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Points Table

Scorecard
East Zone salvaged some pride at the end of a disappointing Deodhar Trophy campaign with a high-voltage batting performance and hunted down a mammoth target of 347 at Rajkot. Mahendra Singh Dhoni got them off to a fantastic start with a fiery 87 off 67 balls before Rohan Gavaskar and Sanjib Sanyal carried on the momentum and took them closer to victory. Gavaskar’s unbeaten 89 piloted them towards the target and East stunningly got home with an over to spare. Earlier, Suresh Raina and Syed Abbas Ali had propelled Central Zone to the massive total with both notching up splendid centuries. They added an exact 200 for the fourth-wicket stand as Central gave themselves a great chance of staying in contention for the trophy. The defeat, though, meant thatthey had no chance of winning the title.
Scorecard
A fine allround batting effort saw North Zone register their second win of the tournament, with a bonus point to boot, and head the points table at the end of the penultimate round of matches. Yuvraj Singh, Gautam Gambhir and Ajay Jadeja produced half-centuries and a surge towards the end boosted North to a healthy 288 at the end of their innings. West Zone, who could have sealed the championship with a victory, began solidly as Parthiv Patel anchored the chase with a cheeky 56. But a middle-order collapse, when they slumped from 160 for 3 to 201 all out, thwarted their hopes and North snapped up the bonus point and sneaked to the top of the table.North now take on South Zone in the final league match on February 4 and a victory there will ensure them the title. West will need to beat Central on the same day at Rajkot and hope that North slip up in their encounter at Valsad. If West fail, though, South Zone could beat North and sneak the title through the back door.

Today’s final of the KFC Cup West Indies limited-overs championship between hosts Guyana and Barbados at Bourda Oval is shaping up to be quite intriguing.Guyana’s strong batting line-up, headed by two of the West Indies’ leading batsmen, will have to confront Barbados’ feisty attack that can call on no less than four West Indies fast bowlers. Shivnarine Chanderpaul, the West Indies captain, and Ramnaresh Sarwan, his deputy, have been at the very heart of Guyana’s batting throughout the competition in which their side has played unbeaten. Chanderpaul and Sarwan could have a first-hand look at Corey Collymore, Tino Best, and Fidel Edwards, three of the fast bowlers that will comprise the West Indies’ attack in their three-Test series against Australia next month Down Under.”I think we will have to respect Barbados’ bowling line-up, since they have an attack with players that have the experience of playing for the West Indies,” Albert Smith, the Guyanese coach told CMC CricketPlus.”Our strength definitely is our batting, since we have two of the top West Indies batsmen, so it is clear that it will be the ball against the bat in the Final. He added: “Our batsmen will be more comfortable playing against Barbados’ fast bowlers at Bourda. Of course, they will not get the same kind of pace and bounce from the pitch that they get in Barbados, and when it comes our time to bowl at them, their batsmen will have to adjust to the lower bounce of the pitch, so I think we will start with a bit of an advantage there.””Matches between Guyana and Barbados are always competitive,” Smith said. “For both teams, it will come down to our planning, and execution of those plans. We have two very experienced captains in this match, both teams are looking forward to winning, and the team that performs better under pressure will do this.”Guyana have appeared in the final of the regional limited-overs competition a dozen times and this will be their fourth appearance in the last five years.”It all has to do with our preparations, and the competitiveness in our county championship. We want to be consistently doing well in regional cricket, and we try to inculcate this into the younger players in our domestic competitions. It’s good that we have been consistent. It’s been a lot of hard work, and plenty of commitment. We won in 2001 and 2003, but we lost the final last year with some silly performances that we do not want to happen again this year.”For Barbados, they will be looking to get the monkey of losing to Guyana on a regular basis in the regional limited-overs competition off their backs.Speaking to the reporters, Courtney Browne, the Barbados captain, said: “It’s always a tough ask for us to beat Guyana because they always seem to play the type of cricket that places severe restrictions on our batting a lot. I think if we are to going to beat Guyana, we will have to bat well because I think we have the bowling attack that can limit them. Whether we are setting a target, or chasing runs, we always seem to fall down in our batting against Guyana, particularly against the spin bowlers.”Although Guyana and Barbados have made more appearances in the final of the regional limited-overs competition than the others, they have only met twice in the Championship decider, and on both occasions Guyana won.Squads:Guyana(from): Shivnarine Chanderpaul (capt), Krishna Arjune, Sewnarine Chattergoon, Derwin Christian, Esaun Crandon, Lennox Cush, Narsingh Deonarine, Assad Fudadin, Rayon Griffith, Reon King, Neil McGarrell, Mahendra Nagamootoo, Ryan Ramdass, Ramnaresh Sarwan.Barbados (from): Courtney Browne (capt), Tino Best, Ian Bradshaw, Shirley Clarke, Corey Collymore, Fidel Edwards, Ryan Hinds, Alcindo Holder, Martin Nurse, Floyd Reifer, Dwayne Smith, Kurt Wilkinson; Dale Richards (injured)..

Andrew Symonds and James Hopes passed fitness tests for the one-day tour of New Zealand today while Matthew Hayden will have his immediate future sealed tomorrow. Hayden continues to recover from pneumonitis, a swelling condition of the lungs, and Trevor Hohns, the chairman of selectors, has left the decision on whether he will join the squad until the last minute.”Matthew’s condition has improved and we will give him every chance to be fit by waiting until tomorrow,” Hohns said. The team leaves for the five-match tour on Wednesday and both Symonds and Hopes were assessed in Brisbane today.Symonds, who injured his Achilles tendon in the first VB Series final against Pakistan, was the greater concern while Hopes, the new Australia allrounder, complained of hamstring tightness during Queensland’s ING Cup loss to Western Australia on Friday. “Symonds and Hopes have been declared fit to travel to New Zealand after passing rigorous tests,” Hohns said.Australia play a Twenty20 international against New Zealand at Auckland on Thursday before the first 50-over match at Wellington on Saturday. The series concludes at Napier on March 5.

The Melbourne bouncer charged over the death of David Hookes will face a ten-daypreliminary hearing in November. Zdravko Micevic, 21, who has previously indicated he will plead not guilty to manslaughter, appeared briefly before the Melbourne Magistrates Court today.His bail was extended until November by Duncan Reynolds, the magistrate, andhe then left the court, hiding his face under a black jumper as he walkedpast the media. Hookes was allegedly knocked to the ground during a scuffle outside St Kilda’s Beaconsfield Hotel on January 18. He died soon after from his injuries, aged only 48.Hookes played 23 Tests and 39 one-day internationals for Australia, and wasfamed throughout the cricket fraternity for slamming England’s captainTony Greig for five fours in five balls on his debut in the 1976-77 Centenary Test at Melbourne.

November 27, 1992 – At 21, he replaces Dean Jones in the Australia middle order and makes his Test debut against West Indies at Brisbane, scoring 36 and 15 in a drawn match.December 8, 1992 – Makes his one-day international debut, also against West Indies, but scores 0 in a 14-run win.December 29, 1992 – Curtly Ambrose gets him a third consecutive time in Tests, but he scores an unbeaten 67 in the second innings at Melbourne.May 23, 1993 – Hits his maiden ODI half-century, an unbeaten 43-ball 51, against England at Lords to help Australia to a 3-0 sweep.January 6, 1994 – Scores his third Test half-century at Sydney against South Africa, but a rash cover-drive in the second innings when Australia needed seven runs to win costs him his place in the Test team for six years. Australia lose by five runs.March 3, 2000 – Opening the innings in an ODI against New Zealand at Auckland, he scores an unbeaten 116 – his first ODI hundred.March 11, 2000 – Returns to the Test team to replace an injured Ricky Ponting at Auckland. In a series that Australia win 3-0, he scores two half-centuries.July 7, 2001 – Gets his maiden Test hundred against England at Edgbaston. Despite 382 runs in the series the Man-of-the-Match awards continue to elude him.March 23, 2003 – Batting with a broken finger that will rule him out of the West Indies tour, he strikes an unbeaten 88 as Australia win the World Cup final.March 2004 – Posts two marathon second-innings centuries – the 161 at Kandy taking almost seven hours – as Australia complete their first series whitewash in Sri Lanka.

October 2004 – He continues his great form in the subcontinent with back-to-back centuries on his first visit to India – 104 in the dehydration-inducing conditions of Chennai and 114 and 97 on the bouncy pitch at Nagpur.November 2005 – Dropped for the home series against West Indies after a poor Ashes series. He returns when Australia tour South Africa in March 2006 and picks up his final century in Johannesburg.October 29, 2006 – Under pressure, Martyn takes Australia into the semi-final stage of the Champions Trophy with a classy, unbeaten 73 in a six-wicket win over India at Mohali.November 5, 2006 – In what turns out to be his final ODI, his unbeaten 47 steers Australia to their first Champions Trophy title. The celebrations are marred slightly over Martyn’s pushing of Sharad Pawar, the Indian board president.December 8, 2006 – Low scores in the first two Tests of the Ashes lead to his mid-series retirement.

As the ECB lurches ever deeper into the Zimbabwe crisis, their chief executive for the past eight years, Tim Lamb, is facing a vote of no-confidence from the chairmen of the 18 first-class counties. According to a report in today’s Sunday Times, the first significant steps towards Lamb’s removal may take place at the next meeting of the First Class Forum on May 11.”His position is very precarious and may become untenable over the next few weeks,” one senior source was reported to have said. “There have simply been too many mistakes on too many issues. We have been wrong-footed on Zimbabwe the whole way along.” David Morgan, the ECB’s chairman, was also singled out for criticism, with another source telling the paper: “I’m disappointed at the poor communication and the obvious mistakes made.”Although the government has made clear its position on the issue, Britain’s sporting interests remain detached from its politics, and so there is no prospect of the all-important ban that would enable the ECB to escape penalty from the International Cricket Council. But, much of the blame for the ECB’s situation is levelled at Lamb, who has been accused of “sleepwalking” into a crucial meeting in Auckland back in March, at which the prospect of suspension from international competition was first raised if England pulled out of the tour.Lamb has since referred to “11th-hour manoeuvring” by other ICC delegates, but he is understood to have backed a hardening of policy in earlier meetings. In addition, his position has been further undermined by the resignation of Des Wilson, whose consultation paper on Zimbabwe had suggested that the ECB would be moving towards a new moral stance on touring. Lamb and Morgan, however, have been retreating from that position ever since the threat of financial sanctions was raised.One of Britain’s leading lawyers, however, believes that the ICC threat could be illegal, and has called on Lamb to challenge the ruling. Robert Griffiths QC, who resigned from the MCC committee last week after it reversed a vote against England’s tour, said: “If you don’t put pressure on the other side, you don’t get to the negotiating table, and they’ve won. The ECB have got to tell the ICC that they have grave reservations whether the ICC can legitimately impose these heavy financial sanctions.”As if that was not enough reason for Lamb to fear for his position, he is also under fire on the domestic front as well. “What is the ECB for?” asked one county chief executive, after a proposal to merge the County Championship and the National League was rejected last week. “Why does it take six months to ask other people? [The ECB] works through committees and goes round in circles. The executive should stand or fall by its decision-making. A lot of people are frustrated. If most businesses were run like this, they would not be around.”

Javagal Srinath said he would quit all forms of cricket if his knee injury rules him out of the tour of Australia, which starts in three weeks. “If I don’t go to Australia, I will retire from cricket,” Srinath said on Thursday.The 33-year-old retired from Test cricket after the West Indies tour last year. He did play in the World Cup, where his incisive spells helped India reach the final.Srinath said that he would play in a local game next week to assess his knee. “I am keen to go if my knee is completely healed. But I am not 23 or 24. The healing is slow, but there is improvement,” he was reported as saying on the BBC’s website.India’s tour of Australia, which begins on November 25, will include four Tests and a one-day tri-series also featuring Zimbabwe. The first Test in Brisbane starts on December 4.

In our new series, My Australia tour, Indian cricketers of the past describe their experiences while touring Australia. In our first instalment, Karsan Ghavri speaks to Samanth Subramanian about the 1977-78 and the 1980-81 tours.

There’s so much to see in Australia, so many places to visit, that thetourism alone makes playing cricket there a unique experience. The wildlife was a big draw for me; to go to their well-maintained national parks and wildlife sanctuaries was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. It’s also interesting for the way the Australians play the game on their own turf. They’re always very aggressive and in-your-face, although, as is well known, they never hesitate to be chummy off the field.In 1980-81, we were all – the Indians and the Australians – invited by Sir Don Bradman to his house for dinner. We sat at a huge oval table for dinner, and Dennis Lillee and Kapil Dev happened to be sitting next to each other. So Kapil just asked Lillee: “Dennis, why, every time you bowl, do you swear at the batsmen?”Lillee said: “Kapil, I’m steaming when I bowl express, and I look for a wicket with every delivery.”Kapil: “But I don’t swear at the batsmen, and I look for a wicket with every delivery too.”Lillee: “You’re not an express bowler. You’re just a medium-fast bowler. With express bowlers, the frustration comes out more. When you become an express bowler, you will do the same thing as I do now.”Ironically, Kapil went on to win the match for India at Melbourne. On the fourth day, he did not come on the field because he was injured. But in the last innings, Australia were three down, and I’d picked up two wickets in consecutive deliveries. So on the next day, Kapil came in on painkillers and ran through the side on a pitch of uneven bounce.The 1977-78 series was a very interesting one, because they won the first two Tests and we won the next two, and the fifth one involved us chasing a big target, which we lost by 40-odd runs.During that tour, Ashok Mankad was a member of the Indian team. He and Jeff Thomson were very good friends, always having a glass of beer after the game. Thomson used to give Ashok quite a few gifts, because Ashok was very fond of western music, and Thommo used to provide him with all the latest songs in the evening.On the field, however, the first thing he bowled to Ashok was a bouncer, followed by some colourful swearing. Ashok went down the wicket, tapping the pitch and meeting Thommo on his follow-through. He asked him: “Thommo, we’re friends, man!”Thommo said: “We are friends … but not on the field.”The Australians are aggressive cricketers, and they play hard and fight it out. But off the field, they’re nice guys, friendly and easy-going.

Sri Lanka have called up Kaushal Lokuarachchi, Nuwan Zoysa, AvishkaGunawardene and Nuwan Kulasekera into a 15-man squad for the first Testmatch against Australia, which starts in the south coast town of Galle onMonday.The selectors, who picked the side on Thursday night after the completionof a three-day warm-up match between Australia and a President’s XI,included four specialist spinners in a match that should be dominated by theslow bowlers.Rangana Herath, a left-arm spinner, is the surprise omission afterimpressive performances for Sri Lanka A in South Africa and India. Hisomission from the A squad for a tour of New Zealand had suggested apromotion to the national team.Zoysa, now 25 years old, returns to the fold for the first time since June2002 after his match-winning performance against Australia in the finalone-dayer, when he grabbed three wickets and then stroked 47 from 42 balls.Zoysa is expected to open the bowling with Chaminda Vaas. The seamers willbe backed up by two frontline spinners and seven batsmen. But there is anoutside chance that the final XI will include three specialist slow bowlers.The squad needs to to be ratified by the Minister of Sports.Sri Lanka squad Hashan Tillakaratne (capt), Marvan Atapattu, Sanath Jayasuriya, Kumar Sangakkara (wk), Mahela Jayawardene, Thilan Samaraweera, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Avishka Gunawardene, Chaminda Vaas, Nuwan Zoysa, Nuwan Kulasekara, Muttiah Muralitharan, Kumar Dharmasena, Upul Chandana, Kaushal Lokuarachchi

Hampshire 2nd XI choose from twelve to take on Sussex 2nd XI in the ECB Trophy semi-final match at The Rose Bowl on Monday 11 August, starting at 11am.Hampshire reached the semi-final of the 50-over contest by winning all eight of their group matches, and will go into this clash as favourites.From the twelve, the only injury worry is Jimmy Adams, who sustained concussion and a bruised eye in the Frizzell County Championship match against Northamptonshire at The Rose Bowl. He is to see a specialist today (Friday) to gain clearance, but coach Tony Middleton is confident that he will be ready.The home side have reached the final in three of the last four seasons, without success and will be looking to redress this, starting with the semi-final.Admission is free to this game.Live scores of this match will be shown on the Hampshirew Web Site throughout the day.Hampshire squad: James Hamblin, Jimmy Adams, Will Kendall (capt), Lawrence Prittipaul, Greg Lamb, Chris Benham, Kevin Latouf, Iain Brunnschweiler (w-k), Charlie van der Gucht, James Hibberd, James Bruce, James Tomlinson.