Fast bowler Hasan Ali on leading the Pakistan attack in the Champions Trophy, and the influence his older brother has had on the way he bowls

Interview by Nagraj Gollapudi20-Jun-2017It’s almost time to break his fast. We have been chatting for half an hour. Hasan Ali is hungry. A box of cookies lies near him. Hasan refuses to look at it because he is resisting anything that has sugar in it. He will not compromise on fitness, the biggest thing he has learnt a player needs to maintain to be successful in international cricket.Almost a year since his international debut last August, Hasan has already broken many records. On Sunday, he took the final Indian wicket to signal Pakistan’s triumph in the Champions Trophy. He led the tournament’s wickets chart with 13 dismissals. Only 23 years old, Hasan, his coaches say, is well settled. Sure enough, he speaks like a leader.How did you become a fast bowler?
I started playing cricket, like many in Pakistan – in the [I had a passion]. So your brother has been the force behind your rise?
The one big moment in my young days arrived when I was 13. [older brother]. For me, he sacrificed his food, his sleep, everything.Your home town of Gujranwala is famous for producing wrestlers, not cricketers. You don’t look like a wrestler, but you also don’t look like a fast bowler with your lean physique.
I am short. Physically also, I am not imposing. During my young days, if I told people I was a fast bowler, they would not believe me. But when I bowled, they would nod their heads and say there is something in this boy. My strength has always been to work hard. – is never to be afraid of anyone. Tell yourself you are the best, have belief and stay calm. And never forget to work hard.You have even overshadowed your senior bowling partners like Mohammad Amir.
Amir bomb [It’s like a bomb that explodes as soon as I take a wicket]. I did not learn it from anyone. I just wanted to be different. I wanted people to remember me with that celebration. My hand goes down, then both hands come up and then I tilt my face upwards to thank the almighty. I started this celebration in the PSL.How has the PSL helped you skills-wise?
When I joined Peshawar Zalmi, we also had Shaun Tait in the squad. I asked him when he bowled at his fastest. He said when he was about 22. He would just head to the nets and try bowling the fastest he could.How important is bowling fast to you?
I bowl according to the conditions. Pace does not matter if you bowl at 140kph or 150kph. If you have pace, you can ally it with your skills. Recently, during the West Indies ODI series I clocked 146kph. Even in the Champions Trophy, I crossed the 140-mark a few times. It feels good when you bowl 145kph and people tell you “well done, good pace”. It boosts you.What has this first year in international cricket taught you?
The biggest and most important thing is fitness. If you are fit, you can give your 100%, otherwise you cannot. You need to focus. You need to have a plan. You need to know what you are going to bowl. You need to understand where to bowl to whom.So have your eating habits also changed?
I have almost stopped eating anything sweet. For the past few months I have not been eating rice and roti. I am eating all these disgusting things that have no taste. Now I eat mostly grilled food. Having come from a desi place, I have eaten different stuff from birth. Now, when I go home I tell ammi [mother] and bhabhi [sister-in-law] the few things I can eat.What is the biggest gift you have given your brother?
The golden ball award is for him. Also, when I won the Man-of-the-Match award against England in the semi-final, it was for him as it was his birthday the next day.

Joe Root will be cheered on by his home crowd at Headingley while for his opposite number the challenge is to make England work harder than last week

Alan Gardner24-Aug-20171:42

‘Through hard times we have to stay together’ – Holder

Yorkshire, and Headingley in particular, is a pretty good place in which ponder captaincy – a pretty good place in which to ponder most matters cricketing, the locals might add. The ground of Hutton and Close, Illingworth (with a grudging nod to Leicestershire) and Vaughan will this match fete the latest member of a proud lineage when Joe Root leads England out for the first time in a Test on his home ground. However well he does – and England will seal the series if they can win for the fourth time in a row – he can expect plenty of feedback.Root has probably already passed his probation, with England’s response to their defeat by South Africa at Trent Bridge last month providing solid evidence for the appraisal. Tougher challenges await, not least a looming winter in Australia, but Root is beginning to shape this England team to reflect his own moods and disposition. The nerves of Lord’s have quickly been replaced by the steel that tempers his batting.The man opposite him at the coin toss on Friday is striving admirably to do the same thing – though Jason Holder, Root’s junior by ten months, has been doing the job for almost two years. His struggles are more of a reflection on the systemic problems that have bedevilled West Indies cricket for the last 20 years but Holder could be forgiven for wondering if there were more rewarding furrows to plough.He has been offered feedback at every turn for the last week – whether wanted or not – and knows what to expect if West Indies cannot lift themselves above the low bar they set at Edgbaston. For Holder, playing Test cricket was a childhood dream and captaining the side is a calling that he won’t shirk. Like Root, he is a softly spoken young man trying his damnedest to fashion a group of players in his own hard-working image.”It’s not easy,” Holder said. “We haven’t had the best results over the last few years but I enjoy it. I don’t shy away from it and I don’t think I’d ever give it up. There might be a situation where people want to move on from me but I can’t control that. The one thing I can control is trying to get the best out of each and every individual in the dressing room and I try my best to do that. One thing I’ve said to myself is that when I leave here just leave some kind of mark on it. So far the guys have been quite receptive and helped me out tremendously. It is a young group, we’re trying to learn as fast as we possibly can under the circumstances we’re faced with.”Jason Holder ponders the challenge ahead•Getty ImagesWest Indies have battened down the hatches in the days since Edgbaston, working with the team’s sports psychologist, Steve Sylvester, and trying to “understand our games a bit more”. On Tuesday, they visited Bramall Lane – no longer a Test ground but the home of Sheffield United (coincidentally the team Root supports). The knives may have been out but the Blades were more welcoming.”I don’t really hear it,” Holder said of the criticism. “I can’t change it or control so it’s a waste of time worrying about it. We’ve taken a fair bit of criticism from West Indians and English and everybody else to be honest. That’s something that inspires or motivates some people and it breaks some people. But for us we’ve got to stay together as a side for people who might not necessarily be able to handle it. For the people it motivates that must drive them to get the best out of themselves.”While Holder and the coach, Stuart Law, attempt to rally a dressing room that has experienced far more dales than peaks in recent times, England are in no mood to offer mercy. Root gives the impression that some traditionally Yorkshire straight-talking was required after England followed a resounding win over South Africa at Lord’s with pusillanimous defeat a week later and he wants the team to continue honing a harder edge at Headingley.That also comes with a tacit admission that there are future battles to prepare for. Chris Woakes’ return in place of Toby Roland-Jones – a man who Root said had “not done a lot wrong” – suggested they are edging closer to their preferred XI ahead of the Ashes. Root’s demand of his players “mentally being ruthless and at no point easing off the gas when we get into a position of strength” seems to have been reflected in selection.”It is important to make sure we win this series,” he said. “After a strong performance last week it is vitally important that we back that up. Earlier on in the summer at Trent Bridge we didn’t play as well as we could have after a really strong start to that series against South Africa. Having that mentality of going out and backing that up and trying to gain some momentum and consistency moving ahead is really important.”It’s alright saying things and asking the guys to do it but when they go out there and back up performances it makes it really pleasing that the message is getting across and we are capable of doing those things. So for me it’s just another opportunity to go out and gather that momentum and gain some more consistency.”Words from a captain are only so important as the responses they provoke, of course. England’s other selection issues revolve around opener, No. 3 and No. 5 – currently Mark Stoneman, Tom Westley and Dawid Malan – and Root had straightforward advice. “I think the only message for those guys is to go out there and take this opportunity. It’s another week of hard Test cricket, where of course guys are under different pressures wherever they bat in the batting order. If they want to nail down those spots they have to deal with that and, if they get in, make it really count.”Root’s family will heading across from Sheffield “in their forces” to watch on, as English cricket’s heartland prepares for an outpouring of pride – Jonny Bairstow’s advice on Twitter was for Yorkshire folk to “get your hands in your pockets and get here”. For Holder and a West Indies side bowed by the weight of history and their current diminished circumstances, pride must come from within.

England’s inability to crack Australia’s lower-order, or shore up their own, is the biggest indicator of the gulf between the sides

Daniel Brettig in Perth17-Dec-20170:57

Australia channeling the Mitchell Johnson ‘snowball effect’

Wickets fall fast at the WACA Ground. Australia have beaten England here in two and a half days (1998), and lost to West Indies even faster than that (1993).Even in the ground’s more recent, less lively years, the extra bounce means it is still a difficult place to start an innings, often resulting in days of free and rapid scoring that are followed by sessions in which the bowlers dominate. So when Australia gave up 3 for 12 early on the fourth day it could quite easily have been expected to be followed by another three rapid wickets and the cessation of the innings.James Anderson, after all, was moving the ball through the air and off the seam, the WACA Ground’s cracks were opening up, and Australia’s bowlers were impatient to set about England’s second innings. But instead of the procession continuing in more typical WACA fashion, a crowd of 18,688 witnessed the maintenance of a theme dictated more by the nature of this Ashes contest than the locations at which it has so far been played.Pat Cummins has so far been a thorn in England’s side when batting in each first innings, and in the company of a doughty wicketkeeper in Tim Paine he was to be one again. Despite numerous balls snaking along the ground or deviating sharply off the cracks, Cummins made it to 41 in adding 93 with Paine, extending Australia’s innings until it became their highest Ashes tally since Cardiff in 2009, while also keeping England’s fielders on their feet for another 21 frustrating overs.As a batting talent, Cummins has plenty to offer, as he has now shown in numerous pressurised situations, whether it be shovelling the winning runs off Imran Tahir at the end of his storied Johannesburg debut in 2011, hitting out in a narrow loss to Bangladesh earlier this year, or repeatedly foiling England’s attempts to push further into the Australian tail. Mitchell Starc had no qualms recently in saying he was happy for Cummins to move up the order, while the bowler himself has commented this series on his strong desire to keep England’s bowlers out in the middle for extended periods, the better to aid the overall team cause.All this is indicative of a team operating in sync, as batsmen and bowlers alike see their role as making as many runs as possible while discomforting the opposition, and of a lower order enjoying the fact that those above them are making runs that mean things are not quite so hot when it is eventually their turn to bat. When looking for areas of required improvement ahead of this Ashes series, greater effectiveness from the middle order and tail was high on the list of the coach Darren Lehmann, with the displays of Shaun and then Mitchell Marsh at No. 6 aiding Paine and in turn Cummins to contribute further.However there is another side of the lower-order tale, which involves looking across at the state of England’s bowlers with the bat. Just as surely as Cummins’ confidence has grown across the series, so too has that of Moeen Ali, Stuart Broad and James Anderson ebbed away. Moeen’s difficulties in dealing with bounce have gradually compounded against both spin and speed, while Broad and Anderson have grown increasingly hesitant about spending too much time exposed to Australia’s pacemen.Pat Cummins piles into Moeen Ali’s offspin•Getty ImagesAs a younger player, Broad was very much in the Cummins mould, showing plenty of talent for shotmaking but also a willingness to hang around. His batting peaked at the age of 24 with an extraordinary innings of 169 from No. 9, the same spot occupied by Cummins, against Pakistan at Lord’s. But time, several ugly blows including a sickener from Varun Aaron in 2014, and the mental hurdle of Australia’s greater velocity have all compounded to have him looking less and less likely to pose a problem.Anderson, meanwhile, is nowhere near as capable, but has in the past been willing to hang around when required – such as at the end of the aforementioned Cardiff match in 2009 when he and Monty Panesar secured the most fortunate of draws. Yet even when asked earlier in the series about his prospects if required to help conclude an unlikely fourth-innings chase in Adelaide, Anderson could say he was only good for around 10 runs needed.The sight of Broad and Anderson flailing about at the conclusion of England’s first innings on day two was a source of considerable satisfaction for the Australians, for it proved they had once again imposed a sense of trepidation in England’s tail that outstripped any desire to hang around for the good of the team. Certainly Josh Hazlewood saw it that way, and contrasted it directly with what Cummins had been able to provide.”We work hard on our batting all the time and I think we’ve seen Patty Cummins especially this year hang around with a batter or with the tail and score some useful runs,” Hazlewood said. “We pride ourselves on that and we’ve made their tail feel very uncomfortable and they were obviously a bit sore the day before yesterday, they didn’t want to be out there and we’ll continue to use the same method we have been. We saw with Mitchell Johnson last time it just kept snowballing as the series went on, so we’ll keep continuing to do that and hopefully have the same results.”Australia had been very eager to remind both themselves and England of 2013-14 in the lead-up to this encounter, to the extent that the captain Steven Smith said he wanted to have some of the older visiting players to be thinking “oh not this again” after their difficulties four years ago. While the personnel on both sides is different, the lower-order theme has been remarkably similar, this time personified by Cummins where last time it was largely the work of Brad Haddin, now the team’s fielding coach.At the same time, England’s dressing room conversations can only be guessed at, but the recollections of Graeme Swann give some idea of how things deteriorated in terms of how other viewed the bowlers’ attitude to batting. “[Graham] Gooch had a go at me and Broady for not scoring many runs,” Swann told the BBC.”And as Stuart pointed out very succinctly, we go in at eight and nine for a reason. If we go in at 300 for 6, we’ll get you another 100 runs. If we go in at 80 for 6 and Johnson’s only bowled three overs, we’re not, mate. And that wasn’t taken well. ‘Don’t blame our batsmen, it’s your fault, you’ve got to chip in down the order’. The wheels had fallen off: who can we blame?”Add to all this the missing heft of Ben Stokes, and there is plenty of evidence to suggest that England’s lower order is not just a source of trouble for the tourists, but a symptom of wider issues within. Equally, its under-perfomance relative to Australia means that the hosts are not fretting much at all about the unseasonal rain that has descended on Perth towards the end of this Test. All available evidence suggests they need only one or two breakthroughs to quickly roll up the rest, as so much WACA Ground history dictates.

England’s seamers have been more effective than Australia’s when bowling a good length, and this MCG pitch could test Australia’s ability to take wickets off the short or full deliveries

S Rajesh26-Dec-2017The MCG pitch has been roundly criticised after the first day of the Boxing Day Test, and rightly so. The lack of pace and bounce on the track has resulted in an attritional battle, with most of the batsmen struggling to time their strokes and score quickly, and equally, the bowlers struggling to extract much from the pitch to get wickets. Apart from David Warner, none of the batsmen managed a strike-rate of 50 on the opening day (though Steven Smith, the man who can do almost anything, is nearly there).On such a surface, the key attributes for both batsmen and bowlers are patience and discipline, virtues that are more English than Australian. When England’s seamers bowled on a good length on the first day, Australia hardly managed anything apart from a defensive bat: off 221 such balls, only 39 runs were scored and three wickets lost – that is a scoring rate of 1.05 runs per over. Shaun Marsh scored a solitary run off 37 good-length balls during his unbeaten 31.However, against all other lengths from the seamers, they scored 148 from 236 balls without losing a wicket, which is a rate of 3.76 runs per over. In the first session, when Warner was blazing away, the rate was 5.54 (73 from 79 balls). That England’s seamers gave away these runs would disappoint them, while Australia would be pleased they lost only three wickets in conditions that are atypical for their batsmen.

James Anderson was vocal in his criticism of the pitch after the first day, but these conditions should suit England more than the conditions in the three earlier Tests. For one, pitching it on a good length seems to be more profitable for the seamers here than in the first three Tests: as the table below shows, scoring off the length ball wasn’t as tough in the three previous Tests.

Second, keeping it on a good length and inducing errors from the batsmen is a more English way of taking wickets than an Australian way. In this series itself, there is hardly any aspect in which Australia haven’t bossed England, but the good-length ball has been more profitable for England: their fast bowlers have averaged 30.94 runs per wicket when bowling that length, compared to 41 for Australia. The hosts’ preferred method has been to blast batsmen out with back of a length, short or full balls, which is borne out by their stats when bowling any length other than the good length: they have averaged 19.3 compared to England’s woeful 60.66.These numbers also explain why England have been so lethal in home conditions, where the good length fetches them far greater rewards by way of seam movement and wickets. The relative lack of pace in England also makes the short ball – and hence the full delivery – less effective than in Australia.In this series so far, all the Australian quick bowlers have averaged more than 33 when bowling the good-length ball – Mitchell Starc has averaged 33.6 (five wickets), Josh Hazlewood 36.25 (four wickets) and Pat Cummins 55 (three wickets). On this surface, Jackson Bird’s bowling style might be more suited to the conditions than Starc’s, but England’s batsmen should still fancy themselves to put up more runs on the board than they did in the first three Tests. For Australia, it will be a test of whether to stick their trusted method in the belief that it will work here as well, or whether to adapt and prove to England that they can beat them at the good-length game too.

The timing of Ben Stokes’ recall will raise eyebrows, but the need to be ‘fair, reasonable and proportional’ is the justification for the ECB’s actions

Andrew Miller17-Jan-2018The decision to allow Ben Stokes to resume his England career, immediately after he was charged with affray following an alleged incident in Bristol in September, is an appropriately muddled response to an issue that has tied English cricket in knots for the best part of four months.You can tell from the ECB’s statement that this was not a decision that they reached lightly. “A full Board discussion, in which all considerations were taken into account” sounds euphemistically like a bunfight, especially when you take into account the clear divisions in the ranks of the ECB’s 13 board members that were reported by The Times on Monday.On the one hand, there were the pragmatists (most notably, it seems, the top brass of Tom Harrison and Colin Graves) who recognise Stokes’ huge and enduring value as both an England match-winner and an ECB “brand leader”, and who have been adamant for several months now that his rehabilitation, as far as possible, should be conducted on the field.On the other hand, those with little or no involvement in the board’s day-to-day operations, such as the independent director, Lord Patel of Bradford, appear to have had more leeway to allow their objections to hold sway – and given that their number include, among others, a headteacher and a former deputy police commissioner – it’s clear that those concerns will have been given a significant and solemn airing.However, when push comes to shove in the cold, hard world of sports business, morality tends to play second fiddle to expediency, and it’s been self-evident for months now that England have been itching to get their star turn back into the limelight.After all, he’s been named (with obvious caveats) in every England squad since his arrest was confirmed in September – most notably, of course, the Ashes, for which he was even retained as vice-captain until the publication of video purporting to show the incident made his retention for that series too hot an issue to countenance.From that moment on, irrespective of the video’s authenticity, the ECB’s desire to ensure that England’s best player was available for their biggest series of the year had to be over-ridden by the concerns that his presence, or rather the “circus” surrounding his presence, would have detracted from the main event and brought their sport into disrepute. With that in mind, it is telling that he is not being parachuted straight back into Australia for the start of the T20 triangular, but is being teed up for a lower-key landing in New Zealand later in the tournament.But even in the midst of his Ashes exile, Stokes seemed to remain a phonecall away from a recall. There he was, hotfooting it to New Zealand on November 27, armed with an ECB no-objection certificate to play club cricket for Canterbury – and at the earliest possible juncture, it soon transpired, given that Avon and Somerset Police announced the conclusion of their investigation just two days later. And now, here he is, at the end of another 48-hour operational lag, being teed up for an international recall.Perhaps the ECB have been taken aback by just how slowly the wheels of justice have been grinding during the past third of a year, though there was never any reason to believe that Stokes’ high profile would be a reason to rush the process – quite the contrary, it could be argued. Nevertheless, their decision to slipstream the legal process by deferring any judgement until the CPS made the first move now leaves them wide open to accusations of hypocrisy.Ben Stokes walks through the airport surrounded by media•Getty ImagesPerhaps that is an unfair accusation to level at the board. Ultimately, the ECB have fallen back on that basic tenet of British law, that the accused are innocent until proven guilty – and Stokes’ own statement on Monday, in which he signalled his intention to plead not guilty by welcoming the concurrent prosecution of two other suspects, Ryan Hale and Ryan Ali, was an open invitation for the bosses to back their man.It appears that they may also have been swayed by legal advice – now that he has been officially charged, it could have been prejudicial to his trial were the ECB to extend his exile any longer, plus a potential restraint of trade.But that question of morality still lingers in the background of this story – heightened, of course, by the fact that Stokes’ primary employees are country, not club, which (rightly or wrongly) elevates his career from that of an ordinary sportsman to, for want of a better phrase, a national ambassador.A precedent for this differentiation was set in 2000, when the Leeds United footballers, Jonathan Woodgate and Lee Bowyer, stood trial after being charged with grievous bodily harm and affray. They remained available for their club throughout the legal process, as indeed Stokes has in being cleared for his Canterbury stint and, it appears, for the IPL. However, Woodgate (who was ultimately found guilty of the latter charge) was suspended by England and missed both Euro 2000 and the 2002 World Cup.But, with that in mind, it should also be recognised how much of a punishment Stokes has already served for a crime that a court of law may yet determine that he did not actually commit. For all of the lip service that can be paid to Test cricket in the modern T20-driven world, there is still little doubt that the Ashes remains the “pinnacle” for all English and Australian cricketers. Not only has Stokes been deselected from a series in which he would surely have played a central role, he has had to watch his team-mates get crushed 4-0 in his absence and, moreover, have their off-field activities subjected to a level of scrutiny that, as he has already acknowledged, would not have been the case but for his actions.It’s a short shelf life at the top for elite sportsmen – even the greatest allrounder in England’s history, Ian Botham, was visibly past his prime by the age of 27, which will be Stokes’ next birthday. There’s no reason to believe he won’t be at the very top of his game when England next tour Australia in 2021-22, but this is a winter he will never get back, and will unquestionably regret for the rest of his life.As the ECB acknowledged, it would not be “fair, reasonable or proportionate for Ben Stokes to remain unavailable for a further indeterminate period”. Whatever verdict is delivered by Bristol Magistrates’ Court in the near future, few could deny that he’s been significantly punished already.

Nicknamed ‘camel’, the fast bowler recorded the most economical spell – 4-0-8-4 –
by an Australian in T20Is

Liam Brickhill in Harare02-Jul-2018Billy Stanlake has rediscovered his aggressive streak. Less than a week after he was carted for 44 in three overs at Edgbaston, Stanlake recorded the most economical completed spell by an Australian in T20Is, with his four wickets coming at a cost of only eight runs. That this was to be Australia’s day became apparent right from the moment the anthems rang out across the ground.The singing of national anthems is a standard of international sport, but Australia were taken by surprise when the PA system at Harare Sports Club belted out not just one, but two verses of . That’s the sort of thing usually for Australia Day or state funerals. There were some wry smiles, and some fluffed lines, and the jokes continued when the team took the field, with plenty of laughs when the cover fielders set up and then launched into a second verse of “c’mon Billy’s” to complement their first round as Billy Stanlake stood smiling at the end of his run-up.”[The second verse] took a lot of us by surprise,” Stanlake joked after the game. “We sort of took our arms away from each other and were ready to start going, and then we had to keep singing. Most of us actually hadn’t heard that before. Growing up back home through school it was never played, so it took all of us by surprise.”I don’t know the words,” he admitted. “There’s a lot of us that have to do a bit of learning. I think there’s only one or two of us who actually knew the words.”Stanlake’s nickname in the side is ‘Camel’, because of alleged similarities between Stanlake, who at 2.04m is the tallest fast bowler to play for Australia, and the camel from a car advert in Australia that sticks its head out of the sunroof of a vehicle because it’s too tall.But Pakistan would have seen nothing funny in the sight of Stanlake pounding in from the City End of Harare Sports Club to rattle the splices – and find the edges – of their top four. He harried sides in just the same way throughout the Big Bash, and also at times in the T20 triangular featuring England and New Zealand, and the hype around him seems to have been growing ever since. His performance on Monday will only amplify it. Stanlake, on his part, pointed to a renewed focus on aggression as the catalyst for his success.”The boys have been talking to me in the last few days about being a little more aggressive, so that’s why I came out and tried to do that,” Stanlake said. “In the last game, at Edgbaston, I probably got away from that a little bit, JL [Australia coach Justin Langer] was getting in to me at training the other day about getting a bit more aggressive at our boys in the nets, and he kept reinforcing that, so I really wanted to make an emphasis on that today.”Langer’s reward for geeing Stanlake up is his very first win as Australia coach, and a chance for Australia to start moving beyond their disastrous England tour, where they lost all their six matches across both limited-overs formats.”England was a challenging tour for all of us, but the key message was doing the simple things well and sticking to our strengths,” Stanlake said. “And I probably got away from that at times during England, so that’s why I came back today just trying to be aggressive with the new ball.”Billy Stanlake bowls against Pakistan•AFPBeyond the hype built around his menacing height, there have been concerns in the past around Stanlake’s stamina and a history of injuries. He hasn’t played a Sheffield Shield match since 2015, and Cricket Australia pulled him out of a potential stint with Yorkshire so that his workload could be more carefully managed.His most recent return from injury was nothing more than a broken finger, though, and Stanlake insists that his body is feeling as good as ever. “I’ve come back from a broken finger, so that was nothing major,” he said. “I stayed on my feet throughout that injury. I’m feeling really good at the moment. The body’s feeling good.”Stanlake was feeling so good today that he completed his opening spell with four overs on the trot – something he doesn’t remember ever doing in T20s before, and something he’d be happy to do again when Australia face Zimbabwe on Tuesday. “I think that was probably the first time I’ve ever done that in T20 cricket,” he said. “I’m happy to do so if that’s what the captain wants. Today, it was because of the early wickets Finchy just kept going with me. If I hadn’t got a wicket, I would have stopped after two and then come back in the middle overs.”Stanlake might not have learned the second verse of his anthem by the time it is sung again at Tuesday’s game, but he’s hoping his bowling will sing from the same song sheet as it did on Monday.”I think I’ve probably had faster spells, but it was great to get early wickets and I was backed up by Finchy with a couple of great catches as well,” he said. “There have been times where I have been [both fast and accurate], but it’s been a little inconsistent. The challenge for me is being able to do that game after game.”

A hard-fought, entertaining day of Test cricket threw up a number of talking points about England’s performance in the field

George Dobell at Trent Bridge18-Aug-20185:45

#PoliteEnquiries: How long before Rashid is Kohli’s bunny?

The tossA glance at the close of play scorecard might well lead to the conclusion that Joe Root erred in electing to bowl first. And it’s true, leaving his side the prospect of batting fourth against a top-class spinner in R Ashwin may come back to haunt him. Virat Kohli would have batted first anyway.But there was some logic in the decision. There was just a little green in the surface and, with a little cloud and a pretty strong crosswind, England must have fancied they would find some movement.Indeed they did. At times the ball jagged around alarmingly off the seam but, whereas at Edgbaston and Lord’s England’s seamers were wonderfully probing with the lines and lengths they bowled, here they were just a little short and just a little wide. Statistics showed they bowled 41 back-of-a-good-length deliveries in the first 15 overs compared to 25 at Lord’s. They also bowled six short balls in that period here whereas they didn’t bowl any at Lord’s.India deserve some credit, too. Having now had more opportunity to acclimatise to the conditions – they really didn’t give themselves much of a chance to go into this series in top form with their brief warm-up schedule – their openers were a little more compact and a little more composed.The selectionOne of the great truisms of the game is that players’ reputations often improve when they are out of the side. So here Sam Curran, somewhat controversially omitted so Ben Stokes could be brought back, was soon being talked about as a vital missing ingredient. And it’s true England’s seam attack – containing, as it does, four right-arm seamers of remarkably similar pace (there was just 1.6mph difference between the quickest average speed of the attack, Stuart Broad – at 83.4 – and the slowest – Chris Woakes, at 81.8) – might have posed different questions with a left-arm angle.Stokes didn’t look anywhere near his best, either. He started with a couple of very stiff looking long-hops and, after his first spell of seven overs cost 27, saw his second – of just two overs – cost 18 more. Gradually he began to find a bit more rhythm and produced some vast inswing, but this wasn’t the day after he had wanted after his recent experiences.But would Curran have made much difference? We will never know. He would, almost certainly, have gained movement but, on this slow surface, it is hard to say whether he would have done it with enough pace to trouble the batsmen.It’s probably wrong to frame the debate as simply Stokes v Curran, too. Perhaps, had this Test not been at Trent Bridge and had he not produced spell at Lord’s, the spotlight might have fallen on Broad. Jos Buttler will need some runs here, too.1:19

Harmison: India would be the happier team at stumps

Did Adil Rashid have a good day?Yes. Any day that includes the wicket of Kohli must be considered good. Having set Kohli up – that may be a generous interpretation; he later modestly said that natural variation had been the significant ingredient – with a succession of deliveries that went straight on, he tempted the batsman into the drive with a slightly slower one that turned enough to take the edge. It may prove a key moment in the game and, natural variation or not, Rashid has quite a record against Kohli: this was the sixth time he has dismissed him in international cricket and the fourth in Tests.But there was another side to it. With a couple of his seamers – notably the rusty Stokes, who conceded 45 from his first nine overs – below their best, Rashid was brought into the attack with Root needing some control. And that’s just not his strength. His first spell, in the second session, saw him conceded 29 from five overs, and Root was – as so often – obliged to turn back to his three leading seamers (Anderson, Broad and Woakes) to drag back the scoring rate. By stumps, Rashid had conceded 46 from his nine overs.So can Rashid survive in Test cricket? England’s modus operandi in the field is generally to bowl as dry as possible and frustrate the batsmen. Rashid, without doubt, releases some of the pressure built by his seam colleagues. But that method hasn’t helped England win many games away from home in recent times and with Rashid being encouraged to bowl with the same mentality he has in limited-overs cricket – to think wickets instead of economy – perhaps he can add something different to the attack.It seems he may soon be playing more red-ball cricket, too. There is a thawing in relationships between Rashid and Yorkshire and a real possibility of him signing a new contract with the club in the coming days which would including the commitment to play Championship cricket.The surfaceIn 2014, these teams played out a hideously dull draw on a pitch so slow and lifeless that only 29 wickets fell in total and it was deemed “poor” by ICC match referee, David Boon.This surface isn’t anywhere near as bad as that. It offered seam movement and, in due course, may well assist both reverse-swing (the pitch is in the middle of a huge, dry square full of used pitches) and spin. Had England utilised the new ball a bit better, it might have produced another low first innings total. It was still a pretty entertaining day.But it is a bit slower than is ideal. And there is a danger that, as the match progresses, the life will be crushed out of it by the heavy roller. We could be in for an attritional encounter. But India have Ashwin and he just might be able to unlock such a surface.1:06

India left the ball better than they have done – Woakes

The slipsHere we saw the best and worst of England’s much-debated cordon. The one-handed catch by Alastair Cook to dismiss Ajinkya Rahane was as brilliant as it was surprising. Cook’s catching has been hit and miss in recent times – he has taken 70% of chances since the start of 2016 – but here he stuck out his left hand to take a sharp chance.Left-handed catches from right-handed batsmen are quite unusual at first slip as they might normally be taken by the keeper. And it may be, upon reflection, that England decide Cook should have been a little closer to Jonny Bairstow. But if he can take chances like this, it allows England to spread their cordon just a little wider.The other side of the story came in the shape of Keaton Jennings. He missed what was, by Test cricket’s standards, an unusually straightforward chance at third slip off Broad when Hardik Pandya, who had scored 14, saw one balloon off his glove then shoulder and loop towards Jennings. Maybe the lack of pace on the ball surprised Jennings, but he really did make a fearful hash of the chance. Indeed, the fact the drop produced an ‘Oh-my-Broad’ face very similar to the bowler’s reaction when Stokes held on to that ridiculous catch here to dismiss Adam Voges in 2015 says it all. It just this time Broad couldn’t believe it for all the wrong reasons. Anderson and Jos Buttler ensured it was not to prove too costly a miss, but it was a moment that showed how far England have to go before they feel they have settled on a reliable slip cordon.

After misfielding on his first touch in international cricket, India’s latest allrounder did not look back and grabbed his first opportunity as if it was his last

Sreshth Shah at Eden Gardens05-Nov-2018Krunal Pandya’s first touch in international cricket was disastrous. Moments after making his debut, he was chasing a Shai Hope drive to the boundary off the evening’s second delivery.Krunal had covered the ground in a flash by sprinting towards the boundary. But just as he slid across the ground to parry the ball back, it inadvertently slipped through his fingers and touched the boundary rope. A despondent Krunal was left with retrieveing the ball from beyond the boundary.Starting your India career with an error is not the best of starts. But that first mistake would also be his last in a dream debut that saw India clinch a five-wicket win against West Indies in the series opener.Introduced in the eighth over by captain Rohit Sharma, Krunal conceded ten off his first over. He could not quite gauge the turn offered by the pitch, and after two consecutive wides down the leg side, Krunal had been deposited by Kieron Pollard over long-off. Team-mates in the IPL, Pollard would have faced Krunal countless times over the past three years in the Mumbai Indians nets, and it looked like the West Indian allrounder had a one-up over his Indian counterpart after the first-over bout. But in his second over, a composed Krunal quickly made amends.The first ball of his second over rapped Pollard on the pads, a tight lbw shout turned down. But the next delivery, a quicker one that skidded through, was smacked right down long-on’s throat once the fielder was positioned straighter after that previous six. Krunal had earned his maiden international wicket, and he did not hesitate to blow kisses towards Pollard as he trodded his way back to the pavillion at 47 for 4.”He’s (Pollard) like a brother to me,” Krunal told after the match. “And to get him as the first international wicket is a special thing for me because I’ve been very close to him. During the game itself, I was teasing him that I got his wicket. The kisses at the end was my love for Pollard after getting him out.”Krunal did not add to his wickets tally from there but he also did not concede any more boundaries after that, finishing with 1 for 15 off his four overs, going for only five runs off his final 18 deliveries.Krunal Pandya blows a kiss to Kieron Pollard after getting his wicket•Associated PressIt must have helped that Krunal was being captained by his leader at Mumbai Indians. In the IPL, Rohit had utilised Krunal’s skills brilliantly in the middle overs, using the left-arm spinner’s accuracy to plug the flow of runs. In Kolkata, it was much of the same, as he let the debutant place his fielders just as he wished and backed him without adding any pressure.”I have played a lot under Rohit, under 40-50 games of IPL under him,” Krunal said. “The best part about playing under him is he allows you to express yourself, whether you’re bowling or batting. He keeps things simple and he just says that whate​​ver you want, I’ll give you. Whether fielding or batting also, he never gives you pressure.”Rohit may not have exerted any pressure on him, but the scoreboard surely did when Krunal walked in to bat in the chase. India were at 83 for 5 after 15 overs, with 27 runs to get, and Krunal joined Dinesh Karthik amidst stunned silence after Manish Pandey’s dismissal. Another wicket and India’s weak tail would have been exposed.But Krunal has been in such situations before. For Mumbai Indians, he has played the role of the finisher fairly well in the past. Remember his Man-of-the-Match performance in the IPL 2017 final? India needed a similar innings from Krunal and, of course, he delivered.With another finisher in Karthik at the other end, Krunal quickly soaked in all the pressure built up by dot balls. He took a single off his first, ran a hard double off his second, and by the time he had faced the third ball, Krunal was batting like this was his 50th international match and not his first. The experience of playing over 50 T20s overall was showing. When Fabian Allen floated one up, maybe tempting the batsman to slog, Krunal quickly shuffled across the line and executed a reverse paddle towards the third-man boundary for four. India needed a comfortable 16 off 24 now.In the next over, Krunal dabbed one fine off left-arm spinner Kharry Pierre to beat short-third man, and with 10 runs to go when the 18th over began, he nonchalantly flicked Keemo Paul off his pads to the deep-midwicket boundary. He got the winning runs in style, driving over cover and jogging back for the second, to seal the chase with 13 balls left. He finished with 21 off just nine balls – the best strike rate (233.33) among all batsmen on the evening.When asked whether he felt any nerves before going in to bat at No. 7, Krunal said, “Not at all, no butterflies at all to be honest. I told myself that I have prepared before this tournament and I have been waiting for this opportunity. Then why should I take pressure at that particular moment? So I was completely enjoying myself when I was there. I was just thinking about how I started playing and that this is my moment, so I can’t let go from here.”Hardik Pandya gets a kiss from brother Krunal after taking Mumbai Indians home•BCCIThis is what Krunal had worked towards for the past three years. He had seen his younger brother Hardik catapult his way into the India team, and he himself had to wait. Hardik, currently out with a back injury, told his brother to play “fearless cricket”, and Krunal displayed exactly that with both ball and bat. Some say that Krunal is fighting for Hardik’s spot as the allrounder in the India team, but the brothers don’t see it that way.”We don’t compete with each other,” Krunal said after the match. “Hardik is a completely different category, he’s a fast-bowling allrounder and I’m a spinning allrounder. So I doubt we need to compete. I’d love to play with him, rather than competing with him. I’ve mentioned before also, whenever he does well, I feel so happy. And whenever I do well, he feels so happy. There is no rivalry. We are so worried about each other [when the other is in action].”Before this series he was teasing me that, ‘Keep my name, go and perform’. I told him, ‘Okay, just make sure I don’t overtake you’. It was all banter, that’s how my relationship is with Hardik. Just before the game when I was with him before joining the team, he told me, ‘Just go out there and play fearless cricket, what you’ve been doing’. That’s the only advice – apart from that I guess Hardik can’t give anything.”It hardly looked like it was Krunal’s first international match. He looked like a man who was always in control. Perhaps, it was the long wait since his breakthrough IPL season that moulded him for this moment, perhaps it was the advantage of having a brother who has been here before, or perhaps, it was Krunal’s attitude of making it count in his first match itself.”Honestly, I have been waiting for my opportunities,” he said. “I was preparing myself before the tournament – whether playing IPL or domestic cricket – but my ultimate goal was to play for India from childhood.”But lately I was desperately waiting for my opportunity. And I told myself, I don’t need two-three games, I just need one game, because that’s how I prepared myself. I like whenever there is a pressure situation, because I work hard for that situation, not for the easy one. So whenever I get those kind of situations, I feel, ‘Okay, here I can be a hero’. So whenever I see this kind of situation, I love it.”With Rohit leading him for the next two games in Lucknow and Chennai, don’t be surprised if Krunal’s all-round performances make him a regular member of India’s T20 set-up soon, and perhaps, even a candidate for the 50-over World Cup squad next year.

The best of the numbers from an absorbing final day of the series as a double-century gave India hope

Bharath Seervi11-Sep-201893.33- Percentage of India’s runs that came from the two century stands – 204 between KL Rahul and Rishabh Pant and 118 between Rahul and Rahane – 322 out of 345. None of the other eight partnerships were of more than 10 and they totaled for only 23. Excluding Rahul, Rahane and Pant the other eight players combined for only 19 runs of which 13 were from Ravindra Jadeja’s bat. There were four ducks in India’s innings. India’s innings is the first 300-plus total since 2012 to include four ducks.ESPNcricinfo Ltd564- Wickets for James Anderson, becoming the most prolific wicket-taker among fast bowlers. He eclipsed Glenn McGrath’s tally of 563 wickets with final wicket of the match and the series. McGrath had taken those wickets in 124 Tests and Anderson got past him in his 143rd Test. Now only the three spinners Muttiah Muralitharan, Shane Warne and Anil Kumble have more wickets than Anderson does.4- Instances of two India batsmen scoring centuries in fourth innings of the same Test. Rahul and Pant became the fourth such duo and the first in this millennium. The last such occasion was when Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly scored unbeaten hundreds in Hamilton in January 1999.204- The partnership between Rahul and Pant – the second-highest for India in the fourth innings for any wicket. They fell nine runs short of the 213-run stand between Sunil Gavaskar and Chetan Chauhan which was also at The Oval, in 1979. India had fallen short by nine runs from the target of 429 in that epic chase.1- Number of bigger partnerships in the fourth innings for wickets sixth or lower in Test history than the one between Pant and Rahul. Justin Langer and Adam Gilchrist had added 238 runs against Pakistan in Hobart in 1999-00, which is the only higher one. The previous highest stand for wickets sixth or lower for India in fourth innings was an unbroken 160 between Manoj Prabhakar and Sachin Tendulkar at Old Trafford in 1990.1- Number of bigger individual scores for India in the fourth innings than Rahul’s 149. Only Gavaskar’s 221 in the 1979 Oval Test is higher. Rahul’s score is also the highest by any opener while chasing in last 10 years, since Graeme Smith scored unbeaten 154 at Edgbaston in 2008. Seven of the highest eight scores by openers in the fourth innings have come against England.ESPNcricinfo Ltd1- Pant became the first India wicketkeeper to score a century in the fourth innings of Tests. The previous highest was 76 not out by MS Dhoni at Lord’s in 2007. Pant is also the first India keeper to score a century in Tests in England, Australia, South Africa or New Zealand. The previous best in this case was Dhoni’s 92 at The Oval in 2007. Pant reached his maiden century with a six, becoming the fourth India player to do so.2002- Last time an India player younger than Pant scored a century, which was Ajay Ratra against West Indies in Antigua at age of 20 years, 148 days. Pant was 20 years, 338 days at the start of this Test. He is also second to Ratra in terms of youngest wicketkeepers to score a Test century.

India T20I captain Harmanpreet Kaur smashed 103 off 51 balls, becoming only the third woman to hit a century in the World T20

Shiva Jayaraman09-Nov-20182 Number of centuries made in the Women’s World T20 before Harmanpreet Kaur’s 103 against New Zealand. Australia’s Meg Lanning and West Indies’ Deandra Dottin are the other batsman to do so. Click here for a list of the highest scores in the Women’s World T20.97* The previous highest score by an Indian in women’s T20Is, which was made by Mithali Raj against Malaysia earlier this year. India’s highest individual score in the World T20 before this was by Harmanpreet herself; she had made 77 off 59 balls against Bangladesh in the 2014 World T20.8 Sixes hit by Harmanpreet Kaur, equaling the second-most in a women’s T20I innings. Dottin had hit nine sixes against South Africa in a T20I in 2010 which is the highest individual tally. New Zealand’s Sophie Devine had hit eight sixes against India in a T20I in 2015. The eight sixes in this innings are also the most by an Indian T20Is. Harmanpreet beat her own record of five sixes which she hit against Sri Lanka in September.201.96 Harmanpreet’s strike-rate in this innings – the third-highest in an innings of 50 or more runs in the Women’s World T20. Only Dottin has struck faster in the tournament history. Harmanpreet’s strike rate is the best by an India batsman in a score of 50 or more in all T20Is.305.88 Harmanpreet’s strike rate in the death overs; she faced 17 balls in the last five overs hitting 52 runs off them. Forty of those runs came in boundaries – four sixes and four fours. Harmanpreet had started her innings slowly, having scored just five runs in her first 13 balls before hitting the first of her eight sixes off her 14th. Harmanpreet bludgeoned 98 runs off the remaining 38 balls she faced in the innings at a strike rate of 257.89.191 for 4 The previous highest total in the Women’s World T20 – amassed by Australia against Ireland in the 2014 edition. India’s 194 for 5 in this match is also their second-highest in a T20I. They had hit 198 for 4 – their highest – against England in Mumbai in March this year.