All posts by csb10.top

Sachin Tendulkar’s 113 took India to their highest score in the NatWest Series so far. It was his 33rd one-day century which helped India to a 63-run win over Sri Lanka at Bristol. He reckons that the fact India had already qualified for the final helped him to relax and play as he did.”Since we have qualified for the final I just wanted to go out there and enjoy myself,” he said. “It was a fantastic batting wicket too.”Meanwhile, the Sri Lankans will be pleased their tour is at an end after a run of disappointing results. Their captain Sanath Jayasuriya admitted things have not always gone as he would have liked over the past three months. He would certainly liked to have had his main bowler, off-spinner Muttiah Muralitharan, available throughout.”If Murali had been there this would have been a different game,” he said. “In this one-day series we would have won one or two games more at least.”Looking back on tonight’s defeat, Jayasuriya felt Sri Lanka could have done muchbetter after Kumar Sangakkara had given them a good start with his rapid innings of 66. But the turning point proved to be the departure of Mahela Jayawardene.”We started very well, and Sangakkara played very well. But to win chasing 300 you need someone to go on to a hundred,” Jayasuriya said. “A few got started, but nobody went on very far past 50. You cannot afford to do that if you are going to have a chance of a successful chase when the opposition has got such a big total.”

Otago joined the list of financial achievers over the past season by recording a small surplus of $3400, which represented a vast improvement and a turnaround of $186,948 within 12 months.That co-incided with a $186,395 increase in New Zealand Cricket (NZC) grants, and distributions, of $862,049, up from the previous year’s $675,654.Chief executive Graeme Elliott noted total expenses had been reduced from the previous year while income had increased by $170,000. The association had also benefited from a capital advance of $300,000 in funds from NZC.Otago have also made some strategic moves to capitalise on their turnaround.Steve Davie has been appointed as fundraiser and event manager which opened new areas from which to obtain regular annual income.”The real benefit from this appointment will be seen in the next financial accounts,” Elliott said.The staging of a One-Day International at Queenstown in the New Year also offered significant funding opportunities while the redevelopment of the University Oval would assist in reducing costs for the hosting of home matches in Dunedin while also providing membership opportunities for Otago Cricket.Elliott said the new strategic plan will be presented to the annual meeting on Thursday.”I am confident that we are moving in the right direction as we assemble the staff and resources to ensure that we are able to play a full part as a Major Cricket Association and develop the game in our region,” he said.A significant part of that is the appointment of Glenn Turner as the first full-time State Otago Volts coach.”With the appointment of Glenn for a two-year period, he has had the opportunity to plan for the coming season. A fit Shayne O’Connor and an enthusiastic Jeff Wilson will add real depth and experience to our team this season,” he said.Otago’s age-group teams continue to perform well and a huge investment was being made.”We have the structures in place to provide for the orderly development of players. Our High Performance Centre offers our teams and coaches excellent facilities for our winter programmes and we now have top class grass practice pitches constructed for the Under-19 World Cup. These will be of real value to all our teams as they prepare for tournaments,” he said.Elliott said coaching director Mike Hesson’s contribution had been outstanding.And on the playing side selection convener and Otago coach Turner said: “There was a strong emphasis on the three R’s this season, respect for self, respect for others, responsibility for all your actions.”In general a stronger approach to higher ethical standards. Otago Cricket made a concerted effort to follow and action ‘The Spirit of Cricket’ as outlined in the laws of cricket. If there had been a fair play award, the State Otago Volts would have won it this year.”Curiously, values have altered to the point whereby such an award is seen as a loser’s award. Unfortunately, this summer the Otago Volts added fuel to this myth in the four-day Championship.”It will be very interesting to follow the Volts fortunes in the 2002/03 season. Will last season’s approach of encouraging players to look deeper into their own game, taking responsibility for their own actions and being asked to come up with some of their own answers, be performance-enhancing in the long term?”

Zee Network are set to get the Indian television rights for the next four years. Jagmohan Dalmiya, the president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, announced in Chennai that the BCCI intended to award the contract to Zee subject to certain conditions. If Zee Network met the conditions laid out by the marketing committee of the board, ESPN-Star Sports, would lose out.”The president [Dalmiya] has announced that the BCCI intend to award the contract to Zee subject to them fulfilling certain criteria,” Professor Ratnakar Shetty, Joint Secretary of the board, told Wisden Cricinfo from Chennai. “They have to pay the board US$20million by Wednesay, September 8 and also furnish a bank gurantee for a further US$75million by September 15. The president has said the BCCI intended to award the rights to Zee Network if they can fulfil these, and certain other criteria.”The marketing committee of the BCCI was in negotiations with senior officials of both television companies in Chennai, and in the end decided to go with Zee, who had bid US$260million for the rights. Zee had also pledged a further US$20million towards coverage of domestic matches. ESPN-Star Sports, the other contender, had bid US$230million.It is also learnt that Zee, who upped their bid to US$308million in the last round of negotiations, are set to launch their own sports channel on October 2. Rediff quoted a Zee official who said: “We will invest Rs100 to 150 crores [US$22million approx] for the sports channel to be launched on October 2 and the cricket matches will be shown on it.” The uplinking will be done from Delhi and the official also added that the launch will coincide with the 12th anniversary of the group.One of the points of contention was that Zee Networks did not havein-house production facilities. Industry sources indicate that TENSports, who are an existing player in the cricket broadcastingbusiness, are frontrunners to produce the live cricket programming forZee Networks.When the tender opened for bids in the middle of August, Zee emerged as a surprise front-runner in the tussle to win telecast rights. Zee tabled a bid worth approximately US$262million, about $14million more than the ESPN-Star Sports offer. Prasar Bharati, the national broadcaster, were willing to cough up $153million. Sony Entertainment Television ($148million) and the Dubai-based Ten Sports ($141million) were the rank outsiders.

Man of the Match Keith Parsons was once more the hero for Somerset as they beat Worcestershire on Wednesday to progress to a lucrative home tie with Kent in the semi finals of the Cheltenham and Gloucester Trophy.In front of a crowd well in excess of 5500, Taunton born Parsons scored 121, his highest in one day cricket, took two wickets, held onto two catches and threw down the stumps to secure a run out.Already deprived of the services of Andrew Caddick and Richard Johnson, there was further injury misery for the Cidermen when Marcus Trescothick left the field in the 13th over of the morning with a broken left thumb, after fielding a fierce drive from Graeme Hick.The England man joins a long Somerset injury list and will be missing from the cricket scene for at least six weeks.At the start of the day Worcestershire had been put into bat, and after getting off to a flying start had been dismissed for 271.With the score on 118 for I after 18 overs and Graeme Hick scoring quickly 350 seemed to be possible. However Parsons had other ideas and in his third over he tempted the former England man to play inside a ball that went on to knock over his off stump.Hick and Vickram Solanki(53) had added 81 for the second wicket in 12 overs, but from that point on Worcestershire were reined back by some tight bowling and some excellent fielding.Despite an unbeaten 85 from number four batsman Ben Smith, with the exception of Steven Rhodes(15) the rest of the Worcestershire batsmen failed to make double figures and they were dismissed for 271 in 49 overs.The pick of the Somerset bowlers were Steffan Jones who ended with 3 for 47, Parsons who took 2 for 37 and Mike Burns 2 for 53.In reply Somerset had slipped to 36 for 2 before Parsons walked to the wicket. Sharing in fifty plus stands with Burns (24) Blackwell(30) and then the match winning fifth wicket partnership of 106 with Rob Turner (47) Parsons took the Cidermen to within sight of the victory that had seemed highly unlikely earlier in the day.In the end it was left to Keith Dutch to hit the winning runs to see Somerset home by 4 wickets with 15 balls to spare.After the match Somerset coach Kevin Shine told me: "This was the greatest performance that I’ve seen from the boys since I took over as coach. Everything seemed to have gone against us, but we still ended up winning."

Our last week here in New Zealand was filled with a mixture of emotions. We were ecstatic when we beat India in the semifinals last Sunday. It gave us a full week to recharge our batteries and prepare for the final on Saturday, 9 February.However, like when we first arrived here, the weather was determined to play a major role in the way the tournament was to proceed. The East coast of this region of the South island was hit by a huge storm and this meant that we were unable to train outdoors for three full days. It also meant that the semifinal match between Australia and the West Indies had to be postponed from the Wednesday to the Thursday which the Aussies won and only by Thursday evening did we know who our opponents for the final would be.During this week we had to struggle against the threat of boredom. A planned golf day and a visit to the beach had to be cancelled due to the poor weather. Nevertheless we managed to see at least 2 good movies, do a fair amount of shopping and was forced to improvise and move our training to the indoor facilities here at Lincoln University.Our squad of players was like a caged animal desperately trying to get out and run free. It was a long week for us, but finally Saturday arrived and we resigned ourselves to the fact that no more preparations could be done that would allow us to perform better. Despite the obstacles of this long week we did feel that in the end we were prepared as well as we could be for the challenge of competing in the Under 19 World Cup Final against the Aussies!On the morning of the match the sun shone as bright as ever and any thoughts of the storm that had prevailed earlier in the week was now a distant memory. Things seemed to get even better when our captain Hashim Amla won the toss for the umpteenth time in this tournament and decided that we would bat.We had a solid start to the match and at 12 overs we were cruising at just under five runs an over despite having lost two early wickets. From this point, things started going horribly wrong for us. We suffered two silly run-outs at crucial points of the match and was never really able to recover from this as we had lost two of our better batsmen. The fact that they were also our better players of spin was compounded by the fact that the Aussies were playing four spinners in their team. Things were going really badly until our wicket-keeper Zwelibansi “Bob” Homani came to our rescue and hit an unbeaten 53. Bob unfortunately ran out of overs an we ended with a score of 206, a remarkable feat considering the obstacles in the middle of the innings.The rest of this match was something we would prefer to forget. despite our bowlers bowling very well and consistently beating the bat, we were unfortunate not to take wickets and somehow lady luck did not smile on us with any “lucky breaks”. The Australians eventually beat us by seven wickets – a statistic we did not feel reflected our worth as a team – they were simply better than us on the day! To the credit of our players, they tried all the way to the end and should be commended for their efforts to have reached this stage of the tournament. No doubt many of our players will have learnt from their experiences at this World Cup and this can only bode well for our cricket.Later that evening we attended the final dinner along with the other semifinalists of both the Super League and the Plate Championship. It was an opportunity to mix with players from the other countries without the tension of competition in the air. A good night was had by all and certainly by the end of the evening, the bitter taste of defeat was beginning to fade.A lie-in on in the morning and an easy day of packing before the long flight home was our main activity as we awoke on our second last day in New Zealand. We were all bracing ourselves for the early start to our final day. We had to be up at 03h00 to allow us to leave for Christchurch airport at 04h15 to catch a connecting flight at 06h30 to Sydney and then on to Johannesburg. The only good thought that we had about all this travel was the knowledge that we will soon be back on South African soil.The tour had flown by from the first day we met as a team on 4 January and I think that I speak on behalf of the entire squad when I say that it was a fantastic experience that will remain in our minds and hearts for the rest of our lives. Our only regret would be that we did not bring back the World Cup.For myself and Anton Ferreira who accompanied us as a technical advisor, it is even harder to bear as it is the third Under 19 World Cup that we have had the pleasure of participating in without winning the big prize.No doubt other South African Under 19 teams will compete at other world cups in the years to come. Maybe they will have the benefit of our experiences here to allow them to go one step better and have a little more success than we did. They will however never be the same team, as the Under 19 team of 2002 of which, I can honestly say, “I am proud to have been a member of”.Farewell,Shane Jabaar (fizzer)

Have New Zealand flattered to deceive with their first-up victory over Sri Lanka at Sharjah?By taking their victory by 11 runs, this despite losing five wickets for nine runs to the one-man Sri Lankan demolition squad that is Muttiah Muralitharan, the New Zealanders have extended their run of successes at Sharjah over the Sri Lankans to 6-1, with one tied.This suggests a degree of dominance over the highly-ranked Sri Lankans, but in effect most of the results were achieved a good time ago.The real scorecard at all venues in their most recent contests has Sri Lanka leading New Zealand 8-3.And that is what makes last night’s success all the more important for New Zealand.The side is now in World Cup countdown mode and every step along the way is another step toward ensuring strategies are in place to counter whatever situations arrive during the World Cup.Clearly the Muralitharan factor needs some tweaking. In 23 ODIs against New Zealand, he has taken 39 of his 275 ODI wickets at an economy rate of 3.64.But on last night’s performance his economy rate was down to 0.9!With one more game, and hopefully two, against Sri Lanka in the tournament, there is a need to go some way down the road towards uncovering the mischievousness of his bowling. For a team that managed to unmask Shane Warne during the last summer, there is surely some method whereby Muralitharan’s effect can be negated.New Zealand are not alone in their inability to get on top of him, but having the confidence to cope with him goes a long way towards ensuring he doesn’t hold the whip hand in the World Cup final, and that is how every opponent must be viewed now.Considering that New Zealand went into the match under-strength, without Chris Cairns, and latterly without Andre Adams, the effort to win the game had to be admired. Adams was hit in the jaw in pre-match training and is not expected to be able to play tomorrow night’s game against Pakistan either.This is a good Sri Lankan unit which has had the wood over New Zealand in recent years so the ability to fight back is encouraging. No one bowler dominated the Sri Lankan innings which suggested some outstanding teamwork to achieve the win.From New Zealand’s point of view, there had to be huge encouragement from Jacob Oram’s return to international matchplay. Batting at No 8, his 46 off 33 balls again proved crucial in ensuring Sri Lanka would have a sizeable total to chase. And with the ball he took one for 31 from 7.1 overs.This is significant for New Zealand. Oram’s all-round abilities, including his fielding, coupled with Adams’ qualities, blended in with what Cairns has to offer, along with Chris Harris, Nathan Astle and Craig McMillan, gives New Zealand some outstanding options. To have all these players firing is exciting, and would make the side very competitive in any World Cup scenario.It was interesting that Chris Nevin was the victim of the law which does not allow a television umpire to intercede if a player has clearly not hit the ball. When a catch was claimed off Nevin the enquiry from the umpire on the ground only asked if the ‘catch’ had been held. The replay showed his bat was well away from the ball, but the third umpire could only comment on the query.With that in mind it is not surprising that Mathew Sinclair stood his ground in the face of umpire Srinivas Venkataraghavan’s decision he had been caught. Sinclair claimed the ball was off his arm, and Venkat discussed the matter with Sanath Jayasuriya and changed his decision.New Zealand has started to up its consistency rate in ODIs, and in the calendar year 2002, it has won eight of 16 ODIs which is a success ratio of 50% – not insignificant considering Australia, South Africa and Sri Lanka must all be genuine contenders for the World Cup. When compared to New Zealand’s all-time success rate of only 43%, that is a start.Lifting both statistics even higher by year’s end will be a significant factor for confidence when embarking for South Africa next January.

In the end it all proved too much. For four days England played with commitment against a noisy Sri Lankan team, in sapping heat, on a puffy pitch, with umpires who were inconsistent. It was a frightful experience and it finally broke the tourists.When they started this morning, with the reassuring presence of Michael Atherton and Graham Thorpe at the crease, they would have retained realistic hopes of batting out the day on a pitch that, though spinning like a top, wasn’t as volatile as had been expected before the game.

Those hopes were dashed as England lost Atherton, Thorpe and Graeme Hick before the lunch interval. In the afternoon session they then capitulated, losing their last five wickets for 13 runs to lose the game by an innings and 28 runs.Once again, the umpiring decisions of Peter Manuel and A.V Jayaprakash dominated the minds of the players, the media and especially the supporters.Some English fans booed the umpires last night as they left the field and a small band tried to hunt them down later in their beachside hotel. Today, they hooted with glee at every decision turned down and growled with frustration whenever the finger was raised.They did not have to wait long for action too, as Michael Atherton failed to add to his overnight score of 44. He was caught behind in Chaminda Vaas’s first over of the day. A.V Jayaprakash raised his finger, although television replays confirmed that it was close enough to warrant a trial by television.Alec Stewart and Graham Thorpe batted for an hour as they added 22 runs. It was trench-like stuff, a squirted single here, a guided edge there, but Stewart was more fluent than he had been in the first innings. He even hit four boundaries in his unbeaten 34, including two off Muralitharan, a feat that only Trescothick had previously managed in this match.But Jayasuriya’s regular rotation of his bowlers finally paid dividends as Kumar Dharmasena ended Thorpe’s two-hour resistance, trapping him lbw with a quicker delivery. Graeme Hick was then caught at second slip off Jayasuriya for six.England went into lunch on 174 for five. Shortly afterwards Craig White prodded forward to Muttiah Muralitharan, in the 103rd over of the innings, and offered a simple bat-pad catch. Jayaprakash ruled not out and the Barmy Army wailed with delight. The next ball White tried to sweep a full-length ball. It struck him outside the line of off stump, but the dreaded finger went up nevertheless.

It was all downhill from there. Caddick was bowled around his legs by Jayasuriya, Ashley Giles was pinned to his stumps by the beguiling Muralitharan, Robert Croft appeared to have edged on to his pads, but was adjudged lbw, and Darren Gough was bowled, first ball.Dav Whatmore was delighted with his team’s performance: “I thought it was a fantastic effort, with a controlled amount of energy throughout those four-and-a-half-days. The taste of victory is always sweet, but particularly so against an England side that has shown signs of improvement recently.”Not everyone agreed with the phrase “controlled amount of energy.” The Sri Lankans are being accused of pressurising the umpires through excessive appealing.Sanath Jayasuriya can’t see what all the fuss is about: “I spoke to the players after the Match Referee spoke to us yesterday morning about excessive appealing. I don’t think there is a problem there. The players are human beings and they are used to appealing in these conditions where the ball is turning and keeping low.”The Match Referee, Hanumant Singh, did not agree. He has fined Muttiah Muralitharan, Russel Arnold, Mahela Jayawardene and Kumar Sangakkara 25% of their match fee for “unnecessary appealing and running towards the umpire in jubilation before the decision is given.”

Glamorgan County Cricket Club confirmed today that the One-Day International between Australia and Pakistan in Cardiff on Saturday 9 June has now sold out.Chief Executive Mike Fatkin said: “We’re naturally delighted to have sold all of the tickets for the game next month.”This is, apart from the World Cup game we hosted in 1999, our first experience of formal international cricket and the response from the public has been tremendous.”Things are taking shape on the ground already and we’re all looking forward to the game itself.”

A crucial half-century by No. 8 Qaiser Abbas took National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) to a two-wicket win against Port Qasim Authority (PQA) at the Gaddafi Stadium.Chasing 211, NBP were in trouble at 122 for 6 when seamer Tanvir Ahmed, who took 12 wickets in the match, ran through the top order. But a defiant seventh wicket partnership of 84, led by Abbas, revived the chase and helped them secure victory.Neither team dominated the low-scoring game but NBP were at a slight disadvantage after the first innings, when a seven-wicket haul by Ahmed bowled them out for 117, leaving them 33 behind. The last six wickets fell for 16 runs.As PQA looked to consolidate on the lead and set their opponents a stiff target, fast bowler Umaid Asif took 5 for 55 to peg them back in their second innings. Umar Amin and No. 7 Daniyal Ahsan scored 42 and 45 respectively to help them reach 177 before being bowled out. Yet, a target of 211 meant NBP has to score the highest total in the match to win it.After the early loss of opener Nasir Jamshed, NBP were given a platform by Sami Aslam and Umair Khan, and later Wahab Riaz. But three wickets for two runs changed the complexion of the game, with 129 runs still needed. Abbas sealed the chase with his 52 off 66 deliveries.Despite the game being dominated by bowlers, fast bowler Riaz went wicketless in the game, and Mohammad Sami, who had taken seven wickets against Pakistan International Airlines a fortnight ago, took two wickets. Opener Jamshed managed only 11 runs across both innings.

The NSWIS (New South Wales Institute of Sport) Blues have defeated the Queensland Fire by 33 runs to take a 1-0 lead in the best-of-three final series of the 2000-01 Women’s National Cricket League at Bankstown Oval, Sydney, today.A powerful 80 by former Australian batsman Michelle Goszko, playing on her home ground in grade competition, carried the Blues to an impressive fifty-over total of 5/234 after NSW captain Belinda Clark won the toss and elected to bat.Goszko shared a third-wicket partnership of 116 with Lisa Sthalekar (43) to lift the Blues’ scoring rate in excess of 4.5 per over.Pace bowlers Tricia Brown (2/57) and Kelly Klibbe (2/58) had the most success for the Fire, while Cindy Kross bowled her ten overs unchanged for the figures of 0/16. But the NSW bats always looked comfortably on target for a 200-plus score.Vanessa Pickering (35) and Melissa Bulow (37) made an impressive start to Queensland’s pursuit of 235 in the early overs, however the introduction of slow bowlers Hayes and Sthalekar to the NSW attack but the brakes on the scoring.When both openers were removed, Queensland were 2/80 in the 30th over and well behind the required run-rate. Sally Cooper (78 not out from 60 balls) played a superb knock, hitting two big sixes, but had little support. The last five wickets fell for 12 runs with the chase beyond Queensland’s reach, the Fire all out for 201 in 48.3 overs.Left-arm pace bowler Emma Liddell (4/33) was the most successful of the NSW bowlers, while Lisa Sthalekar bowled ten overs of tidy off-spin to concede 0/20. Bronwyn Calver claimed 3/48, but suffered an injury to her left thumb late in the game when taking a return catch to dismiss Cindy Kross.New South Wales have won the Women’s National League in each of the last four seasons and will be looking to another win over Queensland tomorrow in the second final to make it five in a row. Queensland, the only side to beat the Blues in the round-robin series this season, need a victory tomorrow to take the finals series into a third day on Sunday.