissed for 125 and lost the series 1-0.

1920
The start of one of the alltime great careers. Wally Hammond made hisfirst-class debut for Gloucestershire against Lancashire at Cheltenham.Ironically, for a batsman of the highest possible class, he made a duckin his first innings. He went on to set any number of world records,among them becoming the first man to score 7000 Test runs and the firstto take 100 Test catches. Three of his big scores are in the Wisden 100:his 336 not out at Auckland in 1932-33, another Test record at the time- and two majestic double-hundreds against Australia. One of theundisputed legends of the game.

1956
Birth of dashing batsman and film star Sandeep Patil, who played in 29Tests for India. His four Test centuries included genuinely brilliantknocks at Adelaide in 1980-81 (174) and Old Trafford in 1982 (129 notout), when he hit six fours in an over from Bob Willis. His important 27in a low-scoring match helped India win the 1983 World Cup final.

1936
On the last day at The Oval, England captain and pace bowler Gubby Allencompleted figures of 7 for 80, the best of his Test career, to helpEngland beat India by nine wickets and take the three-match series 2-0.

Other birthdays
1879 Hugh Bromley-Davenport (England)
1908 Bill Merritt (New Zealand)
1923 Jahangir Khan Irani (India)
1923 Sadu Shinde (India)

Stephen Coverdale, Northamptonshire’s chief executive, is to resign his position and leave the club before the start of next season.Coverdale has held the post since succeeding Ken Turner in 1985, making him the longest-serving chief executive in England. He will also stand down as a director of the England & Wales Cricket Board, and as a member of the ECB’s management board.”I have reached a stage in my career when, even though I remain as fully committed as ever, I genuinely do need a new challenge,” he said. “Cricket remains my passion but I am considering suitable opportunities both inside and outside the sport.”

Matthew Elliott has been confirmed as one of Glamorgan’s two overseas players for 2004. He had one season with them in 2000 and replaces Queensland captain Jimmy Maher, who is unable to make the start of the season because of personal reasons.Elliott, who has also played for Yorkshire, is expected ahead of Glamorgan’s Championship-opener against Derbyshire in April.”Jimmy Maher was due to return to Glamorgan this summer but he informed us a few weeks ago that he was unlikely to be available for the opening games of the season for personal reasons,” Mike Fatkin, Glamorgan’s chief executive, explained. “We understand his reasons but he in turn appreciates the importance which our captain Robert Croft and John Derrick [the coach] attach to having our overseas players available for the start of the season.”We know Matthew well from his time at Glamorgan in 2000, when he helped the team reach its first major Lord’s final in 23 years.”Elliott has been in good form during the Australian season, scoring more than 1,000 runs for Victoria. In his one season with Glamorgan he also exceeded 1,000 runs, and was named Man of the Match in the C&G Trophy final when he blasted an unbeaten 128 at Lord’s.Elliott, who still harbours ambitions to play for Australia again, played the last of his 20 Tests against the West Indies at Bridgetown in the 1998-99.

All season, as England have racked up Test win after Test win, the murmurs have gathered voice and volume. Steve Harmison and Andrew Flintoff have struck notes so strident that the pundits dared to join the punters’ chorus of “Bring on the Aussies, bring on the Ashes.” Well, on a cold day at Edgbaston, when an ICC Champions Trophy semi-final turned into an Ashes clash, the crowds stayed away.One journalist walking into the ground an hour after play started wondered if the match was really on at all. And you couldn’t blame him: a tea party in a geriatric ward on a good day would have had more atmosphere. Only about 8000 of the 23,000 seats were taken, and, while the crowd at the India-Pakistan match here two days ago was over the top in its hooting and honking, this crowd was downright polite. Even Michael Vaughan finding one-day form and caressing four boundaries in a Brett Lee over – including a pair of the most gorgeous cover-drives you could hope to see – failed to get the fans going.The odd Warwickshire member sitting in the stands at the City End, listening to commentary on a pair of headphones large enough to double up as ear-muffs, was occasionally stirred into apologetically bringing his hands together in appreciation. The clearest measure of the silence was the fact that you could hear Adam Gilchrist’s encouraging chirps as far as the boundary line.Many reasons have been put forward for the lack of crowds. It was a working day, and people could not book tickets in advance because England only qualified to play this game a few days ago. The football season has begun. This match came at the end of a long and bountiful season of cricket for England. But none of these cut much ice. England had not beaten Australia in a one-dayer in more than four years, and this was their best chance.On the eve of the match, Vaughan called on England supporters to back their team. “It is always very special to play Australia, and both teams have shown good one-day form during the Trophy. We’ve had fantastic support this summer from England fans and we’ll need them on Tuesday when we measure ourselves against the most successful one-day team in the world. We’re ready for the challenge.”In the end, England did all right without the support, but such a plea is unheard of in places like India. Why, even the India-Pakistan match at Edgbaston was sold out months in advance, and £35 tickets were being flogged for as much as £120 on the black market. But today, when England set up a famous win, and are in sight of winning their first major competition, the fans failed their team.Some old-timers reckon that the best indicator of the health of a sport in a country is the patronage it receives at grounds. Vaughan has felt time and again recently that he has let his team down – he came into this game averaging just 18.07 in his last 15 one-dayers. The day he turned things around, and played an innings of true character, he deserved better than a one-thirds-full ground. His flowing cover-drives, off front and back foot, and his authoritative pulling against one of the world’s fastest bowlers demanded a more fitting celebration.When Vaughan finally fell, ballooning up a catch while trying to pull Brett Lee, he had made 86. He fully deserved to reach his maiden limited-overs century, but perhaps it was better that he fell 14 runs short. When one of the most beautifully brutal batsmen in world cricket lifts his game to reach a special landmark, it deserves to be treated as more than just another good knock.The Oval, where England will play either Pakistan or West Indies in the final, promises to be a sellout. England will be desperate to end their successful season on a high note. Whether the fans can rise to the occasion, like their team, remains to be seen.Anand Vasu is assistant editor of Wisden Cricinfo.

An ICC summit meeting on throwing, involving five former players and the world’s leading experts on biomechanics, will convene on October 25 and 26 in Dubai to review the current regulations after the completion of in-depth research into one of the game’s most emotive topics.The five former players – Angus Fraser, Michael Holding, Tim May, Aravinda de Silva and Tony Lewis – will probe into research and make recommendations to the ICC Cricket Committee, chaired by Sunil Gavaskar, which is due to meet on November 9 and 10.The sub-committee is expected to conclude that the ICC’s current tolerance levels should be increased after laboratory and match analysis has shown that a considerable number of international bowlers are presently exceeding the permitted levels of arm-bend.The ICC’s current tolerance levels for arm-straightening permit spinners to bend the albow by five degrees, and fast bowlers ten degrees. The tolerance levels were introduced in 2002 after scientific research indicated that the vast majority of bowlers broke the game’s rigid throwing law.The highest-profile casualty of the current system is Muttiah Muralitharan, who was stopped from using his doosra – a disguised legbreak delivered from the back of his hand – after laboratory research indicated that his arm bent by some 14 degrees when he delivered it.This was later reduced to ten degrees after remedial action at the University of Western Australia, but Muralitharan still exceeded the ICC’s tolerance levels. Muralitharan’s arm straightens by an average of three degrees when he bowls his stock offbreak.But preliminary results from the latest research completed by Paul Hurrion, a UK-based sports scientist, during the ICC Champions Trophy – where video footage of the world’s leading bowlers were recorded and analysed by super-speed cameras – indicate that Muralitharan’s arm-bend is moderate in comparison to some bowlers.The conclusions of a secret report conducted for Cricket Australia by Dr Marc Porter, who analysed top-level fast bowlers from five countries in competitive match conditions over an 18-month period leading up to March 2003, revealed that 14 of the 34 deliveries analysed exceeded the ICC’s ten-degree tolerance limit.Further research carried out in New Zealand on spinners and research by Bruce Elliott from the University of Western Australia has also revealed the extent of the rule-breaking under the present system, and the scientists are expected to recommend that tolerance levels be lifted immediately.Scientists at the meeting will also debate the theory behind the ICC’s sliding tolerance levels on the basis of ball speed. The University of Western Australia has argued before that this may discriminate against spinners, such as Muralitharan, who have a similar arm speed to faster bowlers.Cricket sources are predicting the adoption of a flat-rate 15-degree level of bending for all bowlers, which will allow Murali to continue using the doosra when he returns to international cricket at the end of the year.The decision of the ICC Cricket Committee will be ratified by the executive board in a telephone conference in late November or early December.However, although Muralitharan is set to be cleared, the controversy is unlikely to blow away completely, because some other high-profile international bowlers would, according to the latest research which has a five-degree error margin, also exceed the new 15-degree tolerance level.

The Indian board has decided to reject Pakistan’s proposal for a three-match one-day tour in mid-March. The Pakistan board had requested the BCCI for a series once the Australian tour was shortened but India felt their players’ schedule was too tight to accommodate another tour.”The players have had a long and strenuous tour of Australia and will return only on March 8 or 9,” Niranjan Shah, the board secretary told Cricinfo. “They have to assemble for the South Africa series on March 22. So it will be really tough to play three ODIs in between.”The series had been under discussion between the two boards following the hesitancy shown by Australia in coming to Pakistan as scheduled in March-April. It was decided recently that Australia’s tour – if it goes ahead – would be considerably shortened. Pakistan were then keen to utilise the free period in the first half of March.The Pakistan board, it is learnt, were confident that the tour would go ahead and had already began preparations for the three games, all scheduled for Lahore. The decision from the BCCI – taken by the office bearers today – was conveyed to the PCB chairman, Nasim Ashraf, by his Indian counterpart, Sharad Pawar.However, India are likely to tour Pakistan for a short one-day series before the Champions Trophy in September-October.