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ESPNcricinfo presents the Plays of the Day from the first day of the third Test in Dominica

Daniel Brettig at Windsor Park23-Apr-2012Pad-up of the day
Ravi Rampaul has sat on the boundary’s edge for two Test matches as Australia’s openers David Warner and Ed Cowan have generally made a smooth start to their innings. However Rampaul is known for producing wickets with the new ball, and on his return to the team he did exactly that once more. Apart from one play and miss, Cowan looked sure enough against Kemar Roach in the first over but in the second he faced Rampaul, who has shown the capacity to swing the ball back into left-handers. Seemingly oblivious to this, Cowan let his second ball from Rampaul go as he had done the first, only this time to find it was fuller and straightening, hitting him in line and going on to strike the top of off stump. Tony Hill’s finger was raised, and, unlike in Trinidad, Cowan chose not to refer the decision.Strategy of the day
When the teams returned after lunch, Darren Sammy opened up with the tidy bowling of himself and Shane Shillingford. Given Australia’s sound, if slow start, and the prospect of a long day in the field if more wickets were not collected, it seemed a conservative decision, leaving Rampaul and Roach to ruminate in the outfield. However Sammy’s confidence in his and Shillingford’s ability to frustrate David Warner and Shane Watson, two batsmen who like to keep the runs flowing, proved well-founded. They struggled to score at better than 1.5 runs per over after the break, and on 41 Watson fell to the leg trap, hooking to deep backward square.Field setting of the day
Shillingford’s bowling was again thrifty and crafty, making use of the turn on offer to him at Windsor Park. Supported by a raucous Dominican crowd, he went close to a wicket with plenty of deliveries before Warner gifted his by slapping a shortish ball to cover point. Michael Clarke soon came close to perishing too, when he turned an off break around the corner to land millimetres short of backward short leg’s hands. However Sammy and Shillingford allowed a little of the pressure to lapse by sending mid on back to the fence for Clarke and Ricky Ponting, despite neither showing the inclination to loft down the ground. Instead, they were able to milk a few singles as tea approached, alleviating some of the hosts’ stranglehold on the scoring.Record of the day
When Ponting reached 23 with a single pulled to deep square leg from Shillingford, he became the second-highest run scorer in Tests, a position he is likely to occupy in perpetuity given that the man he passed, Rahul Dravid, is retired while the man ahead, Sachin Tendulkar, is a long way off in the distance. The moment arrived without much fanfare, and Ponting was unable to stretch his lead over Dravid by more than that one run – in Shillingford’s next over he squeezed a catch to backward short leg as another off break fizzed and bounced on the Roseau pitch.

Was it worth having Olympic athletes walking all over the sacred turf of Lord’s a fortnight before the ground’s biggest cricket event of the year? The jury’s still out

Liam Herringshaw04-Aug-2012A sunny Thursday morning in early August, and Lord’s is ready for the first session of yet another high-level, high-quality battle. The crowds arrive in their droves, hopeful of a full and exciting day’s play. It isn’t cricket they’re here for, though, as England are taking on South Africa 200 miles north, in Leeds. No, the public have come to St John’s Wood for something completely different: Olympic archery.For me, it’s my last day on site. They call me a Games-maker, but that doesn’t feel like the correct term. I’d love to say I volunteered at the London 2012 Olympics for purely altruistic reasons, but I didn’t. I offered to help out at the archery because I wanted to see behind the scenes at its host venue. As a cricket fan, where else would I want to be but Lord’s?I may be an interloper, then, but no one in my team seems to mind. Many colleagues volunteered for similar reasons. Not that everyone here is happy: the MCC has surrendered control of the home of cricket for three, prime, midsummer weeks. The idea was to use London 2012 to promote Lord’s to a new audience, but some of the old guard are less than impressed.I began my stint in mid-July, and the ground was eerily quiet. Walking past the pavilion in my Sergeant-Pepper-becomes-a-supermarket-cashier uniform, I saw an elderly gentleman walking towards me. I smiled non-confrontationally at him.”Go away,” he spluttered at me. “Go away! We don’t want you here!” And he walked on indignantly.I couldn’t entirely blame him for his outburst. We’d hindered him from going about his usual lordly business, plonked bright pink access boards all over his beloved pavilion, and the brand protection team had gone berserk with the white sticky tape. This was Lord’s, Jim, but not as he’d know it.And then there was the outfield. Rather than use existing seating, spectator stands were erected on the hallowed turf, right in front of the pavilion. The archers would shoot straight across the square, towards targets on the bowlers’ run-ups at the Nursery End. Swathes of grass would see no daylight for weeks, and the wicket would be completely open to the elements.Geoffrey Boycott might hail a temporary return to uncovered wickets, but with fewer than two weeks between the end of the archery competition and the start of the third Test, what chance is there that conditions will be properly playable? Especially with this being the soggiest British summer in living memory.”We are working with the MCC and its turf specialist to ensure the venue will be in good condition for the Test match,” a spokesperson for the Olympics organising committee told me. “Lord’s groundsmen will be able to access the ground for maintenance before and after sessions during the Olympic Games.”New grass is being grown in Lincolnshire, and squares of fresh turf will replace the damaged outfield. Mick Hunt and his MCC ground staff have managed to keep much of the ground in an impressive state. Nonetheless, a 13-day repair job is a monster of a task: dismantling the stands, removing the targets, screens, cables, banners, cabins and tents; removing all signs that the Olympics were here. MCC Head of Cricket John Stephenson admitted earlier this year that Lord’s may not be at its resplendent best in time for the Test.The “Have A Go At Archery” practice range in the Coronation Garden, with WG Grace playing a (fairly) straight bat to the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune•Liam HerringshawIf that’s the case, and a crucial England-South Africa match is affected, will the experiment have been worthwhile? The answer seems to be an almost unqualified yes. Sell-out audiences have come to enjoy a new twist on an ancient place. One press veteran of ten Olympics told me he’d never seen archery so popular, whilst the MCC Museum staff were delighted by the number of visitors. High-profile guests have been drawn in too: the Princess Royal, Lennox Lewis and Paul McCartney, to name but three. And cricket even made it into Danny Boyle’s opening ceremony.The archers, meanwhile, have seemed very much at home. The Australians acquired inside information from advisor Steve Waugh; the South Korean men broke both individual and team world records on the first day of competition; and Britain’s Larry Godfrey – the Kevin Pietersen of archery – celebrated his second round victory with a flurry of cover drives*.There were some appropriate pairings: Yorkshire’s Amy Oliver against India’s world No. 1 Deepika Kumari in the women’s event; an Ashes clash between Taylor Worth (Aus) and Alan Wills (GBR) in the men’s. Britain claimed a surprise win in the former, but Australia took the second.Sadly, the promise from India’s male archers that they would celebrate a medal a la Sourav Ganguly never materialised. Italy took the men’s team title, and, in the individual event, neither Jayanta Talukdar, Rahul Banerjee, nor Tarundeep Rai got beyond the second round. In making the last 16, only Godfrey and Worth flew the flag for cricket-playing nations.The weather hasn’t always been helpful, but rain doesn’t stop play. The archers just have to adjust, and the skill on display has been amazing. Not that I’ve been able to see many matches first-hand. Perhaps aware of my background, the organisers gave me a volunteering role in Lord’s most glamorous setting: a Portakabin in the No. 6 car park. Still, I’ve been able to sneak into the pavilion now and then to watch some of the action, and our workforce canteen in the Mound Stand has a fabulous view of the field of play.Anyway, it’s not the watching, it’s the taking part that counts. I’ve been privileged enough to see Lord’s in a way I’d never imagined, to achieve a lifelong dream and walk down the steps and out onto the field of play, and to discover many useful things. Don Bradman looks like Bono, for example, whilst real tennis is a very strange game indeed.And when Seb Coe zoomed in to see a thrilling finale to the women’s competition, ending with a golden arrow shootout that South Korea’s Ki Bo Bae won by the slimmest of margins, the place was a different Lord’s. Whether all is “normal” again in a fortnight remains to be seen, but for now there was no doubt this strange test had been a great success.*though they did look a bit golfing

Virender Sehwag’s unorthodox style and approach to the game has redefined Test batting at the top and his impact for India and on world cricket should outlast his recent slump in overseas form

Sidharth Monga22-Nov-2012If it were possible, Virender Sehwag would have gone from 94 Tests to 100 in one match. That’s what he usually wants to do once he reaches 94 in a Test innings. Even if it means risking getting stumped on 99 to a debutant spinner. If he had hit a six of caps when 94 not out, Sehwag fans – and I am one of them – would have been able to stop facts from coming in the way of a good story.Those facts that were driven home during his struggles in Australia. Hard as you tried, you couldn’t live in denial and shrug it off by saying, “That’s the way he plays.” There, he even tried to buckle down for the team’s good but was simply not good enough. Against the moving, bouncing new ball, his minimal footwork proved inadequate. The bowlers no longer feared bowling to him, especially if they could get it to rise rib high or move after pitching. With every confused dismissal, Sehwag reminded you he had gone from Adelaide to Adelaide without a century outside Asia in four years.During the same period, though, Sehwag delighted with his dominance in Asia. He scored his second triple-century, in Chennai, plundered 293 of the most delightful runs in Mumbai, 201 of the most difficult ones in Galle, and even Usain-Bolted the record for the highest score in ODIs, a format he has never quite mastered. On numerous other occasions Sehwag stole results from the jaws of draws through his strike-rate in India’s first innings. Often he targeted the best bowlers in the opposition so hard he practically eliminated them. To overlook this impact will be to stop facts from coming in the way of a depressing story.The Sehwag story is anything but depressing. It is, for the most part, one of unabashed joy, of lack of inhibition, of a reminder that nine fielders can cover only so much of the field, of redefining good and bad balls, of playing scarcely believable shots with a bat only whose inside edge is visible to the bowler, of daring left-arm spinners to give up negative tactics with the promise that he will hit them for a six off the first ball they bowl from round the stumps, of pulling through mid-off to counter deep-square fields and short and wide bowling and later saying he can’t play boring cricket, of failing when trying to go from 195 to 201 in one hit but still trying it in future at 295, of a reminder that cricket is just a sport after all.You might look at Sehwag struggling in certain conditions – for just four of his 12 years, lest it be forgotten – and flourishing in certain others (you just can’t ignore the number of big centuries he has scored at that strike rate) and call him a product of his times. You couldn’t be more wrong.Sehwag is not a product of his time; his times are a product of him. That’s one box ticked for sure on the greatness list. He didn’t just redefine opening in Tests, he did so without being an opener by training. You see openers – Watson, Gayle, Dilshan, Warner – trying to intimidate bowlers today. Sehwag started it. And he started it when asked to open the innings because the Indian middle order, his preferred station, was too packed. He gave meaning to the vague term “staying beside the line of the ball”. To do it once in a while is okay, but you don’t do it with his alarming regularity by fluke. He has scored six centuries at more than a run a ball, and taken three of them past 250. Three of the five fastest double-centuries, and five of the top 10, belong to him. He has done it not through brute strength, but through delightful manipulation of fields.

“You just react to the ball. If the ball is there to be hit, you just hit it. Don’t worry that this is a Test or one-dayer or T20. You just hit it. Because it’s your routine. You are not worried about ‘what if I get out’. You are not worried about a four or a sixer, one or two. You just hit the ball. And enjoy the sound.”Virender Sehwag’s take on batting

Sehwag batted as if meditating. “You just react to the ball,” he once told me. “If the ball is there to be hit, you just hit it. Don’t worry that this is a Test or one-dayer or T20. You just hit it. Because it’s your routine. Every time you practise in the nets, you just go and see the ball and hit the ball. You are not worried about ‘what if I get out’. You are not worried about a four or a sixer, one or two. You just hit the ball. And enjoy the sound. At the end of the day if you hit the ball or defend the ball, you love the sound that comes when the ball hits the bat.”Sehwag had me by then. As if enlightened, I added: “And that sound won’t come when you are leaving the ball…” Like an arithmetic teacher who had just shown me how to add two and two, he smiled benevolently and said: “Exactly.”How simple life would have been if the man who brought us batting nirvana didn’t frustrate us so. If he hadn’t picked the IPL over Tests in the West Indies and England. This was Dylan gone electric. Perhaps Sehwag thought he could fit it all in. Perhaps he thought he could get the best of both worlds: take the IPL money, play Tests in England and give the West Indies a miss. Perhaps he did become a product of his time after all. He is no god, he is human like all of us. If he did pick money over Tests, perhaps he should be allowed to make all the money he wants. “Don’t worry this is Test or one-day or T20,” he said, remember?When it comes to judging greatness, though, history won’t be as kind. It will tell you Sehwag had one good tour each of Australia, England, South Africa and New Zealand, and followed them up with a bad one to each of those countries. He is a man who made a mockery of statistics but will not be allowed to hide behind them, behind that average of 51 after 99 Tests.We, though, will rate him by his impact, by his innovation, by his entertainment. Sehwag has brought us all of that, except only in certain conditions over the last third of his career. On the eve of his 100th Test appearance, do we let that last third outside Asia cloud our view of Sehwag? Or do we look beyond the immediate and revel in all the joy he has brought us over the rest of his career? Or do we see his hundred in his 99th Test as yet more proof of his positive attitude, that he can come back from all that and start stealing results from the jaws of draws as if nothing was amiss?We know what Sehwag would do. Take a deep breath, sing a tune to himself, try to clear his mind of all thoughts, and just see the next ball and hit it. And enjoy the sound.

This was just the sort of pitch that MS Dhoni has said he doesn’t want, but it may just have given his side a chance after the slowness helped them contain England’s scoring

Sidharth Monga13-Dec-2012It is often – rightly – said that a verdict on a pitch should not be delivered until Virender Sehwag has batted on it. We shall reserve the judgement then, but it is clear that this pitch is not made for attractive cricket. Only players like Sehwag and Kevin Pietersen are expected to rise above it. The same goes for bowlers, for if a patient batsman puts his mind to it, it will be difficult to get him out until the pitch starts breaking up.The WACA Ground in Perth exposes ordinariness brutally. It has no time for those who are not good. However, if you have the right technique and shots, or if you are a good bowler, it rewards you handsomely. Nagpur was opposite.On Thursday, you could get away by just putting the ball there, and wouldn’t be hit for runs. As a batsman, you could be beaten in the flight, you could make a mistake, and yet you could recover by going back in the crease. The converse held true. There was no value for shots because the ball just didn’t come on. The fielders had only half the ground to defend – forget about scoring runs behind the wicket – and there was no value for the shots even if you beat the pitch and timed them. As a bowler, debutant Ravindra Jadeja said there was no bounce, pace or turn on offer. All you could do was defend and prevent boundaries. The first day in Nagpur was anti-cricket for any neutral fan.And you can’t say for sure this was done by design. For starters this is not what MS Dhoni has been asking for. In fact this is exactly what he has been saying he doesn’t want. Understandably, with the home side going one-down into the series decider, the pitch has received no water over the last three days. It’s possible India didn’t know this pitch would turn out thus. Jadeja, who took two wickets, spoke of it with as much pain as a fan would.”The wicket is too flat,” he said. “It’s slow. There is no turn. It’s difficult for fast bowlers too. After pitching it loses all the pace. For spinners also there is no turn. All we could do was bowl stump to stump, and try to restrict their runs and boundaries.”Jadeja even said Ranji Trophy pitches are better. When asked about the jump he had to make from Ranji to Tests he said: “In the field I saw the huge difference,” he said. “Ranji wickets are a little result-oriented. They favour either fast bowlers or spinners. You can call this a flat wicket. Neither did it turn nor did it go off after pitching for the fast bowlers. The quality of batsmen is high too.”If you listen to Jadeja, there is every chance this is not what India asked for, and also that they misread it. They played four spinners on it, including Jadeja, and only one seamer. Surely they were expecting more turn and bounce? Jadeja hasn’t ruled out turn later in the match, though, which makes their losing the toss worse.”I don’t think we made a mistake,” Jadeja said. “It’s helping neither fast bowlers nor spinners. As the game progresses, it will start helping spinners. There will be footmarks in the second innings, we can work with them”Whether by design or accident, this pitch did provide India some control over the proceedings. Dhoni likes to be in control of the game as a captain, he doesn’t want to concede runs, he wants his bowlers to bowl one side of the wicket so he can concentrate on defending that half. His bowlers haven’t been doing that, so the pitch did the job for him.For major chunks of the day, Dhoni operated with the slip as the only man behind square. Yes, there was an improvement in the fielding with Jadeja joining Virat Kolhi, but it was also an illusion created by having more men covering a smaller part of the field. Many a bad ball went unpunished because there was no pace to work with.In the last hour, though, India seemed to have run out of the energy to work with the pitch. They didn’t try to bowl as much as they could, which is a little ridiculous when you think of the 97 overs they bowled in six hours, but they did slow down in the last hour. The intensity was a little low, and they were happy to just protect the boundaries.Considering the various stages the first day went through neither team will be too displeased with the 199 for 5. England came back from 139 for 5, and they know they will be bowling last. India, on the other hand, had lost the toss, had to counter Pietersen’s innings, and then came back through an impatient shot from the best batsman on the day. For similar excitement to be manufactured, you might need more impatient shots throughout the Test. Or Sehwag might prove us completely wrong.

The SLPL has had mixed reviews – there are the fanboys of Sri Lanka cricket and then there are the ones who didn’t get it at all

Damith Samarakoon25-Feb-2013As the rain swept away any chance of an intriguing finale for the first real crowd the SLPL had attracted, it rung true with the atmosphere that surrounded the whole event – a tournament that offered promise but stumbled across a few hurdles. The SLPL has had mixed reviews and split fan opinion down the middle. There are the fanboys of Sri Lanka cricket starved of their accessibility to domestic cricketers who would argue that it was the best thing since Microwave oven came out. Then there are the ones who didn’t get it at all – no crowds, no real international stars – how does the SLPL even exist? Others wouldn’t even have watched it.It’s strange to think that the SLPL’s future will actually depend on everything that happens between each edition. Now that the first one is out of the way, the SLC and Somerset Entertainment Ventures have immediate business to attend to. There are many allegations of corruption, sex scandals, pay disputes that must be dealt with swiftly and assuredly. The SLC have mastered the art of burying their heads in the sand and ignoring all that is around them but if they genuinely care about the SLPL and its future then that is a policy they need to abandon.Even more importantly, perhaps, is what happens to the infrastructure at a provincial level. The SLPL cannot masquerade as a provincial tournament if nearly all the players in the series are from Colombo. The board actually seems to understand this, based on a number of grants they have provided to improve the cricketing framework in the various provinces following the SLPL. They have also put in place plans to restructure the junior schools system and to conduct district and provincial tournaments at that level.Change cannot come from without but from within – at the grassroots level. The hope is that these initiatives will organically grow the relationship to a province in a cricketing context. The provincial format might be an alien concept but it’s not impossible to nurture its growth. The cricket that is played must be spread across the island, and while there are practical problems to this, the tournament would find it difficult to sustain itself if this doesn’t happen.It has been suggested that the provincial teams should try to introduce talent from their origins. But in reality, this is difficult, as competitive cricket levels outside of Colombo are simply not of the same standard. That’s not meant to be slight, but it’s a reality check, as the franchises will also be looking to put out the best possible team and not pick players to fill a quota.Of course, such a system would be the ideal, but right now Sri Lankan cricket is far from being able to support it. The quality of international players that the SLPL attracts is also a major factor in its sustainability. While it was good to see the local players come to the fore this year, the harsh reality is that big names attract television viewers. And even if every Sri Lankan watches every single SLPL game, the market would just be too small to impress TV rights holders.The next SLPL is wedged in around July, prior to South Africa’s tour of Sri Lanka. At the same time, the Ashes are being played, and there are talks of a US T20 around the same timeframe. This highlights issues of player availability and inevitably losing players to bigger markets like the US T20, which will undoubtedly be offering more than what the SLPL does. Add to this the major issue of the BCCI refusing to send any India players over and you can start to understand why many of these leagues struggle to go the distance.There are things that the SLC must be wary of as well. It’s an easy trap to think of the SLPL as a silver bullet and have their focus solely on its success. The club cricket system is in a mess. The domestic system is no longer producing Test-quality cricketers. Haroon Lorgat, in his advisory capacity, has warned that Sri Lanka might not qualify for the 2019 World Cup.These are the issues that truly matter for the future of Sri Lankan cricket. It’s also the responsibility of the SLC to maintain and voice that the priority for domestic cricketers should be to strive to be part of the Test side. They need to guard against the mentality shift of a young player wanting an SLPL contract as opposed to putting in the long term work needed to be a proper cricketer. While the SLPL is a shiny new toy to play with, it must remain clear to the people in charge that it’s only a part of the bigger picture.

In which the teams’ season report cards are ruthlessly reviewed, one in more detail than the others

Andy Zaltzman02-Apr-2013It is April. In India, the IPL casts its annual envious glance at Major League Baseball. A hundred and sixty-two matches per side – truly, commercial dreams can come true. And as cricket’s annual big-bucks slugfest begins, the 2012-13 Test season has been tagged, bagged, and taken away to the ICC laboratory for analysis (assuming that you consider the Zimbabwe v Bangladesh series to be part of the 2013 season) (an issue which has, no doubt, exercised your mind considerably over recent weeks). Around the cricketosphere, the world’s Test nations are taking stock. Some with more relish than others.Australia, who began the season by initially dominating the world’s best team, have ended it in something vaguely reminiscent of a poorly directed theatrical farce. The whole of Australia will be desperately hoping that Michael Clarke’s troublesome back recovers within the next 99 days, that his troublesome team reads a few coaching manuals in the same time frame, and that the government’s secret research into the development of an age-reversing serum that it can slather on seven or eight of its former world-dominating stars bears fruit.India is basking in the afterglow of emerging from its era-ending slump, with perhaps a smidgen of concern over how quickly its bright new dawn might be clouded over in South Africa later in the year, and a tinge of regret that they needlessly delayed their obviously-needed process of regeneration until after they had caved in against England in two disastrously low-octane performances in Mumbai and Kolkata.South Africa themselves have spent the last few days having the ICC Test mace analysed by scientists to discover why it seems to possess the supernatural power to magically transform turn a good team into a thoroughly average one. Thus far, they have succeeded only in turning Morne Morkel into a zebra, and Dale Steyn into Sreesanth, although thankfully that metamorphosis was temporary, and lasted long enough only for the world’s leading paceman to put on a headband and throw some excitable shapes on a dance floor. The Proteas may also be wondering why it took them so long (a) to pick Vernon Philander, (b) to fulfil their potential after years of underachievement, and (c) to realise that (a) and (b) might be linked.Sri Lanka have been largely unimpressive with the now-35-year-olds Rangana Herath and Kumar Sangakkara in the team. Without them, they would have been sub-dismal.Since Tino Best produced the most unexpected innings of 95 in the history of cricket – possibly the most unexpected innings of over 70 in the history of cricket – West Indies have won six out of six (for the first time since 1988). That is as many Tests as they had won in their previous 73 matches over eight years. New dawn, or inevitable result of playing the three teams ranked below them? Or a bit of both?New Zealand, amidst concern for the hospitalised Jesse Ryder, are assessing the fall-out from a turbulent season on and off the field, in which creditable drawn series bookended an absolute and merciless cauterisation in South Africa.Pakistan are contemplating how difficult it is to win Test matches without (a) playing regular Test matches, (b) a batting line-up, and (c) England in the opposition dressing room.Bangladesh have made distinct progress in batting, but have, at best, stagnated with the ball. Zimbabwe are playing again.And England? A curious melange of excellence, adequacy and ineptitude, a curious cocktail of rugged determination and inexplicable fragility. They have been brilliant and decisive at times, shoddy and hesitant at others.The batsmen, having enjoyed an extraordinary collective purple patch, then endured an equally extraordinary collective funk in the UAE at the start of last year. Since when, through last summer and this winter, they have been, with the exception of Matt Prior throughout and Alastair Cook in India, mostly inconsistent.The bowling unit on which their previous successes were built had shuddered to a halt at The Oval against South Africa. It has since spluttered inconsistently. From the start of the Pakistan series of 2010, when the bowling unit clicked into a higher gear, until the end of the West Indies series last summer, England picked eight different frontline bowlers. All of them, from Graham Onions in his solitary Test in that time, to Graeme Swann, who played all 24, averaged under 30. Collectively, with the ball, England averaged 26 runs per wicket, and took a wicket every 55 balls.

Pakistan are contemplating how difficult it is to win Test matches without (a) playing regular Test matches, (b) a batting line-up, and (c) England in the opposition dressing room

Since then, the six bowlers England have used in their last three series have all individually averaged over 33, and collectively, they have averaged 40, with a strike rate of 80. Tino Best seems to have transformed more than one team’s fortunes. Before his eye-popping, precedent-obliterating innings, England as a team had taken their opponents’ wickets for less than 30 runs apiece in 19 of their previous 23 Tests. In ten Tests since then, they have done so only in their two wins in India.England should still win one, and probably both, of their impending Ashes contests. Australia’s weaknesses look more pronounced. However, after only two series wins in six, and with no opportunity to avenge their conclusive defeats by Pakistan and South Africa until the 2015-16 season, England’s opportunity to establish themselves as a great Test side has probably passed them by.● Cook’s decision to put New Zealand in to bat certifiably, incontrovertibly and almost disastrously, did not work. This does not mean it was the wrong decision. Even with hindsight, I think it may, in fact, have been the right decision. But it was followed by a rubbishly executed team performance for four days. So it looked wrong. Very, very wrong.There must, similarly, be times when the captain makes the wrong decision at the toss, but his team plays well and wins, so everyone agrees that he made the right decision.Cook’s captaincy is prone to extreme, almost unfathomable, caution in the field. It was visible at times in India, even when England were completely dominant. It was painfully obvious on the fourth morning of the Auckland Test match, when England ran up the tactical white flag and waited for the merciful release of declaration.But Cook’s insertion of New Zealand on day one was a bold move, aimed at maximising England’s chances of winning. It backfired – if this had been a children’s cartoon rather than a Test match, Cook would have been left with gunpowder all over his face, hair on fire, and teeth falling out of his head with a comic twang – but it was strategically sound and statistically sensible.On a pitch that looked likely to remain batsman-friendly for five days, as indeed it did, Cook gave his team the earliest possible opportunity to start the difficult process of taking 20 wickets, with the subsequent options of either trying to force the game forward, or shutting up shop and seeing out a comfortable draw. The fact that they then took only one of those 20 wickets in the first day of the match, and became only the 13th Test side ever to put their opponents in to bat and then see their first two wickets rack up more than 250, does not invalidate the decision. Necessarily.Perhaps England were thinking back to Andy Flower’s first series in charge, when they failed to take the initiative at 1-0 down in the West Indies and needing to force a win on a similarly dull and featureless pitch. Then, England won the toss and, in accordance with convention, chose to bat, thus constricting the time available for taking the 20 wickets they required. They scored 546.West Indies were quite happy to let them score 546. Five of the 15 sessions they would have to survive to secure the series had already gone by the time they went in to bat. One solid team innings on a moribund pitch and they would be almost safe. They replied with 544, and six more sessions had scuttled down England’s drain. England thrashed a quick 237, set West Indies a notional 240 to win in 66 overs, a target that was never going to tempt them, given that they had the lead in the series, and the game ended with West Indies’ ninth-wicket pair clinging on, and England thinking “Oooops.” Cook wanted to avoid a similar scenario, in which his team could be denied a series victory by a lack of time to take the crucial final wickets on a non-deteriorating 21st-century fifth-day pitch. And he did avoid that scenario. By a massive margin. Albeit not quite in the way he was intending to.● Some stats on winning the toss and electing to bowl:Since 1 January 2000, toss-winning Test captains have elected to bat 396 times. Their results: won 142, drawn 96, lost 158. They have chosen to bowl 209 times – won 86, drawn 55, lost 66. In terms of their win-to-loss ratio, captains choosing to bowl first have been 45% more successful than captains choosing to bat (1.30 wins per defeat, to 0.89 wins per defeat).This was the 23rd time England had chosen to bowl first since 2000. They have won 12 and lost only two of those matches. In the 53 Tests in which England have won the toss and batted in that time, they have won 19, drawn 16, and lost 18.

Sikandar Raza is not going to let himself be satisfied with his promising start to the series; he wants more for himself and for Zimbabwean cricket

Liam Brickhill at the Harare Sports Club24-Jul-2013A maiden international fifty against the world champions would give most cricketers cause to celebrate. But for Sikandar Raza, reaching the 80s and not going on to a hundred left him bitterly disappointed.”A friend of mine just asked me something,” he said after Zimbabwe’s six-wicket defeat to India. “He asked me: ‘How did it feel when Virat got hundred?’ I tell you, that question stung me properly. I’m going to remember that for the rest of my life. I’m not going to find these opportunities a lot, so when I do I’m going to have to make sure that I convert them.”Raza is no stranger to disappointment, and perhaps it is a residual memory of the failed eye test that quashed his childhood dream of becoming a fighter pilot in Pakistan that motivates him so fiercely. Or maybe it is the sheer amount of hard work he has had to put in to get this far as a cricketer. Either way, at 27 years old and now only beginning his international career, he knows he has got to take every chance he can.”I’ll definitely be in the nets after this press conference,” he said. “I’ve got a few areas to brush up on, so that if I find myself with the same opportunity, I’m not putting myself under pressure and neither am I putting my team under pressure.”After losing the toss on a lively pitch first thing in the morning, Zimbabwe were indeed under pressure from the very start. “History tells us that at [Harare] Sports Club batting first is always very tricky,” Raza said. “It was nipping around. From one side it was skidding and from the other side it was not coming on to the bat. That was happening, along with the movement and seam, so it was quite tricky to bat. So what we decided was that we’re going to keep wickets in hand, because that would give our team a better chance to post a competitive total.”Sticking to such a defensive gameplan couldn’t have been easy for a batsman who built his domestic reputation upon innings of daring adventure. He sums up his batting technique as “see ball, hit ball, and try to survive mate”, and once shared a partnership of 98 with Brian Lara – a batsman known to play a few shots himself – in Zimbabwe’s domestic Twenty20 competition to which Lara contributed just 11. Today, he played more blocks than slogs but still finished with a strike rate of 73.21 and eight boundaries.”The flair will stay there, and I hope it stays there for the rest of my career,” Raza said. “But the fact is when you’re playing international cricket at such a high level you’re not going to get bad balls and if I’m trying to make something out of nothing I’m going to throw my wicket away.”I would love to play my cricket with a lot of flair but unfortunately that doesn’t always happen after just four [ODI] games. Hopefully as I keep on playing, I can start playing more shots. But at the moment, the plan we set, we have to stick to that so that it gives me and my team the best opportunity.”With his brother and several cousins – all wearing ‘Team Raza’ t-shirts – cheering him on, Raza was in sight of his ton when he swiped across the line at a delivery from Mishra that skidded on to rattle his stumps. Raza trudged off, his head hung in disappointment, and conceded that with the big-hitting Elton Chigumbura at the other end, he probably should have been looking for a single.”I just wanted to give Elty [Chigumbura] the strike. Elty was hitting it so well that when I was standing at the other end I was slightly scared [what would happen] if he hits one straight back. Maybe I was trying to be too smart. I saw a gap and I wanted to pick two or three there. Maybe I should have just kept it simple and let Elty do the power hitting.”Raza will get another chance to prove himself on Friday, but insisted that success in this series is more important to the team and cricket in Zimbabwe than it might be to him personally. Zimbabwe have struggled to attract elite opposition – and the TV rights cash that comes with them – and they understand what a big opportunity a visit by India presents.”This is a massive tour, for Zimbabwe to start with and then individually for me as well, because it could be make or break for us,” he concluded. “So if we do really well here, hopefully we’ll have more cricket coming to us, which could only help us improve.”

Loose shots have contributed to Rohit Sharma’s downfall on all three occasions. The sooner he adjusts to his new role as an opener, the greater the chances he will begin converting his starts

Nagraj Gollapudi at Edgbaston16-Jun-2013Even Rohit Sharma would admit that it is getting embarrassing to be back in the dressing room when he could have been there in the middle converting his starts into big scores. He had started off watchfully three times in the tournament. He converted two of those to half-centuries. Against Pakistan today, he started fluently once again. But just as his innings was about to blossom into another fifty, Rohit got distracted and played a loose stroke. Like the unnecessary pull shot against South Africa. Like the unwanted push against a leg-side delivery against West Indies. And like the unfathomable urge to hit over midwicket today when India were in a commanding position.Probably the pain of getting a start and then playing an erroneous stroke could be worse than getting a duck. At Sophia Gardens, then at The Oval and then at Edgbaston, Rohit walked back punching his gloves, cringing his eyes, shaking his head, hitting his bat on his pads, pursing his lips. It was clear how much he wanted to be in the center even as he reluctantly departed the field. He has been rightly accused in the past of throwing away his wicket. However, this tournament, Rohit has stayed hungry.He trained hard in the nets. Even after finishing his regular batting stint he would return later to continue to take throwdowns and be the last to leave. The best music to a batsman’s ears comes from middling the ball. From a distance it can seem as if a player is hitting a mallet to stroke his bat. Yet, it is the urge to get the feel that makes the exercise fascinating.You could see the confidence he derived from those preparations in the crucial partnerships he built with Shikhar Dhawan against South Africa and then West Indies, which were the key legs in the Indian victories. In the first match Morne Morkel tested Rohit with a robust spell of fast bowling, firing in short-pitched deliveries at an aggressive pace.Rohit looked uncomfortable at times, was even hit on the box once, folded into two on another occasion while trying to fend the white shell that was climbing high and fast towards his head. But Rohit knew the key was to leave the ball. What also helped was an understanding he had with Dhawan as both men showed the keenness to keep rotating the strike.The time he has to play his shots, the fact that he has all the shots in the book make Rohit a dangerous batsman once he gets his eye in. Over the years in the IPL, he has tended to take pressure positively, understanding when exactly to go for the big one. So even if India were scoring at a slow rate in the initial ten overs, he did not show any desperation. In fact, in the first two matches, Rohit had started slowly compared to Dhawan, yet accelerated effortlessly to reach the half-century mark before his partner. But what he has not been able to do is to get to three figures like Dhawan managed in the first two matches. So why is that?Not for the lack of courage. Probably it could be to do with his new role. Unlike Dhawan, who has primarily been a specialist opener, Rohit has played in the middle order for both India and Mumbai in first-class cricket. But his superior technique and ability to play the short ball confidently encouraged captain MS Dhoni and coach Duncan Fletcher to vault him into the opening position. With the Indian middle order looking settled, the challenge for Rohit is to adapt quickly.Rahul Dravid, the former India captain, who performed in various positions including as an opener in ODIs, reckons Rohit needs to be flexible. “He has all the talent, he has the goods. It is a question of him now converting it and having the hunger and desire when he has in good form to actually stack them up,” Dravid said on ESPNcricinfo’s The Huddle on Saturday.For now, Rohit has his captain’s confidence and he is bound to get the long rope if he continues to provide confident starts. “That’s the only space that we have got, where we all felt that with his talent he can really capitalise and be a good opener,” Dhoni said on Friday. However, Rohit knows well that he needs to start making centuries that will finally allow him to enjoy a settled role.Having played 90 ODIs and leading Mumbai Indians to the IPL title, Rohit, despite his young age (26), has stated assuming more responsibilities. He has seen a contemporary like Virat Kohli grow into one of the most reliable players for India. Rohit is now as close to fulfilling that role. But like his seniors have mentioned, he is the driver of his destiny.

Ross Taylor’s career needed realigning at the start of the season, and he has responded with a glut of runs which is taking him to rarely seen heights for a New Zealand batsman

Andrew McGlashan in Wellington11-Dec-2013It was West Indies’ moment. Ross Taylor had driven at a wide delivery from Tino Best. The ball flew at head height between second and third slip, and Kirk Edwards committed to the catch. But Instead of holding on to it, he palmed the ball away to the boundary.New Zealand would have been 26 for 3 if the chance had been held. The confidence that West Indies had gathered from the latter half of the Dunedin Test, would have surged. Instead, New Zealand closed on a healthy 307 for 6, and Taylor had taken his tally for the series to 362 by the time he was, eventually and ironically, acrobatically caught at deep point after being given two further lives once he had passed his hundred. That late wicket perked up West Indies, but there will be plenty of nagging regret at what might have been.The ball did not jag around as may have been expected on a well-grassed surface, but that was largely because the West Indies bowlers did not allow it to. Tino Best created chances, but his length was inconsistent, and although Shannon Gabriel’s early figures were economical – 11-4-18-0 at one point – it would have been worth the risk of a few more driven runs for the threat that the pitched-up ball brought. The ideal length was the one that found Hamish Rutherford’s edge, only to be spilled at second slip by Darren Sammy, although it was not a costly error.”When you’re inserted on a greenish wicket, we’ll take six for 300 most days of the week I think,” Taylor said. “I wouldn’t say it was nipping round corners but the odd ball kept you honest.”The frustration from Best was that he was actually very dangerous when the fuller length was found. He showed this with the first ball of the match after a full delivery caught Peter Fulton trapped in the crease for lbw, until the DRS, and an early use for Real-Time Snicko in support of Hot Spot, confirmed a thin inside edge. It was very thin, for even the batsman did not seem aware of it, as he waited nervously for a few seconds before calling for a review.Only having two wickets in the bag by lunch was a missed opportunity, but the visitors kept a foothold in the day as their spinners picked up a wicket apiece after tea; Brendon McCullum flicking Narsingh Deonarine lazily to midwicket, and Corey Anderson bottom-edging a sweep from Shane Shillingford straight to Kieran Powell.That West Indies resorted to using spinners for 31 consecutive overs either side of Tea was an indication that their seamers weren’t firing. In fact, by the time the second new ball was taken, Best had only bowled 11 overs in the day.Taylor did not waste his reprieve. “I thought it was there to hit and it was nice to have a bit of luck,” he said. A dismissive pull off Sammy took him to his half-century, but his most significant shot was when he lifted Narsingh Deonarine over midwicket. It is often a favoured scoring area for Taylor but one that he had completely locked away in these two Tests until then.His most uncomfortable moment during the knock came when Gabriel slammed a delivery into his rib cage. There were concerns late in the day when he began flexing his right leg and took on some pills from the physio, but he said he was down due to a lack of energy from only eating a small lunch. The resulting lapse in concentration cost him his wicket.When he had brought up his 10th Test hundred – his second on his home ground – in front of his parents who had travelled over the Rimutaka hills from Masterton, Taylor went past Stephen Fleming in New Zealand’s all-time list, in almost half the Tests that the former captain had played. Taylor also ticked off the 4000-run landmark. It has been a busy week.Unlike some players who say they ignore numbers, Taylor was happy to admit otherwise. “It’s nice to beat players who have played for a long time and beat their scores in less time as well,” he said. “I’m happy with where I am at the moment and just want to continue, obviously there’s a few more hundreds I want to score – not just 11,12 or 13.”He entered this Test with a career-high ranking following his double-hundred last week, which moved him into the top ten of the current list. With 794 points before this innings began, he is now almost certain to become only the third New Zealand player – after Glenn Turner (1974) and Geoff Howarth (1981) – to top the 800-mark. Turner is also the only New Zealand batsman to be ranked at No. 1, and at his best, was well clear of Garry Sobers in second, followed by Martin Crowe and John F Reid who both reached No. 3 during their careers.Although comparing eras is an inexact science, it is the nonetheless impressive to see Taylor’s progress, considering that his career needed to be realigned at the start of the season. Whatever advice Crowe has been dispensing to him has had outstanding results.

Our correspondent catches some tennis, comes to grips with oversize parathas, and watches a “milkshake challenge”

Kanishkaa Balachandran03-Mar-2014February 21
The teams are back to training after taking the first gap day off between the group stages and the knockouts. Head down to the ICC Academy ovals where India and New Zealand are training. As the Indians pack up and leave, the sounds of Shakira’s “Hips Don’t Lie” disturb the peace. The DJ? Sarfaraz Khan. It plays off his mobile phone in his pocket with the volume cranked right up.Meet New Zealand’s Raki Weerasundara and then thank the team manager Kaushik Patel for setting it up. As I leave I ask if he’s in any way related to Dipak Patel, the former New Zealand offspinner. “Yeah. He’s my brother.” Like Dipak, Kaushik has dedicated his life to cricket and has been coaching since he was 20. A former opening batsman and left-arm spinner, Kaushik played semi-professionally for Stratfordshire and signed as a junior player with Worcestershire. Settled in New Zealand in 1996 and has been involved as an U-19 coach and selector since. Says the Patel family was “born with a cricket bat and ball in their hand”. The conversation veers towards Dipak’s career.February 22
The knockouts begin. The defending champions India are shown the door by England in a nail-biter. The mouthy send-offs to two England players spark comments on Twitter and in the media box about the behaviour of the Indian players when under pressure. Ben Duckett, the star of the day, says England didn’t expect to make it to the semis. There’s hardly anyone from the British media to cover it. Perhaps they didn’t expect it either.February 23
Nicolas Pooran plays a blinder, 143 against Australia. His mentor Daren Ganga times his arrival in Dubai perfectly to witness the innings of the tournament.It’s interesting observing different players handle media conferences. The Australia captain Alex Gregory appears nervous. I tell him he better get used to it, for it’s only the start, and he laughs. The previous day India’s Vijay Zol was asked how boring it was to talk to the media. He looks startled for a second and gives a diplomatic answer: “It’s all part of the game.”February 24
England have a habit of producing thrillers. If they are not getting abuse thrown at them, they’re dishing it out, as is the case in the second semi-final against Pakistan, but the camaraderie between the two sides after the game makes up for it. Catch up with Imam-ul-Haq, the tournament’s leading run scorer at that point, and nephew of Inzamam-ul-Haq. Over a 15-minute conversation – rather monologue – it’s clear the excitement of the win hasn’t sunk in for him. The floodlights are dimmed by the end of it and the ground is empty. Fear the team has already left for the hotel without him.February 25
The South Africans are having fun at a fielding session at the Academy Oval. Coach Ray Jennings splits them into two groups, batsmen v bowlers, for a “milkshake” challenge: the team with the most direct hits wins. The batsmen come out on top. The captain, Aiden Markram, is the best fielder of the evening. The bowlers have to shell out cash for milkshakes for the winners.Aiden Markram leads South Africa’s celebrations after the win•ICCMy quest for new eating options continues. I come across a no-frills Pakistani joint in a residential area. Grossly underestimate the size of the parathas.February 26
It’s the second semi-final, with Australia taking on South Africa. The game gets over earlier than expected. As usual, a few of us head down to the seats to get a feel of the action. We head back up to the media room after a while but one of the journalists wants to stay on for a few more overs. He ends up staying for longer because he gets locked in. A security guard has bolted the exit door to keep fans from entering the commentary enclosure. A few phone calls and an argument with the guard later, he’s released from captivity.February 27
The first of two gap days before the final. I head to Sharjah for a change. Unlike Dubai and Abu Dhabi, the location of the stadium here is more central – if anachronistic. The press and VIP enclosures are open-air and the commentary box, when in use, can get really cramped. That was open air too in the days when Henry “Blowers” Blofeld graced the chair. Also surprised at the size of the outfield. Maybe it was Tony Greig who made it seem like Sachin hit those sixes into the ocean. Watch India gain a consolation win for fifth place before they catch the flight back home.At night a few of us journalists decide to have a mini night out in Dubai. We head to the Irish Village next door to the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championship. It’s the start of the weekend and there are no seats outdoors. A giant screen shows the live match for those who couldn’t get in or afford tickets. Dubai’s answer to Henman Hill.February 28
It’s the eve of the final and a captains’ press conference is arranged at ICC headquarters. Head to the Academy Oval to watch a bit of the third-place playoff between England and Australia. It’s a good place to watch cricket so long as the weather is good. Dave Richardson makes an appearance. Dave Collier too drops by for the game. A couple of England players fill their plates and sit down for lunch next to us. After the press conference, Sami-ul-Hasan, the ICC’s media and communications manager, gives us a guided tour of the ICC office. It’s empty since it’s a holiday.March 1
The final day of the tournament. The stands start filling up as Pakistan keep losing wickets. Plenty of green jerseys around during the interval. We watch the first 15 overs from the seats, and at 28 for 2 the expectations are high. They recede as Markram and Greg Oldfield build on. The celebrations after the win aren’t quite the same as India’s tribute to Usain Bolt in Townsville in 2012.It’s one of the simpler tournament final presentations I have seen – no confetti or crackers. How it should be. Jennings prefers to sit outside the change room, where his boys are letting their hair down. Markram sits coiled on the outfield on his own, answering his mobile, before joining the rest. We stay on and get some reactions from Justin Dill and Clyde Fortuin. A few South Africans come out with the trophy for some photo ops. Ngazibini Sigwili shakes our hands before heading inside. There’s one final warm gesture awaiting us. As we say goodbye to the South Africa manager and thank him for his help, he lets each of us hold the World Cup trophy. It was the postcard moment of the tournament. It didn’t matter that all of us are over 19.