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India Women pick only three pacers in squads led by Mithali Raj for the limited-overs tour of Australia starting on January 26

ESPNcricinfo staff08-Jan-2016Wicketkeeper-batsman Sushma Verma was recalled to India’s ODI squad, while Shubhlakshmi Sharma and Latika Kumari were left out of the T20 squad that will travel to Australia for the limited-overs series later this month. Sushma, who last played an ODI in 2014, impressed in the T20 series against New Zealand at home last July. R Kalpana, the wicketkeeper, who made her international debut in the same series, also found a place in the ODI squad.Thirush Kamini and Niranjana Nagarajan were picked in the T20I squad, while allrounder Deepti Sharma was dropped from the ODI squad, but made the cut for the T20I squad. Surprisingly, only three pacers were picked in both squads that will be led by Mithali Raj.With just two wins in nine matches, India head into the three-match ODI series placed seventh in the ICC Women’s Championship table. While the top four teams gain direct entry to the Women’s World Cup in 2017, the bottom four teams will play with four qualifiers to determine the four remaining spots.India will kick off the tour with the T20s starting on Australia Day (January 26) at the Adelaide Oval. All three T20Is will be double-headers, with the men’s game following soon after.This is the first tour for the India women’s team since becoming fully professional following the awarding of contracts by the BCCI in November.ODI squad: Mithali Raj (capt), Jhulan Goswami (vice-capt), Smriti Mandhana, Thirush Kamini, Harmanpreet Kaur, Veda Krishnamurthy, Shikha Pandey, Niranjana Nagarajan, Sushma Verma, Ravi Kalpana (wk), Ekta Bisht, Rajeshwari Gayakwad, Poonam Raut, Poonam Yadav, Sneh Rana.T20I squad: Mithali Raj (capt), Jhulan Goswami (vice-capt), Smriti Mandhana, Thirush Kamini, Harmanpreet Kaur, Veda Krishnamurthy, Shikha Pandey, Niranjana Nagarajan, Sushma Verma (wk), Ekta Bisht, Rajeshwari Gayakwad, Poonam Yadav, Vellaswamy Vanitha, Anuja Patil, Deepti Sharma.

Once Somerset had avoided the follow on with their penultimate pair at the crease, a draw was the only realistic result

Ivo Tennant at Taunton31-May-2013
ScorecardJames Hildreth scored his first Championship ton of the season•PA Photos

Once Somerset had avoided the follow on with their penultimate pair at the crease, a draw was the only realistic result. Yorkshire, who eventually had a first-innings lead of 140, had not the time nor the inclination to attempt to enhance that swiftly once three wickets had gone for 21 runs. Adam Lyth, who never tires of batting in Taunton, remained at the crease at tea and, indeed, thereafter.At least, from Somerset’s perspective, another batsman has found some form. On Thursday it was Marcus Trescothick. Now James Hildreth reached his first century of the season, indeed his only meaningful Championship score, before he was yorked by Moin Ashraf when just three runs were required to save the follow on. Like his captain, he is not as yet back to his very best, but his punched drive square of the wicket, a shot he plays as well as virtually anybody, was in good order.Hildreth, who was on 76 overnight, reached his century with, depending on your point of view, 12 or 14 fours. Two were all run and so do not feature as boundaries in the scorers’ official books and computers. Or, on this occasion, one scorer, as Gerry Stickley, of Somerset, was making his international debut at Lord’s.Craig Meschede partnered Hildreth competently enough until he drove too early at a slower ball from Steven Patterson and was caught at short mid-off. They had added exactly 100. At that stage, 29 runs were still required, but the pitch, effectively a third day one after the rain of Tuesday, was akin to one of Phil Frost’s surfaces of old: all even bounce and of little help for seamers and spinners alike.George Dockrell ensured Yorkshire would have to bat again by pulling Adil Rashid for four before he played on when failing to counter bounce from Ashraf. Yorkshire, then, had two options: to bat out the afternoon or to have a quick thrash in the hope of bowling out Somerset in, say, 30 overs. Not as unlikely as it would seem given Somerset’s dreadful batting this season.What happened instead was that Joe Sayers was caught at second slip by Marcus Trescothick for a single off Steve Kirby, as he had been in the first innings; Phil Jaques padded up to the second ball he faced; and Andrew Gale was leg before half forward to Peter Trego’s medium pace. That was 21 for 3 but Lyth, who continued his fine run of form on this ground by reaching a half century off 106 balls with six fours, hardly played and missed.”It was a boring draw in the end,” Trescothick admitted, “and my own batting is a work in progress. But James Hildreth has been batting well in one-day games and he shepherded the lower order well. The last four wickets put up a good fight to save the follow on.”

The BCCI has invited Pakistan Cricket Board chairman Zaka Ashraf to watch the final of the IPL to be played in Chennai on May 27

ESPNcricinfo staff20-May-2012The BCCI has invited Pakistan Cricket Board chairman Zaka Ashraf to watch the IPL final to be played in Chennai on May 27. Ashraf confirmed that he received the invitation from the Indian board a few days ago.”I see the invitation as another positive step forward in further normalising bilateral cricket ties between the two countries,” Ashraf said. “The invitation will allow me to undertake a two-day visit to India and I plan to use this visit to have informal discussions with the Indian board officials regarding enhancing chances of restoring bilateral cricket ties.”Recently, the BCCI had announced that it had no objection to the participation of Pakistan T20 title-holders Sialkot Stallions in this year’s Champions League Twenty20 tournament, a move welcomed by the PCB.”We want to play India regularly in bilateral matches and we are willing to talk to them at every level to achieve this,” Ashraf said. “I will be speaking to them on this when I go to India.”The PCB had been pushing for the inclusion of a side from Pakistan, the only major Test-playing nation to not have had teams in the CLT20 since its inception. Sialkot were invited to the inaugural edition of the tournament towards the end of 2008, but it was put off after the terror attacks in Mumbai in November that year.Those attacks strained political relations between India and Pakistan and, subsequently, bilateral cricketing ties between the two countries were severed. Pakistan players – with the exception of Azhar Mahmood (who also has a British passport) this year – have not been a part of the IPL since.

The three Pakistan players accused of spot-fixing in the Lord’s Test got off lightly, according to the majority of players polled in a recent survey

ESPNcricinfo staff02-Jun-2011The three Pakistan players accused of spot-fixing in the Lord’s Test got off lightly, according to the majority of players polled in a recent survey. The Federation of International Cricketers’ Associations (FICA) has revealed the results of its player survey, and 77% of respondents believed the penalties handed to the Pakistan trio were too lenient.An ICC tribunal found Salman Butt, Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif guilty of orchestrating deliberate pre-planned no-balls during the Test against England last August, and they received bans ranging from five to ten years. All three men could be free to play officially-sanctioned cricket again in five years, due to part of the penalties for Asif and Butt involving suspended sentences. None of the 45 players surveyed believed the penalties were too harsh, while 23% considered the bans “fair”.The process by which the three Pakistanis were punished was more complex than a simple ICC edict. Under the anti-corruption code, the decision must be deliberated over by an independent tribunal, with the verdict and penalties handed down from those arbiters. Provisions for far harsher punishments are included in the code.Although the ICC has achieved its goal of making players aware of the Anti-Corruption Code – 100% of players said they were given education on the code before the World Cup – it’s not all good news for the game’s governing body. While 100% of players said they would report any suspicious approach they received, 20% did not have confidence in the ICC’s anti-corruption unit treating that information confidentially.Two-thirds of the players said they would be more comfortable reporting any approach to their team manager than to the anti-corruption unit, despite their obligation to do so. Tim May, the chief executive of FICA, said the responses from the players surveyed was an indication that they wanted a tougher stance on corruption.”This sends a strong signal to stakeholders that the vast number of players want significant penalties to be invoked against those who are found guilty of serious corruption offences,” May said.FICA co-ordinates the activities of players’ associations in seven countries: Australia, England, New Zealand, South Africa, Sri Lanka, West Indies and Bangladesh. Notably, Pakistan and India are the two major Test-playing nations – along with Zimbabwe – who are not affiliated with FICA.In addition to being found guilty of spot-fixing by the ICC, Butt, Asif and Amir are now facing criminal charges in the UK. Under Britain’s Prevention of Corruption Act 1906, penalties of up to seven years in prison can be meted out for accepting corrupt payments. The trio also face charges under the Gambling Act 2005.The players were questioned by Scotland Yard detectives after the tabloid newspaper made accusations that they had orchestrated deliberate no-balls in the Lord’s Test.

A round-up of all the action from the Clydesdale Bank 40

21-May-2010Essex beat Holland by just one run as the hosts came close to causing a huge Clydesdale Bank 40 upset in Amstelveen. Set 219 runs to win, the Dutch finished on 217 for 6 as Eric Szwarczynski provided the bedrock of their brave chase. Despite seeing Nick Statham (five) and Michael Dighton (nine) depart cheaply to leave the hosts 37 for two, the South Africa-born right-hander remained unflappable as he fashioned a recovery.A Chris Schofield half-century guided Surrey to a two-wicket win over Glamorgan in their Group A game under the Swalec Stadium floodlights. Surrey were set 224 to win but looked in trouble until Schofield and Gareth Batty rescued their side from 126 for 6 in the 26th over with a 53-run partnership.

The season will start on September 19 with a two-match Test series against Bangladesh

ESPNcricinfo staff20-Jun-2024India will host Bangladesh, New Zealand and England during their 2024-25 home season, in which they will play five Tests, three ODIs and eight T20Is.The season will kick off on September 19 with a two-match Test series against Bangladesh. Chennai will host the first Test and Kanpur will host the second Test from September 27. This will be Bangladesh’s third Test tour to India. They played a one-off Test in 2017 and a two-match series in 2019.After the Test series, Bangladesh will play three T20Is as well, in Dharamsala, Delhi and Hyderabad.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

New Zealand will be the next to visit, for a three-match Test series starting on October 16 in Bengaluru. Pune and Mumbai will host the second and third Tests, respectively.Just before Champions Trophy 2025, England will tour for five T20Is and three ODIs. They had visited India earlier this year for a five-match Test series, which the hosts won 4-1.The Test series against Bangladesh and New Zealand will count towards India’s push to qualify for their third successive World Test Championship final. They currently lead the WTC 2023-25 standings with six wins in nine Tests and a points total of 74, or 68.51% of their points contested. Other than these two home series, India’s remaining WTC assignment in this cycle is a five-Test tour of second-placed Australia in 2024-25.

Devon Conway said the conditions on day one at the Basin Reserve were the windiest he had ever played in

Andrew Fidel Fernando17-Mar-2023The immensely blustery conditions at the Basin Reserve were likely the cause of the Sri Lanka seamers’ wayward lines and lengths on the opening day of the second Test in Wellington. Both the day’s top-scorer Devon Conway and Sri Lanka’s fast bowling coach Dharshana Gamage agreed on this point, suggesting it was particularly difficult to bowl into the wind.A biting northwesterly whipped through the venue after rain had washed out the morning session’s play. The New Zealand MetService put the average wind speed in Wellington at close to 60kph during the late afternoon, with some gusts likely far more powerful than that. Players’ hats, sunglasses, and even the bails on top of the stumps kept being taken by gusts.Conway, who plays domestic cricket for Wellington Firebirds at the Basin Reserve, said these were the most severe winds he’d experienced at the ground on a playing day.”Today was the windiest conditions I’ve ever played in at the Basin,” Conway said. “There was a moment when both sets of bails fell off and they brought out heavy bails that I’d never seen before in my career. It would have been a real challenge for their bowlers and they were some tough conditions to play cricket in.”Early on, with a couple of their guys, I could see on their faces – they were thinking, ‘This is quite a challenge.’ And also the way they bowled at times, particularly into the wind, they missed their lengths and bowled slightly too full and gave you scoring opportunities.”Conway used his experience at the venue to make 78 off 108 balls, which formed the bedrock of New Zealand’s 155 for 2 when play stopped for bad light.”At the beginning the thing I did was to stand a little lower in my base, not to get pushed left and right by the wind,” Conway said. “And with my bat as well, when I was waiting for the bowler to bowl, I could feel it getting pushed away from my body, and up and down. It was sort of trying to stay nice and firm in my stance, and putting their bowlers under pressure by taking the wind into account. I understand it was a green surface, so I needed to make good decisions – leaving the balls I needed to leave, and attacking balls that were in my area.”Although New Zealand were scoreless for the first three overs of the innings, and had only made 20 after nine, Conway hit boundaries square of the wicket in particular as Sri Lanka’s bowlers strayed. He was striking at over 70 when he was eventually dismissed, making a mistake against the spin of Dhananjaya de Silva.”I’m very fortunate to call this my home – I’ve played a fair few four-day games for the Wellington Firebirds here,” Conway said. “I’ve taken a lot of experience from playing in those games. As you can see, on the first day, it’s more often than not pretty green here.”One thing you can do as a batter is flip that mindset, and keep a positive mindset throughout. For me personally, it’s about trying to go after balls that are in my area, not over-hit the ball, and trust the bounce, because there’s good bounce here on day one and day two. Leaving on length is something I try and incorporate into my plan.”Although the surface was green, Sri Lanka’s fast-bowling coach Gamage did not believe the track was as conducive to seam-bowling as it appeared.”It was a green top but we didn’t get that lateral movement like Christchurch, so it was flat conditions. They didn’t get that movement, so that’s why we didn’t do well in the first few hours. When you take the third session they improved a lot.”There was also dampness in the outfield following the morning’s substantial rains, however, and a wet ball may have prevented it from moving as much as it could have.

The former Zimbabwe batter also faces the charge of failure to report an accident

ESPNcricinfo staff14-Feb-2022Tarisai Musakanda, the Zimbabwe batter, is reportedly expected to appear in court on charges of culpable homicide and failure to report an accident. Musakanda, who was driving his car in Harare on the night of January 16, was allegedly involved in a collision with a pedestrian, who has been identified as Gwinyai Chingoka – a tennis player who has represented Zimbabwe in the Davis Cup.Chingoka was 38.According to a report in , Chingoka sustained fractures on the left leg and elbow, and died in hospital on January 27.Musakanda is alleged to have stopped at the scene of the accident and driven the injured Chingoka to hospital, but that he did not report the accident to the police within 24 hours of the incident. It is alleged that Musakanda filed a police report on January 28, a day after Chingoka’s death.The post-mortem ruled that the road accident was the cause of Chingoka’s death.This is not the first time Musakanda has been in trouble related to driving. In January 2020, he returned home from Australia after his club team, New City Cricket Club, sacked him for a drink-driving conviction.The 27-year-old Musakanda has played five Tests, 15 ODIs and 12 T20Is since his international debut in 2016. His most recent appearance for Zimbabwe was in a T20I against Bangladesh in Harare in July 2021.

All the buzz from the IPL 2020 game between the Chennai Super Kings and Kings XI Punjab, in Dubai

Karthik Krishnaswamy04-Oct-2020