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A trio of quintessential images sums up Brian McMillan: his hands, a broken middle stump and the farcical end to South Africa’s 1992 World Cup campaign

Sidharth Monga11-Jan-2011At the risk of over-simplifying, the Brian McMillan story can be told through three images that come forth when you first think of McMillan. Not necessarily ones seen on TV or in photo albums or collectors’ libraries. They are etched in the mind.THE HANDS. Those big hands, almost the size of baseball gloves. And not just big, they are fleshy, hence soft. Hands made to catch round objects hit hard at you, to the right of you, to the left of you, at your toes, over your head. McMillan caught his fair share, standing at slip. If he dropped a catch – and there aren’t too many recorded instances, so you have to rely on his first-class colleagues for that – the reaction in the field would be stunned silence. Just silence, players looking at each other, not saying a word.”It happened once or twice. I have got to be honest,” says McMillan, who obviously has no need to be humble about his slip-catching.Talking to him about slip-catching is a fascinating experience. It’s something he can date back to when he was around eight or nine years old, when “you were not even thought of”.”My brother was a good cricketer as well, and we played cricket against men,” he says. “We were youngsters playing with men, and the men were so bloody slow, they couldn’t bend down, you know. So after a while they thought, ‘Let’s try the youngsters and see if they can catch.’ We then went to slip and gully. It was never first slip, more third slip and gully.”And then we started practising together, as you would do with brothers. We started taking good catches. We always took the good catches, never the average one. Always had the thing for a difficult catch, the dive.”Once the bug bit them, the McMillan brothers went on to acquire skills needed in the slips. “We used to ping golf balls at each other, get in line and defend. And then catch with those golf balls and hard balls. You had to catch them in your fingers, if you caught them in your palm, it would be quite sore. Slowly you develop a web between your fingers.”The key to any catching, he says, is to catch the ball between the lowest third of the fingers and the first horizontal line on the palm. On his hands, of course, it is a huge area. “The easiest way to catch a ball – people talk about catching in the palm and all – is actually, like baseball, you have to catch in the fingers and upper palm of your hand. If it hits you in the palm, it’s going to hit you slap bang and it is going to hurt. I promise you, in my career it happened 10 times. Rest of the catches were always in my finger region.”That kind of self-assurance – and he admits he might sound a bit cocky at times – is the biggest attribute of a good slip fielder.”You need confidence in yourself,” he says. “So any ball that comes your way, say a metre and a half to your left or right or above you, if you can get three-quarters of your hand to it, you should be able to catch the ball. If you reach it with the tip, you can never catch it. If you get three-quarters of your hand, you should have soft enough hands to absorb the impact of the ball.”Anything in your region, where you have to step this side, step that side, you shouldn’t miss it. Slip fielding is about the other percentage, something a little further, the half chance. If you pick up 60 or 70% of half chances, then you are a good slip fielder.”McMillan’s inclination to the sporting life helped offset the big frame, which could be a hindrance in taking those half chances. “I was a natural sportsperson, used to play cricket, rugby, hockey, squash, tennis. So you learn to move around the court, you learn the basics.”

“When a catch is good, smooth – when a batsman hits it, it is quick, and you catch it in finger and lower palm – it is a good feeling. It’s nice. But the real good feeling is when it is wide of you and you pick it one-handed. That’s fantastic”

To the outsider it seems like the Mark Waugh-type catches, ones that smoothly settle in the hands, making a soft little sound, would be the most satisfying for a slip fielder. They must feel as good as a full ball despatched with a straight bat and high elbow is to a batsman. For McMillan it was about the ones that made him stretch. “When a catch is good, smooth – when a batsman hits it, it is quick, and you catch it in finger and lower palm – it is a good feeling. It’s nice. But the real good feeling is when it is wide of you and you pick it one-handed. That’s fantastic.”McMillan remembers two of those. “One in India. Mohammad Azharuddin was batting, Allan Donald was bowling, wide, and I was standing one-and-a-half, and he hit at a wide one, and it went wide to my right, and I picked it in three fingers, which is phenomenal. I thought it was one of my best catches.”Another one, there is a picture of that somewhere in England, in one of the brochures, where Graeme Hick at Headingley edged a very similar one. In the air, wide. Caught it in three fingers again. So those are the good catches.”Hard as it is to believe, McMillan has done a lot of fielding at silly point and forward short leg too. “I have got a lot in the shin off the bowling of Pat Symcox. Especially against Sri Lanka and India. They would come down and smash it straight into silly point.”MIDDLE STUMP SNAPPED. Brian McMillan to Ian Botham, allrounder to allrounder, good friend to good friend, in a league match in the 1992 World Cup, at the MCG, and the middle stump broken into two. McMillan was never a fast bowler. He’d just put his body in, bowl the heavy balls, cutters, and also rely on the seam and the pitch.”More of a strength bowler,” he says. “Not a technique bowler, not somebody like Dale Steyn, who goes on rhythm. I had to run in hard, bowl hard. Hit the deck. I loved wickets that had good bounce. That suited me. If the wicket was green I could bowl the seamers.”It was on that sort of pitch in Melbourne, during the course of a “phenomenal trip” for the World Cup, that he bowled to Botham.”Beefy and I are good mates as well. I remember he was trying the pinch-hitter thing for England. The wicket was good to bowl on, and I knew if I bowled well there was something. I got that ball right, with a bit of gas in it, it nipped back in, took the stumps out. It hit the middle of the stump, perhaps that’s why it broke. I told Beefy ‘I’ll meet you for a beer afterwards.'”SOUTH AFRICA TO WIN NEED 22 RUNS OFF 1 BALL. The giant screen at the SCG narrating the farcical turn of events. An angry McMillan and Dave Richardson just going through the motions. Ambassadors of a nation, part of a team just readmitted to cricket and hugely loved in Australia, trying their best to suppress anger and avoid ugly scenes.A photo McMillan looks at every day•Getty Images”I promise you,” McMillan says. “If we had played Pakistan in the final, we would have beaten them. We had beaten them before that, we had a mental edge. They just couldn’t play us.”In the semi-final, though, chasing an improbable target, South Africa came really close. They needed 25 off three overs when rain arrived, and thanks to a mindless rule – drawn up, ironically, by a committee that had Richie Benaud on it – after the interruption they were left to chase 22 off seven balls. Which turned out to be a typo on the big screen. The reality was even more ridiculous.”We knew they would need to bowl a part-time bowler for at least one over,” McMillan says. “So at 27 off three overs, the game was on. Then it came to 23 off 13. We thought we were still on. We had a short boundary on one side at the SCG. Even then it was great. But at 22 off 1 we were stuffed.”The irony of the whole saga was that a South African, Allan Lamb, went up to Graham Gooch and told him they must walk off. It was actually he who advised Gooch, otherwise Gooch was going to play on. Lamb advised Gooch, and he is a South African. When we walked off, to give them credit, Gooch and Ian Botham walked up saying, ‘If we were to win, we don’t want to win that way.’ So I have got to give them credit. That meant a lot to me.”That third picture is not in the McMillan house, but the one where Gooch is shaking his hand after the farce is over, hangs on a wall. So conveniently located is it that he sees it every day walking out to work.”That was the rule of the game. That was it. So we live by it.”

ESPNcricinfo presents the plays of the day from Pakistan’s encounter with New Zealand

Osman Samiuddin and Brydon Coverdale in Pallekele 08-Mar-2011Birthday gift of the day
Ross Taylor turned 27 today. Then he came across Kamran Akmal, who gifted him two lives in three balls, on 0 and 4. Then he got a career-best hundred. Happy birthday Ross.Sign of the day
At least one fan in the crowd was prepared for Taylor’s big day, with a computer print-out that was held up as a sign. There was only one problem. It read: “Happy birthday Rose Taylor”. Ah well, a Ross by any other name would smell as sweet.Opening of the day
Pakistan: land of strapping, wicket-taking fast bowlers who blow through you with the new ball and clean up with the old? Perhaps not. Shahid Afridi chose to open with Abdur Rehman for the second over of the innings, the time a spinner had bowled one of the first two overs for Pakistan in an ODI since April 1998, when Mohammad Hussain – another left-arm spinner – did so. And until his last two overs went for 34, he hadn’t done such a bad job of it.Communication failure of the day
The Powerplays often create headaches for captains, but it was even more so for Shahid Afridi during New Zealand’s innings. After 10 overs, he seemed to believe the bowling Powerplay had started, but one ball into the over was in an animated discussion with the umpire Nigel Llong, who had not given the signal. At the start of the next over, Afridi made it clear to the other official, Daryl Harper that he wanted the Powerplay to begin. Remarkably, the same thing appeared to happen with the batting Powerplay. Afridi had only three fielders outside the circle for the first two balls of the 41st over, apparently under the impression New Zealand had taken the Powerplay. Again, Llong clarified matters, and at the start of the next over, Afridi watched closely as Harper signalled that finally the batting Powerplay was under way.Atmosphere of the day
It’s to be expected that not all the neutral matches in this World Cup will be well attended, but the crowd at Pallekele was wonderful. Not for nearly a decade has Kandy hosted a one-day international, and the city’s only international cricket in more than three years was the horribly rain-affected Test against West Indies last year. The locals have clearly been craving the game. A big crowd turned out and cheered vociferously for both teams, roaring their support of Taylor late in the New Zealand innings. No doubt the solid numbers were helped by the price of tickets – the cheapest were only 30 rupees, which equates to approximately 27 US cents.

When good sides have bad days, they find a way to muddle through

Andrew Miller at Lord's03-Jun-2011When good sides have bad days, they find a way to muddle through. “Just find a way”, in fact, was the motto that Shane Warne – the best player in the greatest side of modern times – passed down to Chris Tremlett during his days as Hampshire’s captain. Although Tremlett will have to wait until the weekend to reacquaint himself with Sri Lanka’s batsmen, that message was not lost on his England team-mates, who endured their worst day of Test batting since the Perth Test in December, but somehow emerged with a scoreline that did them credit.In many ways it was wasteful; in many more it was admirable. The shock of losing three early wickets to a Sri Lankan seam attack that had been anaemic down in Cardiff was offset by four half-centuries of vastly contrasting style. Alastair Cook’s intense focus wavered fatally – and surprisingly – on 96, but up until that point he had been patience personified once again. He was joined in the attrition stakes by a gutsy Ian Bell, whose recent fluency was kept under wraps by good bowling and a precarious scoreline of 22 for 3. And then, after tea, the stage was turned over to Eoin Morgan and Matt Prior, who doubled the scoreline with a clatter of free-wheeling boundaries.”I think it’s quite even,” said Morgan, whose 79 from 128 balls was his first significant Test innings since his Trent Bridge century ten months ago. “We were quite pleased with the way we performed after having our backs to the wall this morning. It just did enough, and they bowled a fuller length, which was noticeable, then there were periods after lunch when we had to sit in and leave well and try to set it up for later in the day.”It was a day when all’s well that ends well for England. In their constant quest for self-improvement, the management will have reason to dissect at least five of the day’s six dismissals – from the flaccid flap to gully that prolonged Kevin Pietersen’s run of absent form, to the open-faced poke with which Bell brought about his downfall for 52. And yet, even in those moments of strife, there was a clarity of purpose and a closing of ranks that has long been the hallmark of all the best sides. They may at times have contributed to their own dismissals, but because they were instilled with the confidence of regular victories, at no stage did England threaten a Cardiff-style capitulation.”Because of the performances we’ve had recently, the communication was quite good,” explained Morgan. “Guys accept when they’re out and feed information back, so it was quite chilled. There were certain stages when me and Cookie were in and they bowled a channel at us to bowl maidens. We said ‘fair enough, they can bowl quite wide, let them come to us’. It was quite slow, so it was hard to go after the ball.”In many respects, this was a performance reminiscent of Australia in their early-2000s heyday, not so much because England came out on top in the end, but because of the weapons they used to get to that point. At first there was dour accumulation while the going was tough at the top, with Cook and Justin Langer having more than just their left-handedness in common. Then there was a blistering counterattack in the final third of the day, with Prior and Morgan clattering along at a Gilchristian tempo as they flailed a tiring attack and somehow persuaded the ball to be served up right in their slots.”Giving up 170 runs at 4.9 [an over] is not good enough having won the toss,” said Sri Lanka’s batting coach, Marvan Atapattu, who admitted that his team had set their sights on a sub-300 total once Cook’s dismissal had reduced England to 201 for 5. And yet, how often were such sentiments expressed in the days when Waugh and Gilchrist comprised Australia’s sixth-wicket pairing? Like a break of serve against Rafael Nadal, the challenge against the best opponents is not so much knocking them down, but knocking them out.It’s early days for England in that respect, and they have no single player who comes close to matching Gilchrist, but they’ve made no secret of their ambition, and amid the misgivings, this has the look of another vastly significant day in their development. “If we want to be a champion side, when our backs are to the wall we want to come out fighting,” said Morgan. “We recognise that as a crucial part of our game – we can’t just fall over and fold like a deck of cards.”Right at this moment, there even seems to be room in England’s line-up for a luxury item. Pietersen has now contributed five runs out of 838 in the series to date, and is more likely to be included on a wishlist for a Desert Island Discs plaything, rather than a list of players to whom you would turn to bat for your life. His latest aberration spoke volumes for his scrambled mindset, as he attempted once again to slap his way out of trouble, rather than subject himself to the sort of painstaking grind that brought him his last consistent run of Test form, in Bangladesh 14 months ago.Like Matthew Hayden at The Oval in 2005, Pietersen looks as though he needs a score by whatever means it takes, even if it means enduring an afternoon of pointing and laughing from onlookers who remember the dominant personality of old, and cannot equate it with the shell of a batsman now in their midst. Or alternatively, for as long as England keep the faith, he can just carry on trying to batter his way out of a corner, in the knowledge that he might not pull it off every day, but like his Australian counterparts Mark Waugh and Damien Martyn of old, when he clicks he will do so with a flamboyance that none of his team-mates can match.”He works twice as hard as anybody – and he’s looking good in the nets,” said Morgan, with only a hint of annoyance at the raising of a familiar issue. “He’s the type of character who could go out easily tomorrow and score 170. He plays match-winning innings, and has done since he’s come into the side.”The wait for KP’s homecoming may now have to be dragged on for at least another Test, but just as England found a way to force victory in Cardiff despite the absence of their attack leader, James Anderson, so they have found a way to cover for his and other shortcomings at Lord’s. So effectively, in fact, that you wouldn’t spot the mend unless you knew where the hole in the innings had been made.

Harbhajan Singh’s gamble to hand James Franklin the 19th over ahead of himself was a brave decision, but worked out in Mumbai Indians’ favour

Nitin Sundar at the MA Chidambaram Stadium08-Oct-2011Harbhajan Singh wore a pensive look at the end of the 18th over of Somerset’s chase. With good reason too; Craig Kieswetter was assuredly pushing Mumbai Indians out of the tournament.The situation was far better a little earlier, with 45 runs to defend in four overs. But Kieswetter carted Abu Nechim’s 17th over for 16 runs to drastically reduce the cushion. Lasith Malinga came on for the 18th over with wickets in his sights, but Somerset worked him around for seven runs, and crucially denied him a strike. With set batsmen at the crease, Somerset needed 22 to win off 12 balls, and Harbhajan found himself in a catch-22 situation.Ball in hand, Harbhajan trotted from his position in the covers to Ambati Rayudu, who was having a terrible day behind the stumps. Surely the captain was going to confront the pressure head-on and bowl the 19th over himself? Kieron Pollard moved over from his fielding position and joined in the discussion. Hands were waved, gestures were made, and at long last, a decision was taken. As far as radical choices go, this one was from well beyond left-field – James Franklin was brought on for his gentle trundlers on a length.Harbhajan was skating on thin ice, on several counts. Irrespective of the outcome, his decision to abstain from bowling was going to be questioned. He had come under criticism in England for shying away from his responsibility as a senior bowler, but here he also had the responsibility of having to lead from the front.Additionally, the 19th over had been bowling sides’ banana peel right through the tournament, with even Dale Steyn failing twice in the over of the devil. Alfonso Thomas, the Somerset captain, had won his side a game with a brilliant 19th over, but had stumbled at the same hurdle earlier in the day. With a T20 economy-rate of 8.12, and just four overs in the tournament prior to this game, Franklin was virtually set up to fail.Harbhajan was backing his gut feel with solid plans, though. His best fielders – Pollard and Aiden Blizzard – were dispatched to the positions where slogged length balls were most likely to go: deep midwicket and long-on. There was also protection at deep backward square leg and square on the off side, so Harbhajan had most bases covered. Over to Franklin.The first ball was on a length, and Jos Buttler muscled it between Pollard and Blizzard, who tag-teamed on the edge of the field to deny the boundary. The next ball should have also gone for four, but Buttler smashed a low full toss straight into Kieswetter’s forearm, leaving him writhing in pain and bringing about a lengthy stoppage in play. As it transpired, the break killed Somerset’s momentum, and ultimately their campaign. Buttler lost his stumps after missing a frustrated slog off the third ball, and Kieswetter holed out off the next ball he faced. Malinga then easily closed out the game in the 20th by detonating the stumps twice.Craig Kieswetter was taking Somerset home until Harbhajan Singh gambled in the 19th over•Associated Press”I always wanted to ensure we had the luxury of several options in the end,” Harbhajan explained later. “I definitely wanted to keep Malinga for the last over because, if it came down to eight or tens runs to defend in six balls, he is the only guy who can actually defend those runs. Franklin and Pollard were all ready for any kind of situation; I kept them alert from the 15th over onwards, I had told them it could be me, Pollard, Franklin or [Yuzvendra] Chahal.”Given the situation – 22 runs in 2 overs with the wicket keeping low – I decided to go with Franklin and he responded really well.”Despite Harbhajan’s lucid line of thinking, Mumbai had fortune favouring them once again, as it had done right through the tournament. If Buttler’s power-drive off the second ball had gone a foot either side of Kieswetter, it would have come down to 16 off 10 balls and Franklin would have felt the pressure. As it transpired, the shot homed in on Kieswetter like a guided missile, leaving him maimed in addition to robbing Somerset of a crucial boundary.The luck was with Mumbai once again, as it had been when MS Dhoni fluffed a simple stumping to reprieve Lasith Malinga, when Daren Ganga pushed his field back inexplicably with two to defend off the last ball, and when Denesh Ramdin missed a straight-forward run-out from two yards away.In summation, Harbhajan had been mighty brave ahead of the 19th over, and fortune chose to honour its half of the deal. It has taken Mumbai Indians to within a step of their first tournament win, but their opponents on Sunday will match them in both, daring and hunger. Here’s hoping for a humdinger.

It is argued that it is too simplistic to label Ishant Sharma an unlucky bowler who will get the proverbial rub of the green one day, but it might be too simplistic a view

Sidharth Monga at the Adelaide Oval24-Jan-2012One of these days Ishant Sharma is going to bowl worse than he is doing, and walk away with a five-for. That’s what his team-mates, and more importantly his opponents think. One of these days.Today wasn’t one of those days. Easily the best bowler on show today, Ishant produced three edges on a flat track, came close to getting leg-before calls, went past the bat on an almost equal number of occasions, got the ball to seam, bowled the odd cutter with a roll of the fingers, and went for just 52 in 20 overs on a day that India conceded 335 runs for just three wickets. But he still doesn’t have a wicket to show for it.It has been observed, not without merit, that perhaps he is not that unlucky after all. That – likable as he might be with his spirit in the nets, in the field, with the ball, and with the bat – there is a difference between studying hard and scoring marks in the exam. That he bowls just the good balls, not the wicket-taking balls, which would be a length slightly fuller – by about a foot – than he usually bowls. That his game has not evolved from the last time he first impressed, on the tour to Australia four years ago.Or, a little more uncharitably, that, as Shane Warne once observed of Monty Panesar, he has played not 45 Tests but the same Test 45 times. “Unlucky Ishant” has become almost a mock among the fans. Sometimes, though, what those who have been in the contests say matters more. This might be one of those cases.This is what Michael Hussey had to say of him before the start of this Test: “If anything, I think he has picked up a bit of pace from some of the spells that I’ve faced in the past. Particularly in Melbourne he was touching 150 for a couple of spells, and bowled with real pace. I think his pace is up, or has been up earlier in the series.”He’s bowled without luck really. Particularly in the first couple of Tests he beat the bat on numerous occasions, and there were a lot of balls where the rub of the green didn’t quite go his way. Sometimes that can almost shape your series. I know from a batting point of view if you can just get off to a good start, sometimes that can shape your series, and you feel like the rub of the green can go your way. I think he’s bowled really well, but some of those 50-50 things haven’t quite gone his way, and maybe that has flowed on for the rest of the series. I hope that continues for one more Test.”It sure has continued into the first day of one more Test. Australia are almost of the view that Yadav owes quite a few of his wickets to Ishant’s bowling at the other end. A foot fuller, and he could be getting those edges himself. That is why it is argued that it is too simplistic to label Ishant an unlucky bowler who will get the proverbial rub of the green one day. Forty-five Tests into his career, he should be able to bowl a better length without losing his wrist position behind the seam or the arm.Perhaps it is too simplistic to say that. For starters, Ishant has bowled a better – fuller – length over the last year and a half. It has got him results at times – in the West Indies, and at Lord’s – and at others it hasn’t. It’s not like Ishant hasn’t changed things. In his wilderness days, when out of the side, he tried to bowl like Zaheer Khan with catastrophic effects. After his comeback, he has been bowling fuller, but he cannot deviate too much from what his natural length is.It’s the delivery you can bowl blindfolded, a little like changing gears when driving a car. It’s the length that allows him to do things he does with the ball. It’s the ball that got Ricky Ponting’s edge when it held its line four years ago. It’s the length that just goes past the bat nowadays. On a day that Ponting scored a century, he was asked if he, as an opponent who has history with Ishant, thought Ishant has been threatening enough on this tour.”I actually thought in Melbourne and Sydney that he bowled particularly well,” Ponting said. “I thought he bowled better than his figures would have suggested. Even today he kept running in all day. Sometimes you bowl well and don’t take wickets. At other times you don’t bowl as well, and take wickets. It’s like batting … sometimes you feel like you are on top of your game, and just can’t score a run. Other times you feel completely out of nick, and just can’t get out. That’s the game.”The more valid criticism is that Ishant has not strung together such unfortunate days in a cluster. That every time he moves ahead, he soon moves a little backwards once more. It was a tough, long day for India today, but even at the end Ishant kept charging in. He bowled the fuller length and produced the edge, but there was no third slip to catch it. His reaction, that half-smile in defeat, is the image of his career. Does he also believe in his poor luck or will he come back tomorrow and challenge it, again, with 20 more overs of intensity?

Denesh Ramdin, the West Indies wicketkeeper-batsman, marked his second Test century by brandishing a piece of paper criticising the former West Indies captain Viv Richards.

Nagraj Gollapudi at Edgbaston10-Jun-2012Viv Richards bowed to no one. His opponents, mostly bowlers, often paid obeisance to him. They did so not only out of respect but also out of fear that he might hit back powerfully with bat in hand. Denesh Ramdin now knows the feeling.Ramdin, the West Indies wicketkeeper-batsman, after reaching his second Test century, reacted by unfolding a plain white sheet of paper from his trouser pocket on which was scribbled in capital words “YEH, VIV, TALK NAH.” It was a retort to Richards’ scathing assessment of his deteriorating form after he had managed only 51 runs and kept wicket inconsistently in the first two Tests.At the end of the day’s play, though, an embarrassed Ramdin admitted he had gone overboard and that his statement, which he had prepared on Saturday morning, was an “emotional” one.”Sir Viv had something in the press,” he said. “I think I got a bit emotional and it came out the way it did. He is a legend of the Caribbean. I still look up to him. If I see him anywhere I will still call him out and probably have a drink with him.”Richards, a former West Indies captain, who is in England as a radio commentator, had lost his patience with Ramdin, whose scores in the series read 1, 43, 1 and 6 respectively. This from a man who had promised at least three fifties and possibly even a century before leaving the Caribbean.”I can’t remember the statement quite clearly, but it was a bit hurtful to me,” Ramdin said. “I went to the nets, worked hard, came out and proved myself to the critics.”When Ramdin does walk up to Richards to apologise, he had better do it from a safe distance because Richards seems miffed at being dragged into an unnecessary incident.”I am the one who touted him as a future captain for West Indies and always thought of him as good but his form had dipped quite recently and I addressed those issues,” Richards told ESPNcricinfo. “I questioned his ability because he had lost his confidence and thereby lost his shape.”Denesh Ramdin brandishes his piece note•Getty ImagesRichards said Ramdin’s emotive gesture after reaching the century was unnecessary, especially because West Indies have already lost the series.”It is like being in a football match and your team is losing 5-0 and up comes a guy, scores a goal and starts jumping out of joy.”He has played well and if you’re given enough chances you’re going to get it done. He should be happy and humble. I think I remember saying he’d lost his confidence, but I’m on the other side of the fence now and I’m here to do a job – there’s no sentiment in it. I’m glad that he got the motivation from it. Let’s not forget this is in a losing cause — the team’s not winning.”Opinion is growing that Ramdin should be disciplined. Michael Holding said Ramdin had gone down in his estimation and called for the Trinidadian to be given a dressing down and fined. By now Ramdin, recalled to the West Indies squad after a two-year absence, will have recognised that his reaction overshadowed the quality of his second Test century.He also scored his maiden Test century against England, in a high-scoring draw in Barbados. West Indies played 29 Tests between then and the start of the England tour; Ramdin missed 18 of those. At 27, he is one of the most experienced player in the West Indies squad.Marlon Samuels had raised a solid platform on Saturday with a brilliant fifty, but his departure, an over before the second new ball was taken late in the evening, gave England the required opening to widen the cracks. Ramdin, who had been emboldened quickly by Samuels during their crucial 56-run sixth-wicket partnership, took on the onus of shepherding the lower order.Even Ramdin would not have been prepared for the fairy tale that Tino Best was scripting at the other end.”It was amazing the way that Tino came out and played. He played some unbelievable shots. I did not think he had those shots in his armoury. He expressed himself. That’s the way Tino plays.”Best not only listened to his senior batsman, he kept the atmosphere lighthearted and helped Ramdin to relax. “He kept saying: ‘Keep going, big dog. You go out there, you get your 100 and then you bat with me to get my 50.’ I told him I’ll be there when he gets his hundred but unfortunately he got carried away and he didn’t get there.”There was one other man who got carried away and Ramdin knows to his detriment who that is. His statement will no doubt make the cricket book of infamous quotes. Richards might go on to pardon him but each time Ramdin takes to the crease, he needs to deliver. If he fails, someone out there will be ready with a paper displaying the words: “YEH, DENESH, TALK NAH!”

Junaid Khan’s two quick wickets after tea brightened what was a dreary day for Pakistan in the field

Kanishkaa Balachandran in Galle03-Jul-2012Search for “Wasim Akram” on Youtube and one of the most watched videos is of the 1992 World Cup final at the MCG, where he swung those magical deliveries to get rid of Allan Lamb and Chris Lewis in succession. Lamb was squared up by one that straightened after pitching and shaved off stump. Lewis was consumed by one that swung in visciously and took the edge to hit the top of middle. The crowd of 87,000 witnessed a work of art, and most cricket fans have watched it since, perhaps several times over.Junaid Khan, Pakistan’s newest left-arm fast bowling hope since Mohammad Amir, has watched it, and he was awestruck. Several Pakistan bowlers have perfected the art of reverse swing over the decades – Imran Khan, Sarfraz Nawaz, Waqar Younis, and Wasim, to name the best. Junaid is far from that league at the moment, but his incisive spell on a flat, fourth-day pitch at the SSC was encouraging for Pakistan.After his incisive post-tea spell, a soft-spoken Junaid revealed his inspiration. “I watched the Youtube video of Wasim bowling round the wicket with the older ball in the 1992 World Cup final,” Junaid said. “He had also passed on some tips to me.”Bowlers from both sides have toiled without luck in this Test. Sri Lanka’s seamers struggled to get movement in the air and off the pitch. Their spinners rarely got the ball to turn and bounce. On the fourth day, Pakistan’s seamers managed to get more out of the pitch, but wickets were still hard to come by. Their best hope was the old ball.When the ball was 69-overs old, and Sri Lanka 235 for 1 with the centurions Kumar Sangakkara and Tillakaratne Dilshan well set, Misbah-ul-Haq tossed it to Junaid. He attacked from round the stumps after three balls, and by the end of the over, he had a wicket. The ball angled in and hit Dilshan on the back pad as he went forward to defend.Two overs later, Junaid got Mahela Jayawardene, with all of 2697 Test runs at this venue at an average of 79. The angle from round the stumps tested him. Padding up to a fast bowler invariably invites trouble and Jayawardene did not survive. He may have been unlucky with the height, but Junaid’s pace and reverse swing had created doubt in Jayawardene’s mind. He walked back with his first duck at the SSC.The angle and movement should have done Thilan Samaraweera in as well, but the batsman escaped when one that struck him in line with the stumps. Junaid had trapped him on the crease, playing down the wrong line. In his six-over spell with the old ball, Junaid had taken two wickets for 13 runs. Samaraweera’s record at the SSC is as intimidating as Jayawardene’s, and he too walked back for a duck soon after, lbw to Saeed Ajmal.Junaid recalled a previous spell against Sri Lanka in Abu Dhabi, where he recorded his best figures of 5 for 38, in only his second Test. Junaid said he gets a kick out of bowling with the old ball.”In the UAE I managed to get wickets with the new ball as well,” Junaid said. “Some catches were dropped. But most Pakistan bowlers seem to bowl better with the old ball. Today, the ball was reversing.”When asked about bowling on pitches that offer little help to fast bowlers, Junaid said it all came down to hard work, and luck. “On Asian wickets you have to work a bit harder. It depends a lot on your luck, and the pitch too,” he said. “Sometimes if you bowl well, you don’t get wickets. If you are not bowling well, you still get wickets.”The teams had to deal with rain interruptions over the last three days and Junaid said it had upset his rhythm a bit. With two innings yet to be completed, and the rain likely to continue, a draw looms. Though Pakistan fought back post tea, the best they can do on the final day is make Sri Lanka face the possibility of a follow-on. Junaid’s spell has given them hope.

Plays of the day for the Champions League match between Mumbai Indians and Perth Scorchers in Durban

Firdose Moonda22-Oct-2012Interview of the day Shaun Pollock has become one of the better player-turned-commentators and he was a good choice for a dug-out interview during the Sydney Sixers innings. He spoke prudently about the reasons Mumbai Indians did not play well enough to contend for a semi-final spot. When one of his answers was met with total silence by the team, Pollock thought he knew what had happened. “Have you gone to an ad break?” he asked on-air. Nervous giggles met his astute observation before the chat continued.Fielding of the day There were some overthrows given away in the first game, something Yorkshire coach Jason Gillespie said he did not mind too much, but the most comical extra runs came in this encounter. Dwayne Smith drove the ball to mid-off and Nathan McCullum’s pick up was good but his throw a little over eager. The ball evaded Brad Haddin behind the stumps and the fielder at fine leg and cost Sydney four.Cheers of the day Sachin Tendulkar has not had the best tournament but is still one of its star attractions. After managing just a single off the first six balls he faced, Tendulkar provided a teaser to his better days with an open faced drive over point. The ball was in the air for a while and crashed into the advertising boards to the delight of the Kingsmead crowd.The end?One cannot help but wonder whether when Sachin Tendulkar was bowled by Moises Henriques that would be the last time a South African audience would have seen him bat. It was an unflattering end to his innings, as he played down the wrong line to a short of a length ball that held its line from middle and off and beat the open face. Henriques was delighted and a dejected Tendulkar may have said goodbye.Shot of the day Viewers of the tournament must have wondered what would happen if someone hit the Spider Cam. Today, we found out. Dinesh Kartik hit a Henriques’ delivery towards midwicket. It was hit too high, it smashed into the camera, causing it to cut to black, as replays showed later. As per the rules, a dead ball was called and Henriques had to bowl the ball again.Body blow of the day For once, not to a player. Two balls after his camera’s antics, Kartik ran into umpire S Ravi while trying to make his second run. Kartik’s shoulder rammed into Ravi but it was the batsman who rolled on the floor in pain while the umpire barely looked ruffled.Brilliance of the day It may have been too late at night for the Australian selectors to be watching, but if there were, they may mark a tick in Brad Haddin’s column as far as options for the national team goes. A bouncer from Pat Cummins feathered Lasith Malinga’s glove and seemed headed to fine leg. Haddin dived full length to his left and grabbed the ball one-handed as he fell. He moved his arm swiftly to his chest to avoid the ball bobbling out and completed a stunner.

India’s hunt for a solid second spinner has led them to the Haryana legspinner, who says he has sorted out his no-ball problems and improved his batting

Siddarth Ravindran in Hubli23-Dec-2012At lunch on the second day in Hubli, Haryana had reached an improbable 412 for 7, thanks to maiden first-class centuries from lower-order batsmen Amit Mishra and Jayant Yadav. It was turning into a game-defining partnership and both batsmen walked towards the dressing room satisfied with a solid morning’s work.The entire Haryana dressing-room was applauding the pair’s record-breaking partnership, but just as Mishra crossed the ropes, Haryana coach Ashwini Kumar rushed out and delivered the news that Mishra (who went on to score an unbeaten 202) was picked for India’s one-day squad for the Pakistan series. There wasn’t too much of a reaction from Mishra, and he walked on to be congratulated by his team-mates. Once Mishra was indoors, though, he let out a loud, excited yell which showed just how much the recall meant to him.It’s been more than 18 months since he represented the country in any format, a casualty of the disastrous tour of England when India lost their No. 1 Test ranking. As England’s batsmen plundered the bowling, Mishra too had a rough time, with a chronic overstepping problem worsening his case, with 13 no-balls in two innings.Bring that issue up again, and Mishra is quick to counter, even before the question has been completed. “I don’t think it is a problem,” he said. “Before, when I came back from injury I was aware of the problem, and worked on it, and now in the last six-seven matches I have bowled only about four or five no-balls, so I’m not worried.”India’s spin bowling, for so long a major strength, has been weakened in recent times, especially with Harbhajan Singh losing form and his place. R Ashwin has established himself as the lead spinner in all formats but the back-up position in limited-overs cricket is still up for grabs. Legspinner Rahul Sharma rose to prominence in the 2011 IPL but hasn’t been able to hold down a spot, and Piyush Chawla was part of India’s World Cup and World Twenty20 squads without quite having the record meriting selection. Consistency has also eluded the allrounders Ravindra Jadeja and Yusuf Pathan. Pragyan Ojha has established himself in the Test side but the selectors haven’t given him a long run in limited-overs sides despite being impressive in the IPL over several seasons.India’s spin problems have been eased by the emergence of Yuvraj Singh as a reliable spinner and fifth bowler, but the search for the second specialist spinner still persists. Which is why Mishra says he wasn’t entirely surprised at being selected. “The way the new selectors are giving chances to new players who have been doing well … I have also done well in this season,” he said. “So I was aware that maybe if I did well then at any time I could get the call.”The battle for a place in the XI is likely to be between Mishra and Jadeja, who has stormed his way back to national contention on the back of two Ranji triple-centuries in a month. Though Mishra may not reach the batting heights Jadeja has, he has repeatedly shown he is a handy batsman.Even on that ill-fated England tour, there were fighting innings of 43 and 84 in the final Test at The Oval. This season Mishra has hit a crucial second-innings half-century to lift Haryana to their only win so far, over Delhi. And in Hubli, when he inside-edged a ball onto his pads on 109, he walked away and shadow-practised driving the ball before taking guard again.”You can’t just play as a bowler, the one-day format is like that,” Mishra said. “You may be expected at any time to chip in with some runs, if some batsman is batting with you, then if you are able to score some runs yourself then it is a big help for the team, the partnership of 100-150 that you put on will be a boost for the team. It also helps in getting you a place in the XI.”Mishra says he has been working hard on his batting over the past couple of years. He’s only been required to bat three times in his 15-ODI career, which means irrespective of his improved batting prowess, India will need him more for the wickets he can take. He was terrific on that front in his last one-day series, when he took a chart-topping 11 wickets in five ODIs in the Caribbean.In India’s muddled selection scenario where Twenty20 form can lift you to the Test squad (Rahul Sharma) and vice-versa, Mishra finds himself back in the ODI mix though he hasn’t played the format even at the domestic level since October 2011. It’s been a stop-start international career for Mishra so far, something he is desperate to change with his latest lifeline.

From Matt Fennell, Australia
As a young Australian Cricketer i was coached with the ideology that the poms were to be beaten at all costs and no quarter to be given

Cricinfo25-Feb-2013Matt Fennell, Australia
As a young Australian Cricketer i was coached with the ideology that the poms were to be beaten at all costs and no quarter to be given. However, I can not help but admire the talent, determination and courage of one Paul Collingwood under immense pressure after being omitted from the previous Test match. Having witnessed his well-compiled 200 against my beloved Australians in Adelaide in the 2006-07 Ashes, I could not help but feel compelled to emulate his courageous style of batting.While not always the most attractive or pure of strokeplay, he maintains a gutsy determination through any style of opposition attack from and refuses to give in. As I am studying at university away from home I am unable to watch as much international test cricket as I wish but I do check online scorecards regularly. I must admit, though he is an exceptional player and I am sure it was filled with much more dashing strokeplay, I had not noticed the fact that Pietersen had scored 94 runs until a day after I initially checked the score. Instead I was drawn to the fact that Paul Collingwood, a cricketer recognised as a fighter by most, if not all, cricketing nations, had scored a spectacular hundred while under the pump (not to mention at a strike rate of 70).So I simply write this primarily as a hats off to Paul Collingwood and I hope you can transfer your dogged determination into your team-mates for the upcoming 2009 Ashes series in England, because as much as I really would love Australia to win, I really would love to see another epic and well fought out contest as I witnessed in 2005. Even if it is without Harmison, Jones and Hoggard.