All posts by h716a5.icu

Australia’s thrilling 36-run victory over Pakistan was only the sixth instance in Test history of a team winning after trailing by 200-plus in the first innings

Cricinfo staff06-Jan-2010 Australia completed one of the most remarkable comebacks in cricket’s history when they beat Pakistan by 36 runs at the Sydney Cricket Ground. This was only the sixth time that a team overcame a first-innings deficit of more than 200 to win a Test. Australia have been involved in each of those six matches – thrice at the receiving end and thrice victorious.

TeamOppositionFirst-innings deficitGroundMargin of victoryStart dateAustraliaSri Lanka291Colombo (SSC)16 runs17 Aug 1992IndiaAustralia274Kolkata171 runs11 Mar 2001EnglandAustralia261Sydney10 runs14 Dec 1894AustraliaSouth Africa236Durban5 wickets20 Jan 1950EnglandAustralia227Leeds18 runs16 Jul 1981AustraliaPakistan206Sydney36 runs3 Jan 2010Note: The table does not include the 2006 Oval Test between Pakistan and England where England were declared winners after Pakistan refused to play, and the Centurion Test in 2000 between England and South Africa in which both teams forfeited an innings each. It’s Australia’s sixth-lowest Test score in the first innings of a match in a winning cause, but four of those were before 1955. The only other recent instance was against Sri Lanka in 2004, when they were bundled out for 120 in the first innings, but restricted the deficit to just 91, and ended up winning the match by 27 runs. For Pakistan, though, it was the second time they bowled a team out for 127 and ended up on the losing side. Almost 17 years ago in Port-of-Spain they’d dismissed West Indies for the same score, only to be bowled out for 140 themselves, and eventually ended up losing up by a whopping margin of 204 runs. That West Indian attack included Curtly Ambrose, Ian Bishop and Courtney Walsh, but as in Sydney, the bowling hero in the second innings was a spinner – Carl Hooper took 5 for 40. Pakistan’s defeat in Sydney is their 11th in a row against Australia. Since 1990, they have a 2-15 win-loss record against Australia, which is easily their worst against any team. Michael Hussey’s unbeaten 134 lifts his average in his last six Tests to 60.40, with five 50-plus scores in 11 innings. Nathan Hauritz’s 5 for 53 is his second successive five-for in the fourth innings of a Test, lifting his last-innings average to 23.30, at a strike rate of less than 45 balls per wicket.

Yuvraj talks about how the Kohlis and Sharmas are repeating the mistakes he made, the one person who totally understands him, and switching between formats of the game

Interview by Sharda Ugra22-Sep-2010The Yuvraj Singh of today is very different to the electric fielder at point. What happened to him?
It is a series of things – too many injuries, from a knee to a shoulder, wrist to broken fingers. Once you’re injured and come back, you can’t be the same person. Firstly, you are not 21 years old. At 29 your body needs a lot of time to recover. Earlier I wasn’t playing so much cricket, only one-day cricket mostly, and the body was young. I’m not saying I’m 37 years old now, but when I feel my body is 100% to stand at point, I will go and stand at point. In the last series I was standing there. I want to and I’m getting there.Sachin tells me, “If you stand at point, the team will save 15-20 runs. You just need to watch your videos of the last couple of years.” I watch my videos sometimes and I surprise myself. I’m thinking, “Is that me?” When I speak to Jonty Rhodes, he tells me, “It gives me goosebumps to see you fielding.” A guy like Jonty Rhodes is telling . So I think about it. But if I am not able to dive properly or move to the ball quickly, I will not stand at point. When my body is 100%, I will definitely come back to point. I still haven’t given up.What was your first reaction when you heard the news about the spot-fixing controversy?
It was a surprise. I didn’t know what spot-fixing was. Then I read it and some people explained it to me. I was very surprised. It is sad for the game. The England-Pakistan series was going so well, everyone was so excited about it and suddenly this thing comes up. Controversy always spoils the game.It has been sad for the game and for Pakistan cricket. They had just won a Test match. The other problem is that the moment someone is accused, everyone else starts getting accused too. [After the spot-fixing controversy broke] They are saying something was wrong in the IPL or the India-Sri Lanka 414 game was fixed. That’s not done. If you have evidence, please show the evidence. You can’t be printing stories just to create hype, saying that match was fixed, this match was fixed.Cricketers meet hundreds of people socially, at events, parties. Have any “approaches” ever been made to you?
These things happen. You know what kind of people are around, what they are trying to do – and I’m not just saying bookies or guys like that. When you meet people, I believe you have to present a kind of body language that says, “Do not mess with me or even think of saying anything strange to me.” You meet a lot of people who will try and give you advice or want you to get into bad stuff or who ask you to go and meet people you don’t know or aren’t interested in knowing at all.For me, my body language is such that nobody has the guts to even come and talk to me about things like this, ever. You present yourself like that, like nobody can come and touch you. If you can do that then nobody can point a finger on you. I have always been like that and I have never been vulnerable in this case.You’re now one of the older guys in the team after 10 years in international cricket. What has the last decade been like? Are you disappointed or satisfied with what you’ve done since 2000?
When I started my career, I felt that that was when the game was changing in India. When we were newcomers, we watched the seniors and their very different approach from what we did in first-class cricket. The attitude to playing was changing. The game too started to move at a faster pace: 230 to 240 was a winning target when I first began playing, then teams started to chase 260s and 270s.As a young kid starting out, it wasn’t physically that tough. The body was young, you just went and fell anywhere – on the ground, in the dressing room, on the road. It didn’t matter. You just got up, brushed yourself off and were on the go again. Mentally it was harder starting out. After a big performance against Australia and South Africa, suddenly I was in the limelight, and then suddenly you are out of runs in the next few tournaments and you didn’t know how to come back. You didn’t know what to do. It was a struggle.

“I see youngsters like Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma who are talented and flamboyant. I tell them not to make the mistakes I made”

The days have passed, the years have passed, and mentally I’ve become stronger. Physically I have had a lot of injuries in these last few years, so it has been an up-and-down stage, you could say. I’m happy with my one-day career but I could have done better in my Test cricket.Now when you see the newcomers, do you see yourself at the age of 20 again?
I see a lot of guys making the same mistakes.What mistakes?
By mistakes I mean you come into the team, you have some success and you think, “Yeah, I can do the same things on the field all the time,” which is not possible. Then after playing for India, you think, “I can do whatever I want,” which is also not possible. It’s just immaturity. No experience, so you make mistakes and hopefully you learn something from them, and from the older players.I see a lot of youngsters like Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma, who are very talented and flamboyant. As a senior I tell them not to make the same mistakes I made, and try to guide them to a better tomorrow. When I began playing, you could say the game was changing, the distractions were beginning. Now the distractions are too much and my advice to the younger guys is mostly not to be distracted by what is happening outside and to concentrate on the game.Do they listen?
They don’t listen, especially Rohit and Virat. [Suresh] Raina still listens a little bit, but Rohit and Virat always argue with me. I don’t blame the youngsters for not listening, because a lot of times Sachin or Sourav or Kumble said something to me and I said “What do they know?”. But it’s just your age… boys mature very late. That’s what I’ve learned from my life. As a senior, I think it’s our duty to help the junior guys, like [Ravindra] Jadeja and Praveen Kumar. I think it’s our duty to help them as their career progresses. Hopefully they’ll listen, if not to me, to other players.When you say distractions, you mean partying, money, celebrity?
It’s everything. When you are playing for the country, you start having a status. Then you want a big house. Then you want a nice car. You become famous, people start liking you, there is media hype around you. More than the positives, which these may sound like, there a lot of negatives. You start concentrating on other things, going out with your friends, saying “I’ll practise tomorrow.” At that moment it’s important that there is someone to guide you and tell you, “No, your cricket is more important and everything here is because of your cricket. So practise five to eight hours, and after that do whatever you want to.” You need to have a balance.”If there were 50% of distractions in cricket 10 years ago, today they are at 100%”•PA PhotosAs one of the bad-boy generation in the Indian team, did you have a guide?
I feel our bad-boy generation has always been overplayed. Most of the bad boys are actually good boys. I took advice from seniors, like Vikram Rathore: he was someone who really helped me in my career in terms of making the transition from playing domestic cricket to international cricket. Then two guys I played with, Sandeep Sharma and Amit Sharma, who played club cricket for ONGC and first-class cricket for Punjab – they always gave me good guidance. But at that time I think nobody took me seriously.Why was that?
They probably thought, “Oh, he’s a kid.” My body language was such that everyone may have felt I thought too much of myself. So nobody thought to come and tell me that I should do this or that. I was just growing up. It was a new world for me. It was not that I would not acknowledge people, but they may have felt that I would not listen.Do you fear for the younger generation then?
I do actually fear for them. If there were 50% of distractions in cricket 10 years ago, today they are at 100%. Any youngster can fall out anywhere. Especially since the IPL, a lot of youngsters, particularly in first-class cricket, focus on the IPL, which is a very bad thing. The players feel that they are not good enough in international cricket and they can survive in the IPL. You can’t blame them, because the IPL gives them an opportunity to play with the best players, gives them money and gives them a sense of well-being with their family – things a normal man wants.But they need to realise that they need to push towards playing for the country. They need to be thinking of playing for the country, not because they may or may not eventually make it but because wanting to play for India is important in terms of pushing the level of their cricket, improving their cricket. I don’t think the improvement of a cricketer’s game can come by playing only for the IPL. You need to play all forms of cricket.In bad times, is there one place or one person that you return to, to sort things out? What did you do, for example, when you got dropped after a long time?
This was very different from when I got dropped the first time. Then I was young, I didn’t know anything. I came, kept playing my game, got dropped. That happens to all young players. Everyone is not Tendulkar, who knows how to play the game properly. It’s the same thing with young guys in our team. They play, they get dropped, they come back, because they are good players.

“A lot of youngsters focus on the IPL, which is a very bad thing. The players feel that they are not good enough in international cricket and they can survive in the IPL. But they need to realise that they need to push towards playing for the country”

But now last year was mentally very hard because it’s very difficult to come back after an injury, then again get injured and come back and play and then get injured and come back again and again. What I normally do is that I don’t show that I am disturbed. I never show it, I only show it to my mother. I come home and argue or scream at my mom because she understands me totally. She has seen me grow up. I have friends who I talk to, who keep me grounded. But mostly I talk to myself and tell myself that I have to be mentally very strong.Now that you play in three forms, is it harder to switch into improvising in Twenty20s or to building the big innings in Tests?
Actually, after playing Twenty20 if I suddenly have to shift, I find it tougher to shift to one-day cricket than Test cricket. Earlier 50 overs would look like too few overs, and now after Twenty20, 50 overs looks like you have so much of time. It’s a limited-overs format, but for me that is tougher to switch to than Test cricket. For me, switching from 20 to 50 overs, mentally you have to shift very quickly. The 50-over gameplans require much more thinking than Twenty20, where you are going bang bang.Test cricket is very different. It has changed and maybe at a faster pace, but a cricketer knows what is needed. Preparation is of a different kind. The ball changes. You want to leave a lot of balls outside the off stump. You’re trying to get set, you know that.At the start of a season, do you set goals for yourself? The next six months are going to be big for Indian cricket, so what’s the plan?
I have stopped having goals. If you have many goals and you don’t reach your goals, it is very upsetting, so I just think of keeping it simple, working hard and going and playing the game. But I know there are going to be very important series for Indian cricket. I will just try my best to be in my fittest form. Not because the team wants me to or I want to but because it is the need of the situation. I have to give it my best shot because the World Cup is coming around. The last year has been pretty much down and it is time to really push the pedal and hit peak performance very soon.Read part one of the interview here

From the airy lounges of Brabourne’s pavilion to the charmless, modern edifice that is the Wankhede Stadium

Mike Selvey19-Jan-2011Ever since I was a kid, I had wanted to go to “Bombay”, as we knew it then. Both my parents had spent memorable years in India during the Second World War, and spoke fondly of the city. To a young lad brought up in all the austerity of England in the 1950s, the very name conjured images of what to us was the mysterious East. On the radio I had heard Frank Sinatra singing Sammy Cahn’s lyrics to “Come Fly With Me”: “If you could use / some exotic booze / there’s a bar in far Bombay.” And there on the menu of The Bombay, our local curry house (not so much a restaurant as a purveyor of unidentifiable lumps swimming in searing, primordial gloop), was Bombay Duck, which no one dared order for ignorance of what it actually was.Then, 45 years ago, I went, a wide-eyed teenager in a schools cricket team, for the first time to the teeming city that I was to visit on numerous occasions since, next as an England cricketer and then as a journalist. First impressions count. This one remains vivid. We arrived by Air India 707, in the middle of the night, jaded by the journey that had taken us via the painful winter cold of Moscow airport, where, while the plane refuelled, we were forced to decamp into a deserted terminal. From that chill we went straight to the humid warmth of Bombay, transported from the airport into the heart of the city by a bone-shaking bus.Past the shanties and their unnerving smells we rattled – poverty unimaginable to us, first seen and never to be forgotten – and as we did so, cars pulled alongside recklessly, horns blaring, men and children hanging from the windows, waving and shouting and laughing and smiling. Us schoolboys and we were being greeted thus. The journey seemed brief; certainly not the gridlocked nightmare that the city endures nowadays. Half an hour? Or is that time lending enchantment to the past? But there, glittering, was the palm-fringed curve of Marine Drive, the Queen’s Necklace, and suddenly this really was the exotic place of childhood dreams.We stayed at the Brabourne Stadium, just off Marine Drive. Imagine. One of the most famous cricket grounds not just in India but the world, and we could roll out of bed, walk down some stairs and there we were on the turf. MCC touring parties would stay there. And wasn’t it Brabourne of which Frank Worrell spoke when he said it was the only ground where he could remove his dressing gown and go straight out to bat?Brabourne was opened in 1937, and was the home of the Cricket Club of India, which was India’s equivalent of the MCC, and yet also the headquarters of the Board of Control for Cricket in India. Stadium it may be, as opposed to cricket ground, but it possessed charm: a rectangular rather than circular configuration; the pavilion at one end, art-decoish, with its open, airy lounges and ceiling fans that rotated so gently they barely disturbed the air; wicker chairs and tables laid out right up to the boundary’s edge with the field a small step down from the pavilion; and discreet, turbaned staff serving members their pegs as they smoked and perused the .These were fortunate times for us young lads. We were a London Schools side that had come to India for six weeks to play a series of “Tests” against All India Schools. We travelled the country, generally by train, through Poona, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Delhi, Calcutta, right up to Nowgong in Assam, down to Bangalore, Trivandrum, and finally Madras (these all names as I remember them from that time).In Bombay we were feted. We made the papers regularly: “London Schools pacemen impress”. What was that about first impressions? I can recall as clearly as yesterday the first delivery I bowled in India, in Ahmedabad, to a minute young batsman wearing a sunhat bigger than him. Short of a length, it was pulled like a rifle shot and finished up bouncing down from the at square leg before being thrown back. Not the greatest welcome to the country. But then Sunil Gavaskar was to become some player. So was Eknath Solkar, and the Amarnath brothers, Mohinder and Surinder, and Ashok Gandotra, and Anshuman Gaekwad. Match after match we received cricketing lessons from these brilliant young cricketers.Brabourne’s association with international cricket was not to last, however. A few years later the CCI had fallen out with the Bombay Cricket Association over ticket allocation during MCC’s 1973 tour. So, with no resolution forthcoming, BCA simply took their bats and balls elsewhere, built the charmless, concrete edifice that is the Wankhede Stadium, half a mile up the road, opened it in 1975, and confined Brabourne to a minor role, hosting domestic matches and the odd limited-overs international, until India played Sri Lanka in a Test there in December 2009. It remains, however, the calm antidote to modern cricketing mammon.A double decker bus passes Victoria Terminus, now Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, circa 1965•Getty ImagesEleven years on from that first trip, I returned with England. We didn’t stay at Brabourne anymore, for there was five-star opulence to be had in Bombay. Instead, I woke up early on the first morning to gaze out of a window of the old part of the magnificent, tragic Taj Mahal hotel at the cargo ships at anchor on the hazy harbour, and the vendors, snake charmers and street musicians already setting up around the Gateway of India. The incongruous ceremonial arch, with its blend of Hindu and Muslim architecture, was built to commemorate the visit of King George V and Queen Mary to the city, en route to Delhi for the Durbar of 1911, and it was through the Gateway that, in 1948, the last British troops passed to leave India.Three months after we had landed in Bombay, after a successful tour and with the series won, we returned for the final Test. I was not due to play. My wife had arrived, and I was told that once the match started I could absent myself and see the sights. It didn’t work out like that. With the toss imminent, Chris Old pulled up lame, and I was called into the side at the very last moment to play in front of 45,000 at Wankhede in what proved to be my third and final Test.Scarcely any meaningful bowling in the preceding weeks, on the slow dust bowls that characterised those games between Tests, no preparation, and straight on to the field for a Test match; it never looked promising. The ball did not swing as we had hoped, and I paid a heavy price for bowling too straight to that same Gavaskar, and to Brijesh Patel. Between the pair of them, they shredded me. The chance never came again.

Malcolm Speed’s memoir of his time in cricket is an unbiased and relevant eye-opener about what goes on behind the scenes in cricket

Sharda Ugra23-Apr-2011The chances of the words “riveting” and “administrator” appearing in the same sentence are so unlikely that odds cannot be offered on them showing up. To then suggest that they could be used about a book written by former ICC CEO Malcolm Speed would lead to cacophonous catcalls of “Yeah, right.” Well, actually, both “yeah” and “right”. (subtitled “Inside Ten Turbulent Years at the Top of World Cricket”) is that kind of book.Not merely an eye-opener but a real eye-popper, it features cricketers and administrators, caught in situations both uncomfortable and avoidable. There’s Matthew Hayden, who put on his best suit and visited Speed to ask why he had been dropped, Steve Waugh carrying the Australian Cricketers Association’s “Intention to Strike” forms in his bag but not distributing them to the players, Desmond Haynes shouting, Nasser Hussain in a massive strop and Viv Richards banging on tables.And these are mere asides. If cricketers mostly sell their autobiographies on the strength of the few pages that talk up an incident and/or take potshots at an old adversary, bookshelves should demand that Speed’s memoir fly off them.Every chapter contains careful details and facts about events that shook the sport at its roots on Speed’s watch. His career as a cricket administrator began as the CEO of the Australian cricket Board (ACB) in May 1997 and ended it as CEO of the ICC in July 2008. He was at the heart of a dramatically changing cricket landscape – from its on-field fundamentals, the business and industry built around it, the politics that was its constant undercurrent and has now begun to control far too much.The 300-odd pages cover the salary dispute in Australian cricket, the decision to pick Waugh over Shane Warne as captain, the Justice Qayuum inquiry into match fixing, the Mike Denness affair, the scandal that is Zimbabwe cricket, the advent of Twenty20, the 2007 World Cup (“The Event From Hell”, in the words of one of the chapter titles) and the death of Bob Woolmer, the growth of the Indian board, Monkeygate, and revealing individual chapters on the Stanford affair and Darrell Hair. And eventually even why he got sacked with two months left for his contract to run its course. “Ten Turbulent Years” sounds like an understatement.Speed, who came into the ACB job from basketball, was surprised to be picked because he thought of himself as an outsider, in what was an “insular and parochial sport that would not go outside its own circles”. When he took over as ICC CEO he reminded himself that every sporting organisation needed to achieve “respect, influence and an appropriate control”. When he left cricket, the result of wanting to persist with financial inquiries over Zimbabwe cricket, Speed said, “I had lost the stomach for the fight, especially one with the potential to further damage the already battle-weary image of an organisation that had consumed seven years of my life.”The outside world saw Speed as a tough cookie, a stickler for rules, procedure and method. His staff at the ICC, however, still speak warmly of him, as a boss with humane qualities, with an ability to inspire loyalty, and to keep them focused on the objectivity of what their office was trying to do – concentrate on the world game over singular national interest. Towards the end of the book Speed explains his game face: “I was never going to be warm, soft and friendly, and I was not in cricket to win any popularity contest.”This is a very relevant book and it will stay that way. It will not please all those involved in some of the turbulence: some inside the ICC board, player associations, and the sneakiest of the sport’s deal-makers. It is a clear and unbiased account of what battles must be fought, and how they were won (or lost) to keep the game sustainable, viable, and always fair. Every chapter has more than a few facts that, until now, were unknown to the wider world, which explain the chaos that followed crises or controversy. By no means is it a cover-up of errors. It takes a rare sports official to write these words about being booed after the end of the 2007 World Cup final: “I knew it was coming. It was not pleasant, but I deserved it.”It is ironic that the book was released just after the ICC’s cynical and dreadful turnaround over how its ten-team 2015 World Cup was going to be structured. Its last two chapters explain how and why the Associates have been shut out. Speed may not have been in any of the meetings but his detailed explanation of how the ICC’s board of directors and its executive board (made up of the heads of all the full-member boards or their representatives) works provides all the clues. Hint: keep an eye out for a sudden surge in tours of and by Zimbabwe, and the nations involved in them. You will understand how the voting went for 2015, knocking out even a qualification process for Associate nations, a decision Speed called “insular and backward” in an interview.

This is a very relevant book and it will stay that way. It will not please all those involved in some of the turbulence: some inside the ICC board, player associations, and the sneakiest of the sport’s deal-makers. It is a clear and unbiased account of what battles must be fought, and how they were won (or lost) to keep the game sustainable, viable, and always fair

is both witness and guide to the game’s evolution in the last decade. What “ambush marketing” really means, why the 15-degree rule for bowlers makes sense, and what it means for players and boards to sign up to codes pertaining to anti-corruption, anti-racism and anti-doping. Whenever issues pertaining to those codes arose -spot-fixing or Monkeygate or others – the codes that had been signed on had to apply. Ideally without nationalistic kicking and screaming, or cosy mutual deals – like the one informally agreed upon by the Indian and Australian boards under which they asked Justice John Hansen to “an agreed statements of facts and a consent order that they expected [him] to rubber stamp”. Had Hansen done so, a precedent for member boards successfully “fixing” the ICC’s disciplinary processes would have been established.Speed’s wrangles with the BCCI were plenty and his observations about India’s role in cricket are carefully detailed, though he takes the effigy-burning and newspaper headlines a little too seriously. The chapter titled “A 15-rounder With Dalmiya”, related to the Mike Denness affair of 2001, is exhausting to read merely because the episode went on for as long as it did.Relations between Speed and Dalmiya, who he said had a “manic determination to make India a world cricket power” were never warm. But the Australian has some respect for Dalmiya as administrator and adversary, despite the history of their arguments. Listing the ICC presidents who have added to the “governance and fabric of the game”, he says, “yes, even Dalmiya, of whom I have been critical in these pages… he taught the ICC how to capitalise on its new revenue stream”.It is almost three years that Speed has been outside cricket, a period that was marked by the Lahore attack on the Sri Lankan team, the spot-fixing scandal, and the IPL explosion, which has shaken up the game’s economy and re-established India’s prominence in the sport. India was always the game’s “unique selling point” and is now its power base. India does not worry Speed, “as long as that influence and control are exercised fairly, transparently and with the interests of the game as paramount consideration”. So we should all worry, then.The current office bearers of the BCCI leave Speed, “far from confident” about the part they will play in the ICC, whose role “is to balance India’s power and look after all its members”. DRS, anyone? is packed with both broad brushstrokes and anecdote. During one of the Anti-Corruption Unit’s earliest formal lectures with the players who was there was one player who, “for his reasons known only to him, turned his chair around to face the other way and read his newspaper while the lecture was in progress”. The guy had better not still be playing.The book is written like Speed usually spoke: clearly and forcefully. To imagine that it is primarily meant for anyone interested in board politics or cricket’s inner workings is inaccurate. It is meant for all those who consider themselves “genuine” cricket lovers, its “true” fans. It is a revealing and often damning document. It will tell the fans what a struggle it is to keep the game they love going, due to the interests and muscle-flexing of cricket’s self-obsessed.Sticky Wicket: Inside Ten Turbulent Years at the Top of World Cricket
by Malcolm Speed
Harper Sports, hb
326pp, A$35

Nobody expected the final day or have any interest, least of all, it seems, the Sri Lanka batsmen who were caught out in dramatic fashion

ESPNcricinfo staff30-May-2011At around 2pm, with dark clouds still blanketing the sky, the press box greeted the announcement that there would be 55 overs of play with hoots of derision. When it was mentioned that there would be a minimum of 15 overs in the final hour, even more laughter followed, prompting the announcer to defend himself. “I’m just conveying the message, don’t shoot the messenger.”The press pack weren’t the only ones expecting a dull draw. The fans in Cardiff braved the dismal weather over the past four days, and while there was never a full house, each day at least had a few thousand people in. On Monday, when the attention of Wales was focused on the football Championship play-off between Swansea City and Reading, only a few dozen showed up for what was shaping up to be a snoozefest.Those staying away seemed to have made the wise choice as well, as Reading blasted two goals in eight minutes to launch a stirring fight back from the depths of 3-0. Sri Lanka, meanwhile, had had some early jitters, losing their openers but their two most accomplished batsmen, Mahela Jayawardene and Kumar Sangakkara, were seemingly killing off any further excitement in the match by calmly steering the team to tea.The mayhem over the next hour and a half then was hard to explain as Sri Lanka were rolled over for their shortest innings in Test history. Sure, the England bowlers were hostile, but keeling over for 82 on a track where the home side had just piled on 496 for 5 defied explanation. The pitch hadn’t suddenly become a minefield, there were three Sri Lanka batsmen meeting the Test gold standard of a 50-plus average and the opposition had only three specialist bowlers with Jimmy Anderson sidelined by a side strain.Even after Mahela nicked one to slip, there wasn’t too much alarm as the next man in was Thilan Samaraweera, a dour batsman who could be relied upon to grind out a two-hour defensive lesson. Instead of playing it safe, Samaraweera attempted an expansive shot off the back foot and chopped the ball on to the stumps for a nine-ball duck. That snapped any semblance of Sri Lankan resistance.As the top-order floundered, there had been a debate over whether England should have declared overnight or used up a couple of overs to allow Ian Bell to complete his century. Should the team cause have come first or a minor individual milestone on a seemingly run-filled track? All that was rendered insignificant as Sri Lanka were blown away in glorious sunshine with 26 overs remaining.What made the meek surrender even more demoralising was that the batting in the first innings was about the only thing that Sri Lanka could be happy about in the Test. Posting 400 even without their two star batsmen contributing had, on the face of it, vindicated a risky policy of playing five bowlers. The fielding was inept at most times, exemplified by a series of unathletic dives, and the worries over the bowling proved warranted as the attack lacked spark.Now, they have the added dilemma of whether to shore up the batting and push Prasanna Jayawardene down to No. 7 or stick to a similar combination and demand that a curtailed batting line-up deliver.Before the series started, Sri Lankan fans hadn’t taken kindly to suggestions that their side are rank outsiders, pointing to their No. 4 ranking, one ahead of former champions Australia. Nor were they happy with talk that this series was just a warm-up for Andrew Strauss’s side before the marquee one against India later in the summer as England set about achieving their goal of becoming the top side in the world.For all the strides that Sri Lanka have taken in limited-overs cricket – runners-up in successive World Cups, and reaching at least the semi-finals of the previous two World Twenty20s – their Test record outside the subcontinent remains poor. They are yet to win a Test in Australia, South Africa and India, and a victory in a full series in England appears elusive. This tour seems unlikely to be the first step towards improving that reputation, with the interim coach and a new captain having only three days to revive a shell-shocked side before the Lord’s Test.

Plays of the Day from the second ODI between India and West Indies in Visakhapatnam

George Binoy02-Dec-2011Absent-minded moment of the day
Rohit Sharma was not the only fielder to drop a catch today, but he was the only one to do something silly immediately after dropping one. In the sixth over of West Indies’ innings, Rohit grassed a sitter off Marlon Samuels at second slip. His frustration got the better of him and Rohit tossed the ball away in disgust, allowing West Indies an overthrow. So not only did he delay Umesh Yadav’s second wicket, he also added a run to the fast bowler’s figures.Oversight of the day
Virender Sehwag sets fields like he bats – always on the attack. He had three slips for Umesh Yadav when the ball was new and had three close catchers on the off side for the left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja when it was old. He even kept six fielders in the circle once the mandatory Powerplay was over. When he took the bowling Powerplay, however, Sehwag slipped. He needed to have six fielders in the circle but had only five for the first ball of the 18th over. Lendl Simmons didn’t spot the mistake – he merely tapped the ball to mid-off – but the umpire did and called a no-ball. Sehwag had a laugh.Comeback of the day
R Ashwin suffered the day’s first six, when Kieron Pollard stepped out of his crease in the 24th over and hoisted the third ball back over the bowler’s head. He also suffered the second six, when Pollard mis-hit the next ball over the wide long-on boundary. There was no hat-trick, though. Pollard came forward and stabbed at the fifth ball, only for it to graze his glove, lob off the pad and land in Parthiv Patel’s gloves.Catch of the day
The ball was short and wide from Ravi Rampaul. It was there to be cut, carved or crashed through the off side. Gautam Gambhir made some room and freed his arms, smashing the ball hard through the air towards cover, where Sammy had placed his shortest fielder. Adrian Barath crouched, waited for the right fraction, and then sprang up. He timed his jump to perfection and plucked the ball out of the air high above his head with his right hand. Barath went off on a celebratory run as Gambhir looked on in disbelief.Six of the day
Rampaul had already knocked Sehwag on the back of his helmet, and then he bruised Rohit’s bottom hand with a short ball that crashed into the glove. It was the same hand that Stuart Broad broke at Chester-le-Street. Rohit had no opportunity for a riposte that time, but he did today. Three balls later, having spotted the short ball early Rohit was on the front foot, pulling the ball from just outside off stump and rocketing it into the crowd beyond the midwicket boundary.Pounce of the day
You could criticise Pollard for his batting, you could criticise Pollard for his bowling, but you’ll find it hard to fault him for his fielding. In the 18th over, Rohit cut the ball firmly behind point and set off for a run. He had to stop, turn around and hurry back, though. Pollard had moved several yards quickly, dived full length to his left and intercepted the ball cleanly with his right hand outstretched. He then hit the ground, bounced back up, swung around and threw the ball at the batsman’s end. The only thing Pollard did wrong was miss the stumps, or else Rohit would have been out on 6.

Press conferences with MS Dhoni are inevitably a cat-and-mouse game, as the India captain rarely gives anything away

Sidharth Monga24-Dec-2011MS Dhoni is a headline-writer’s nightmare. He refuses to get drawn into any pre-series big talk, post-win boasting, or discussions about pressure. It’s two days before the Boxing Day Test, the biggest event on Australia’s cricket calendar, and you could sum up the state of mind he wants to project in one quote: “What’s important is to live in the moment. You have to try to win more sessions than the opposition.”There have been comments from the opposition, players both current and retired, but he says, “We shall stick to what we need to do.” Try asking if there is an extra significance to this series, coming as it does after the England debacle and in all likelihood being India’s last away Tests for two years, and he says, “There is no point in taking extra pressure. We look to do well in every game, be it home or away. We look to keep it simple. Do small things well. We didn’t do well in England of course but it’s not about past or future. It’s about the present.”Dhoni informs you that everyone is fit and available for selection, but immediately says there are two days to go and two days is a long time. Lest the headline uses the word “confident”. Even the foreign journalists have stopped asking him about DRS, knowing they are not going to get anything new. Somebody asks him if the “favourites” tag means extra pressure, and he retorts, “Even when we were underdogs, you wanted us to be under pressure”Dhoni is then asked about whether Ishant Sharma’s decision to delay the surgery on his ankle was a wise move. “That depends on the individual and what the physio tells him regarding that,” he says. Somebody else has spotted Gautam Gambhir and VVS Laxman making a few technical changes, and Dhoni’s response to that is: “Very difficult for me to answer, because technically I am not very sound. Something that the coach does. One of these days I’ll ask Duncan [Fletcher] to come for a press conference.”However, after about 15 minutes of this cat-and-mouse – and it’s not really a criticism because he was not made captain to help sell papers – he does open up a bit, when asked about his own batting. Obviously in Tests, Dhoni the batsman is not the presence Dhoni the batsman is in shorter formats.He has played important Test hands here and there, has scored quick hundreds when setting up a declaration, averages a respectable 38, but that defining big knock has eluded him. Last year he was on the verge of playing one such, trying to help India save the Centurion Test along with Sachin Tendulkar. During their partnership, batting seemed easy, and swiftly India threatened to erase the deficit. Just before a thunderstorm arrived, though, Dhoni got a corker from Dale Steyn, the kind of ball that, produced at the right time, is the difference between a draw and a win. It was 2010, but Dhoni mentioned the South Africa tour when talking of the year of the “80s”.”I don’t think much about it,” Dhoni said. “Of course as I said I am not technically very sound. At times for me it is about adapting to the conditions. Batting at No. 7, especially if you see this year, it hasn’t been a brilliant year for me individually. I see this year as a year where I have scored a lot of these 80s. At times I have been short of partners, like for example, in South Africa I was batting decently, and [during] a couple of innings, all of a sudden I didn’t have batsmen batting with me.”[In these situations] You look to score as many runs as possible, and at times you get out. At the end of the day it looks like you haven’t scored runs. Of course I would like to improve as an individual.”And while walking off, he jokes it was a very long press conference.

When Shane Watson returned from injury, it was to a changed side and a modified role. He talks about his time outside, and the captaincy

Interview by Daniel Brettig21-May-2012″Batting three in the West Indies is something I really appreciated – the time to mentally and physically relax, even if it’s only a little bit”•AFPYou had a strange summer – an active part on tours to Sri Lanka, South Africa and the West Indies, but with a great, gaping hole in the middle.
It’s been a summer that really gave me time to reassess where I was at physically, especially to be able to try and get through the cricket I wanted. After playing a lot through Sri Lanka, then South Africa as well, there’s no doubt the summer was a big disappointment, not to be able to play a part in any of that, especially the success we had against India.In the end I learned a lot more things about myself – what I need and what’s required to give myself the best chance to play consistently. For it to finish the way it has, be part of a winning West Indian series and be able to captain a few games as well, was something I really enjoyed. A few swings and roundabouts, but in the end there’s been a few really good experiences I’ve learned a lot from.Why did it take so long to come back from what appeared to be fairly minor hamstring and calf injuries?
My hamstring issue was something that came about in the latter part of the South Africa tour. Coming back from it, doing some running to get some load into my hamstring, my calf ended up going. It ended up coming back to the reason why I had soft-tissue injuries when I was younger. Most had to do with the nerve side of things and back injuries at a young age. So it took quite a while to settle down and through some intervention try to find ways to settle my nervous system down through my lower limbs. That’s why it took quite a while, because as soon as I started to get up and running again, with my calf issue, the nerve issue kept tightening up.It was a very important time across the summer to reassess where I was at physically and put things into place that I know had worked previously. And playing so much cricket, I have to be on top of every single thing and have the continued right guidance to ensure I’m doing all I possibly can to get through.Fairly early in your convalescence you stated that you wanted to come back into the Test team as a batsman and then work into bowling. That clearly did not happen. Were you told that the team wanted you back as an allrounder?
In the end, the way it worked out was that the time I could actually get back and play was as an allrounder straight up. Initially, with the hamstring injury you can play as a batsman, but after being out for as long as I was, it meant the longer you leave it, the longer it takes to get back up and going. The way the fixtures were meant I could play grade cricket, then go into a Shield game and get some time in the middle as well – by the time I got back I hadn’t batted for two and a half months – to get some touch back. It worked out that I was able to get into my bowling straight away as well. At other times in the past, if it’s just been a niggle or something like that, I’ve been able to get back as a batsman right away then come back into it as a bowler. But this time the situation meant I was back as an allrounder.Your first-class return was in a fairly traumatic game for New South Wales, against Western Australia at the WACA ground – a hefty innings defeat. How jolting was that?
That was an absolute debacle really. To play in a game where we performed so poorly was something that opened my eyes. I’ve been around the NSW squad for a couple of years now and just to see the different stages guys were at in their careers – some were coming back from being in and around the Australian squad and playing Shield cricket and trying to perform and push their way back into the Australian team. That alone provides a lot of different dynamics to the team. That’s something NSW needs to make sure of – that everyone really knows their role in the team and how to fulfil that role.It was a very interesting game to be a part of, knowing NSW and how successful it has been, I’m sure that’s as low as they can really get, and if they don’t learn out of that game alone, there’s a lot of signs there to show what’s required to get back to having the structure exactly right.

“I think it was a really good thing to have someone with no preconceived ideas about what’s required for the team to be at their best. That’s really what he’s brought, a fresh set of eyes”Watson on Mickey Arthur’s appointment as Australia coach

Do you mean that players dropped from the national team come back to their state with a very narrow focus of getting themselves right rather than contributing to a winning team?
Not so much that – it’s the whole thing about playing for Australia and the scrutiny that you’re under. Everyone seems to know your faults, and they do because everyone’s seen what you’re doing on national TV. Then coming back and finding ways of being able to score runs – if you’ve been dropped it means you’re not scoring runs. So it means you’re either technically or mentally not in the greatest place. It just means guys are probably going to be struggling to try to find ways to work out what’s been going on and how they can turn all those fortunes around. I wouldn’t say it’s selfish at all, but I am saying it is more about trying to find a way to handle what’s just happened in your career, because everyone’s dream is to play for Australia and when that’s taken away from you because of your performances, it takes a bit of time to get back in the right direction to achieve your goal again.Back into the Australian team via the triangular series in February – how different a set-up did you return to? Things were still quite transitional when you left them in South Africa.
Things had certainly changed quite significantly really, from Mickey [Arthur] and all the things he’d put in place through the whole summer, with Pat Howard and his role, and also the new selectors being there as well. So it was a very different feel around the group. Especially after the success that the team had during the Test series [against India], there was a great feel about what was being put in place. It was a very exciting time to come back into the team, where things were starting to be put in place about continuing to see improvement as a team, with fresh faces.What did you feel had changed around the team?
It’s not like what guys have done has reinvented the wheel. Things were pretty similar, but more so the way Mickey operates is being really concise and structured in how we’re going to do things on the training field. Different coaches have different philosophies on how they’re able to operate. It was a significant change from what Tim [Nielsen] had put in place, and there’s no doubt that there were changes from having fresh eyes and a fresh face coming in. That’s what Mickey’s provided – having a fresh set of eyes coming outside Australian cricket. I think it was a really good thing to have someone with no preconceived ideas – apart from playing against Australia – about what’s required for the team to be at their best. That’s what he’s brought, a fresh set of eyes. As Pat Howard has as well, not being from cricket at all. It means they’ve got a very different perspective on what they see, and they don’t have any preconceived ideas about what’s expected.You seemed to have an attitude change across your absence, from clearly wanting to come back as an opener to simply wanting to get back into the team in whatever role you could. You became a little less particular?
No doubt. I did love opening the batting in Test cricket, there’s no doubt, and that’s where I’ve had my success. But even when I was at the start of my injury period, once Mickey had taken over, I talked to him about what the best position is for me to try to fit into the team as an allrounder. We talked quite a bit about whether it was opening, whether it was batting No. 3 or lower in the order; to try to balance being an allrounder as well as we could. That was always being talked about anyway.Watson on captaincy: “I’ve enjoyed seeing what is inside of my mind come out”•Associated PressAt the time I had no idea about batting anywhere else, really. I knew I had a lot of success opening, so that’s where I felt most comfortable. But in the end you just want to play, and being out for three months you just want to be back into a successful environment and able to contribute. So my mindset outwardly was changed. It was a point I’d talked to Michael [Clarke] about where the best place would be and juggling being an allrounder as best we could. Batting three in the West Indies is something I really appreciated, the time to mentally and physically relax, even if it’s only a little bit.You had time as a captain in two limited-overs series at home and in the West Indies. What did you find most challenging?
Being a selector is a challenge that provides a different aspect to being a captain and something that has a different complexity. But on the field it’s more so – seeing what your gut instincts are, and only when you’re put in the position of having to make decisions at certain times do you realise the extent of what you’ve learned in ten years of first-class cricket. That’s been the thing I’ve enjoyed the most, seeing what is inside of your mind come out.The challenges for me were the most exciting things, trying to find ways of being successful in the latter periods of one-dayers, which we still haven’t been able to nail in that batting Powerplay, and also the latter five or ten overs. That’s something that I enjoyed – the challenge of how we were going to execute better but also how we can do it differently to be more successful. Also, talking about what the best balance of the batting line-up is and trying to get the best out of everyone in new conditions. Those challenges were the most enjoyable things about it, really challenging my cricket knowledge and using it as best I can.

ESPNcricinfo reviews the performance of Pune Warriors in IPL 2012

Abhishek Purohit20-May-2012Where they finishedBrought up the rear, like previous season, with just four wins from 16 games, and an IPL record of nine consecutive defeats.Key player
Electric in the field and explosive with the bat, Steven Smith played a key role in each of Warriors’ four wins. His crisp but calm hitting turned tight chases into manageable ones and boosted average totals to match-winning ones. Acrobatic stops in the deep and spectacular attempts at catches were the norm when the ball sped towards Smith. A decent leg spinner, he bowled just two balls in the tournament, but despite that, created enough impact.Bargain buySmith had gone unsold in the 2012 auction (base price $200,000) despite leading Sydney Sixers to the Big Bash League title a week before the auction. He had missed IPL 2011 with an ankle injury after being bought for $200,000 by Kochi Tuskers Kerala.Flop buyAt $950,000 and $850,000, Angelo Mathews and Ashish Nehra were costly acquisitions in the 2011 auction for Warriors. Mathews has a growing reputation as a finisher for Sri Lanka but he wasn’t able to play even one decisive knock down the order for Warriors. He did end up with a much better economy-rate, 7.38, though, than Ashish Nehra’s, 8.37. Nehra had a few productive outings but on five occasions, he conceded more than ten runs an over. His meltdown in the final over against AB de Villiers heralded Warriors’ downfall after they had begun with three wins in four matches.HighlightThe surprise win over table-toppers Delhi Daredevils. Daredevils had started the season with four wins in five games before they ran into Warriors and Ganguly. Jesse Ryder, Ganguly and Smith carried Warriors to 192, their highest total ever. Ganguly then bowled Kevin Pietersen to break Daredevils’ momentum in the chase. Warriors did not give it away in the final over either, with Alfonso Thomas conceding five when 26 were needed.LowlightThe win over Daredevils was about as good as it got for Warriors. It is difficult to pick one low moment in a season which descended into nine consecutive losses. Conceding a hat-trick to little-known Ajit Chandila, the Rajasthan Royals offspinner, comes to mind, as do the twin losses to fellow strugglers Deccan Chargers.VerdictSourav Ganguly or Yuvraj Singh, Warriors have only four wins to show for each season. Both campaigns began positively; 2012 slipped deeper than 2011, and never recovered. While Chargers copped the majority of criticism for their poor showing, they at least got into winning positions in several games only to lose, mostly, through elementary lapses in the field. Even when they did not lose heavily, though, Warriors hardly reached dominating positions, and were largely dull and uninspiring. It was a common feature of their performances previous season as well. It is difficult to blame captains in as volatile a format as Twenty20, but sequences of nine and seven straight defeats in 2012 and 2011 are damning. Yuvraj at least made lots of runs, and quickly. An average of 17.86 at a strike-rate of 98.89 with all but three innings at No. 3 or above show that Ganguly the batsman made it even harder for Ganguly the captain.

When you watch Pakistan play South Africa

Nitish Verma29-Sep-2012Choice of game
In my point of view, Super Eights are the star of this tournament. Pakistan v South Africa is always a good match to catch since they have a history of classic matches on the world stage: the 1999 World Cup and the 2009 World Twenty20 semi-final come to the mind. This one can be added to the list since it was a nail-biter.Key performer
Everyone was wondering whether Umar Gul would get to bowl since the spinners had South Africa in trouble. He came in the 18th over, got smacked for a six and dismissed AB de Villiers off his second ball. Then he came in to bat when Pakistan were 76 for 7. With Umar Akmal, he brought momentum to the innings and hit some of the biggest sixes of the day. His two back-to-back sixes showed he is confident while batting. The crowd went wild, to say the least.Security
Bags were checked twice and there were many cops around the ground. Despite the crowd dancing and singing, the security was enough tight enough to keep proceedings enjoyable and safe.Weather
Since my arrival in Colombo, I’ve heard thunderstorms being predicted daily. However, to everyone’s delight, conditions here were perfect for some T20 cricket.Crowd meter
The stadium was half full, and support for Pakistan overwhelmed the cheers for the South Africans. There were many neutrals who supported both teams. Sixes or wickets, the crowd was very involved in the game.Marks out of 10
9. A low-scoring game that went down to the wire. South Africa fought back from 28 for 3 to post a respectable score. Pakistan had begun their chase brightly when the South African bowlers struck, after which the two brave Umars brought Pakistan back into the match when all hope was gone. The tournament needed a match like this.