John Inverarity acknowledged the gulf Ricky Ponting would leave in the dressing room, and the team-building qualities Shane Watson needed to demonstrate on his recall

Daniel Brettig20-Feb-2012If Shane Watson requires any reminder of the responsibility now thrust upon him, he need only look at the name of the cricketer he has replaced in Australia’s ODI squad: Ricky Ponting. It was difficult to escape the symbolism of Watson’s recall at Ponting’s expense, as the spiritual leader of the team was replaced by a man who must show himself worthy as a senior figure in the dressing room as well as an allrounder.John Inverarity, the national selector, had spoken with Watson in Perth this week as the Australia vice-captain made his first-class return via the Sheffield Shield. While emphasising that Watson’s performance with the bat, ball and in the field would be his primary duty, Inverarity also acknowledged the gulf Ponting would leave in the dressing room, and the team-building qualities Watson needed to demonstrate on his recall.”I’ve had a good chat with him,” Inverarity told ESPNcricinfo. “His role in the team is to play very good cricket, batting, bowling and fielding. There is a gap in that regard [leadership] with Ricky not being in the side, and a gap that needs to be filled, and the senior players need to step up for that.”[Ponting’s] batting has been outstanding, his fielding’s been brilliant and his captaincy record is outstanding as well. His contribution in the dressing room has been a feature of his contribution to the team. When he goes all four of those aspects need to be covered.”The plan for Watson’s return to the ODI team will evolve over the course of this week. He has stayed on in Perth following the Shield match for New South Wales, and will train there before he flies to Hobart on Wednesday to join the squad ahead of Friday’s match against Sri Lanka. Inverarity said there was a chance that Watson’s return would be held back until Sunday’s match against India in Sydney.”Shane is inching his way towards full fitness,” Inverarity said. “There’s a squad of 13 and Shane is vice-captain of that squad. He may or may not play in Hobart. He’ll go to Hobart on Wednesday and he’ll practice hard with the team and in fielding drills, and he’ll be in the embrace of the team, and it may be considered that it’s better to keep him there and practising with the team and he plays in Sydney rather than Hobart. That decision is yet to be made, but those two options are open.”He’s inching towards full fitness and it might be in Sydney on Sunday because there is more work to do. Shane feels good that he got through the [Shield] game, and I thought he was better in his third spell of four overs than he was in his first spell. I thought he looked a bit freer then. Practising today, tomorrow, and Thursday, I think that gives him a nice run in.”In moving from NSW back to Australia, Watson will leave a Blues dressing room that has grown increasingly unhappy across the season. A wide selection of players on the fringes of the national side has not helped to foster a united team, as demonstrated by the innings and 323-run hiding administered to the Blues by Western Australia. Inverarity watched the match, and was not impressed by what he saw from Australian cricket’s most populous state.”New South Wales’ performance in recent weeks has been very disappointing, and they’ve got a large player population,” Inverarity said. “The national selection panel looks forward to NSW, with the talent they’ve got in their squad, coming to the fore and performing well and the individual players performing well. We want to see all six states with the teams thriving and we want to see players knocking down the selection door. In NSW there’s a lot of talent and we want to see them performing.”

Australia Women won the second Twenty20 international against India Women in Visakhapatnam to take a 2-0 lead in the five-match series

ESPNcricinfo staff19-Mar-2012
ScorecardAustralia Women won the second Twenty20 international against India Women in Visakhapatnam to take a 2-0 lead in the five-match series.India elected to bat and Amita Sharma (28 off 16 balls) provided them with initial momentum, hitting five boundaries. However, her dismissal in the seventh over put the brakes on India’s scoring. Captain Anjum Chopra (33 off 51 balls) and Mithali Raj (18 off 30 balls) shared a 43-run partnership, in just over nine overs. Harmanpreet Kaur, who scored two half-centuries in her last two outings, could only score nine off 14 balls.A target of 112 runs was not much of a challenge for Australia as Jess Cameron (68*) and Meg Lanning (40) shared a 98-run stand, setting up a win in just the 18th over. Cameron’s third consecutive half-century of the tour was laced with two hits over the boundary and seven fours.The third game of the series will be played on Wednesday at the same venue.

Two of the players named in court evidence against Chris Cairns have stood by their statements about his involvement in match-fixing during live video link evidence from India

Alan Gardner at the High Court12-Mar-2012Three of the players named in court evidence against Chris Cairns have stood by their statements about the former New Zealand international’s involvement in match-fixing during live video link evidence from India. Their testimony formed part of the sixth day of hearings in Cairns’ libel case against Lalit Modi, the former commissioner of the IPL, at the High Court in London.Cairns is suing Modi for defamation over a 2010 tweet that implicated him in fixing. Cairns denies the reason for his dismissal from the Indian Cricket League (ICL) in 2008 was in linked to alleged corruption, maintaining that failing to disclose an ankle injury was behind his suspension.Gaurav Gupta, Karanveer Singh and Rajesh Sharma, three of Cairns’ former Chandigarh Lions team-mates who have made separate accusations against him, appeared via a video link-up from Delhi. Gupta, a batsman who played first-class cricket for Punjab, has alleged that Cairns told him to score “no more than five runs” during a match between Chandigarh and Mumbai Champs.Questioned about evidence given by Andrew Hall, the former South Africa international who succeeded Cairns as captain of Chandigarh, Gupta denied telling Hall that the instruction had been given by Dinesh Mongia.”No, Chris Cairns told me between the innings and on the pitch as well,” Gupta said. It has previously been claimed in court that Cairns joined Gupta in the middle, with the latter on 4, and told him to “Get out now”.Karanveer, a legspinner who was 19 at the time, described a meeting in which Mongia, a former India international, allegedly told him and his father that everyone within the ICL, from “top to bottom” knew about fixing. He said that he was “shocked” and “broken from inside” to hear the Mongia’s claims.He described a subsequent conversation with Cairns that took place during training, in which Karanveer was asked if he had spoken to Mongia.”This talk was about match-fixing, I was very much convinced,” Karanveer said, though Cairns did not refer to any specific instructions. Karanveer added that he did not report either Mongia or Cairns to the ICL because he was scared that the blame would be shifted on to him.The court also heard from Rajesh Sharma, another witness for Modi, who required the assistance of a Hindi translator to give evidence. He restated his claim that Cairns told him to “keep quiet” about match-fixing and said that he had concluded from this conversation that Cairns was involved. Cairns denies discussing fixing with Sharma.Sharma, who has admitted to receiving money from spot-fixing, said he did not report Cairns’ name to ICL executives or Hall, when questioned, because it would have become a “bigger problem” for him.The judge, David Bean, has allowed for a break in proceedings on Tuesday before summing up speeches on behalf of the claimant and the defence begin on Wednesday. Bean will then retire to consider his verdict.

Kevin Pietersen made 151 as England established a 185-run first-innings lead over Sri Lanka on day three of the second Test

The Report by David Hopps05-Apr-2012
Live scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsKevin Pietersen acknowledges his century after the controversy•Getty Images

A century of great bravado, and not a little theatre, by Kevin Pietersen sharpened England’s anticipation of their first Test win of a troubled winter as they took a first-innings lead of 185 runs in the second Test in Colombo.Pietersen brought chaos to Sri Lanka’s ranks with a potent combination of imperious strokeplay and impatient slogs. His 151 came from 165 balls with 16 fours and six sixes and was a flamboyant contradiction of the suspicious, attritional cricket that had gone before. As he struck 88 runs between lunch and tea to transform the game, he batted pretty much as he pleased. “I probably played a bit one-day modish, but I feel as if I’m in very good form so why not,” he said.On a dead pitch that experts galore had agreed made strokeplay almost impossible, Pietersen batted as if such limitations were intended for lesser men, banishing the memories of a demoralising winter. He had been England’s least successful batsman in four Tests in Asia, scoring only 100 runs at 13. To draw supreme confidence from that record was quite something. It does not take much to stir his self-belief.He departed reluctantly, appealing to the DRS for clemency after Sri Lanka’s left-arm spinner Rangana Herath defeated his paddle shot with a flatter delivery. As reviews go, it was based on little more than the fact that he fancied an encore or two, and replays predictably judged him plumb, but he had provided such flamboyant entertainment that he could be forgiven his indulgence.Herath, who had 1 for 102 at one stage, recovered his poise once Pietersen’s storm had blown out and finished with 6 for 133, his third six-for in successive innings, but there was none of the pleasure he had felt during Sri Lanka’s 75-run win in Galle. There is enough treacherous bounce in this pitch to encourage England’s stronger pace attack and Graeme Swann can expect substantial, if slow turn.There was also a controversial element to Pietersen’s innings when the umpires, Asad Rauf and Bruce Oxenford, clamped down on his unconventional switch hit when he was only two runs away from his 20th Test century, issuing a warning on the dubious grounds that he was changing his stance too early. “To bowl before the bowler delivers is unfair,” Rauf said afterwards. “There is no intention to outlaw the stroke,” Oxenford added.

Smart stats

• Kevin Pietersen’s century is his first in nine Test innings. Between his 175 against India at The Oval and this knock, he had scored 100 runs in eight innings at 12.50. It is also his highest score in Sri Lanka, surpassing his previous best of 45.

• Pietersen’s century is his 20th in Tests, which puts him level with Graham Gooch and Ken Barrington among England batsmen with most hundreds. Wally Hammond, Colin Cowdrey and Geoff Boycott are on top of the list with 22.

• This was Pietersen’s ninth 150-plus score in Tests. He is only one behind Hammond and Len Hutton (10 scores) on the list of England batsmen with the most 150-plus scores.

• Pietersen’s century is the highest score by an England batsman in Sri Lanka, surpassing Robin Smith’s 128 in 1993. It is also the third-highest score at the P Sara Oval by a visiting batsman.

• The strike rate of 91.51 during Pietersen’s 151 is the third-highest for a non-subcontinent batsman and the sixth-highest overall for a visiting batsman in Tests in Sri Lanka.

• England’s score is their highest ever in Sri Lanka surpassing their previous best of 387 in Kandy in 2001.

• Rangana Herath picked up his third consecutive five-wicket haul and became the second bowler after Daniel Vettori (in 2004) to pick up six wickets in an innings three consecutive times. Herath’s series haul of 18 wickets makes it his highest ever.

• England have never lost a Test match after taking a first-innings lead of more than 180. Their highest lead in a losing cause is 177, against Australia at Old Trafford in 1961.

Tillakaratne Dilshan objected to the switch hit, in which Pietersen changes his hands on the bat to become, in effect, a left-hander, and stopped twice in his run-up as he anticipated a repeat. Rauf intervened on the grounds of timewasting – not against Dilshan but Pietersen – and after a conversation with Oxenford warned Pietersen, informing him England would recieve a five-run penalty if he repeated the tactic.Dilshan’s protest came during an over in when Pietersen thrashed his way from 86 to 104. He had unveiled the switch hit in Dilshan’s previous over to combat a defensive leg-stump line and when he was rewarded by a woeful long hop it was apparent that Dilshan, until then Sri Lanka’s most effective bowler, had lost the psychological game.After being told by the umpires that he risked a timewasting penalty, he bided his time, reverse swept again with Dilshan committed to the delivery, and reached his hundred to roars of approval from England’s sizeable contingent of fans. “No dramas,” he said. “They just told me to get my timing right.”Soon afterwards, Ian Bell fell for 18, mistiming a hook to midwicket as a ball from Dhammika Prasad did not get up. It was symptomatic of an innings in which he had rarely timed the ball and he walked off shaking his head at Pietersen’s audacity. Batting alongside Pietersen has a tendency to make you feel inadequate. If Bell felt its full force, so did Matt Prior when he tried to hit Herath down the ground and paid the consequences.For Pietersen, it was all plain sailing. He had been riddled by doubt against Pakistan’s spinners, Saeed Ajmal and Abdur Rehman, in the Test series in the UAE, but Sri Lanka’s slow bowlers – for all Herath’s recovery – were a grade below that class. When Suraj Randiv attempted an Ajmal-style doosra it pitched halfway down. Pietersen had a life on 82, though, when Prasad deceived him with a slower ball but followed up with an even slower attempt to catch.England produced their most authoritative batting of the winter. They resumed on 154 for 1 and their top three created the platform to enable Pietersen to strut his stuff.Alastair Cook, six runs short of a century, was the only England batsman to fall before lunch. It was Dilshan who did the trick, finding modest turn to have Cook caught by Mahela Jayawardene at slip. Earlier, when Cook had 84 to his name, it was still a surprise to see him dust off a reverse sweep, especially as he had eschewed the conventional variety. The ball deflected off the pad to Jayawardene at leg slip, umpire Rauf showed no interest, and despite innumerable replays the third umpire could discern no sign of a flick of the glove for which Sri Lanka’s captain had appealed.Randiv’s use of DRS for an lbw appeal against Trott, on 42, was even more wasteful. Replays showed an obvious inside edge. Trott communicated this to the umpire with a subtle quizzical look and a peaceful examination of his inside edge, his alibis presented with the tranquillity of his strokeplay. He fell soon after lunch, edging a turning delivery from Herath to slip.Nothing was going right for Sri Lanka. Appeal began to follow appeal, each one of them increasingly absurd. Sri Lanka entered lunch with one more wicket and an urge to study TV replays that would have only brought more disappointment. Pietersen at his most disrespectful was about to inflame them even more.Edited by Alan Gardner

Lancashire face a mountainous task to save the match after closing three wickets down following on 360 behind against Warwickshire

Jon Culley at Edgbaston18-May-2012
ScorecardAshwell Prince made an unbeaten 87 in Lancashire’s first innings but fell for 1 second time around•PA Photos

Lancashire managed to interpret the absence of outstanding individuals in their ranks as a virtue while they were winning the County Championship last season but in circumstances such as these it looks uncomfortably like a shortcoming.Winning cricket matches, as Lancashire proved, depends on individuals combining effectively as a team, especially the bowlers, but with 238 runs still needed to avoid an innings defeat against Warwickshire today, the statistics of Lancashire’s batting form are not encouraging.In 2011, for example, even winning the title, they managed only eight first-class hundreds, compared with 16 for both Warwickshire and Somerset, and 22 for Durham. Yet if there is one thing they need to have any hope of saving this match it is a proven accumulator of runs.What’s more, their best hope of any player stepping up to fulfill that role seems already to have gone. Ashwell Prince, whose unbeaten 87 in Lancashire’s first innings denied Warwickshire the opportunity to wrap things up inside three days, perished after facing only four deliveries in the follow-on.The South African was caught at slip going after a ball from Jeetan Patel with a stroke that contrasted so starkly with the patience of his near four-hour vigil earlier in the day it seemed almost as if it were another batsman. Coming moments after Karl Brown had gone for 45, ending a stand of 87 for the second wicket that appeared to have set up Lancashire nicely for a last-day rearguard, it was a bitter blow for Glen Chapple’s side and an enormous fillip for Warwickshire.Paul Horton, with whom Brown shared that second-wicket partnership, played soundly for two and a half hours to be unbeaten on 56, but will now need to do so for a good deal longer and hope for more of the gloomy conditions that came to their aid in bringing the third day to a premature close.As it was, Lancashire limped to 122 for 3 and Warwickshire remain well on course for the innings victory that will put them 15 points clear at the top of Division One with a game in hand on both Nottinghamshire and Somerset.Eight wickets in the day rewarded more impressive work from the Warwickshire bowlers on what has essentially been a good batting surface. Given that Lancashire had been 54 for 5 on Thursday, 197 all out in their first innings represented something of a recovery. Yet the total of 408 they needed merely to avoid the follow-on was never remotely likely.They lost only two more wickets in the morning session, their resistance almost entirely due to the efforts of Prince, who has four half-centuries in 10 Championship innings since he rejoined Lancashire. Only he, with the benefit of considerable experience, of course, produced the necessary resolve that was required to make Warwickshire work for their wickets.There was some, naturally, from Glen Chapple, batting despite the discomfort of the side strain that prevented his bowling for much of the Warwickshire innings. He survived 44 balls but even he was guilty of an injudicious choice of shot, caught behind trying to hook Chris Wright, falling for 14.Gareth Cross, shaping to pull Chris Woakes but failing to commit fully to the stroke, and Ajmal Shahzad, taking the aerial route against Jeetan Patel’s offspin, had both been wasteful earlier, although Jim Troughton, running backwards, did his best to let Shahzad off the hook, juggling the ball twice before grabbing it at the third attempt at long-on.Woakes, making an impressive comeback from the ankle injury that caused him to miss the early part of the season, finished with 3 for 20 and both he and Wright continued to produce moments of menace. Patel could not conjure much in the way of turn but he finished on a hat-trick when he dismissed Simon Kerrigan and Gary Keedy with successive balls, denying Lancashire even the consolation of a batting point.Woakes took his fourth wicket of the match when Stephen Moore edged a fine away-swinger to first slip in only the fifth over of the follow-on and for a moment Warwickshire had visions of a rapid conclusion.Horton and Brown had other ideas but just as some of the more pessimistic Warwickshire supporters were beginning to wonder if the declaration had been delayed too long on Thursday, two wickets in quick succession tipped the balance heavily back in their favour.First Brown, always looking to play shots, edged Wright into the gloves of wicketkeeper Tim Ambrose and then came Prince’s aberration. Horton, who has not made a Championship century since April 2010, has much weight on his shoulders.

Chris Gayle provided the substance, yet again, Dwayne Bravo provided the late blast, and Sunil Narine ended New Zealand’s chase before it could even begin

The Report by Abhishek Purohit01-Jul-2012
Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsDwayne Bravo smashed four sixes in 11 balls•AFP

Chris Gayle provided the substance, yet again, Dwayne Bravo provided the late blast, and Sunil Narine ended New Zealand’s chase before it could even begin. West Indies completed their second big win over New Zealand to take the Florida and Twenty20 leg of the series 2-0. Already weakened by injuries to key players, including captain Ross Taylor, New Zealand had no answer to West Indies’ combination of power, explosiveness and intrigue.Gayle threatened to cause as much damage as he had on Saturday before Nathan McCullum restricted him to 53, but Bravo’s burst ensured West Indies had another substantial total to defend. Narine, who had gone for some runs on Saturday, made a return to his miserly and productive ways from the IPL, picking up 4 for 12.New Zealand were much more disciplined with the ball today than they had been in the first T20, but Doug Bracewell proved the weak link once again. In the absence of Kieron Pollard – rested after hurting his shoulder in the field on Saturday – it was Gayle who delivered again, after another slow start.Gayle didn’t face his first delivery till the third over, and when he did, he went on to play out a maiden to Kyle Mills. With Gayle intent on taking his time, Dwayne Smith falling early and Johnson Charles easing off, West Indies went through a period of only one boundary in 24 balls.Even that four was a thick edge off Gayle’s bat to the third man rope. Bracewell had removed Smith with his first delivery, but West Indies were to regain momentum in his second over, the eighth of the innings. Charles swatted a full delivery over long-on, Gayle pulled a slow bouncer over deep square leg and turned one for four past short fine leg.New Zealand managed to pull things back again, conceding only 26 in the next four overs and dismissing Charles. But Bracewell came back into the attack, and Gayle took toll again, powering consecutive sixes over long-on and reaching his fifty with a slice over extra cover for four.The momentum was to change sides once again. McCullum bowled Gayle after a missed heave and had Lendl Simmons caught at deep square leg to leave West Indies on 124 for 4 after 16 overs. Enter Bravo, after Darren Sammy and before Marlon Samuels. Bravo swung his first ball, from Tim Southee, over wide long-off for six, and hit three more in the next three overs as West Indies took 53 off the last four overs.In hindsight, Bravo needn’t have bothered, given the way New Zealand crumbled against Narine. Struggling to pick him in the face of a tall asking-rate, Martin Guptill skied Narine to extra cover in his first over. Next ball, Rob Nicol walked past a flighted carrom ball to be stumped.New Zealand continued to dig a deeper hole for themselves. Kane Williamson, leading the side in place of Taylor, managed to run himself out in the next over. Southee, promoted to No. 3, holed out off his fifth ball to give Samuel Badree his maiden international wicket.Narine signed off his first spell of three overs with his third wicket, bowling Dean Brownlie after the batsmen backed away and missed. New Zealand had limped to 43 for 5 after nine overs, and the game was as good as over.

KwaZulu-Natal batsman Chad Bowes will lead an experienced 15-man South Africa squad at the upcoming Under-19 World Cup in Australia

ESPNcricinfo staff06-Jul-2012KwaZulu-Natal batsman Chad Bowes will lead an experienced 15-man South Africa squad at the upcoming Under-19 World Cup in Australia. The team, which has toured England and Zimbabwe and hosted Pakistan and Sri Lanka, has undergone extensive training at the High Performance Centre in Pretoria under a team of coaches, including former South Africa senior-team coach Ray Jennings.

South Africa Under-19 squad for the World Cup

Chad Bowes (capt), Quinton De Kock (wk), David Rhoda, Solo Nqweni, Shaylin Pillay, Diego Rosier, Calvin Savage, Prenelan Subrayen, Lizaad Williams, Jan Frylinck, Rabian Engelbrecht, Corné Dry, Theunis de Bruyn, Murray Coetzee, Gihahn Cloete