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The flamboyant batter kept herself calm after a slow start to produce a matchwinning innings

Andrew McGlashan25-Oct-2020Grace Harris delivered on the words of her captain, Jess Jonassen, to provide an early example of “batting smarter” for the defending champions Brisbane Heat having spent the lead-up to the WBBL watching how MS Dhoni has gone about finishing matches.Coming in at No. 4, Harris, sporting a black eye after a run-in with the golf simulator in the WBBL village, went through the gears as 11 off 18 balls became 53 off 37 to ensure the Heat made short work of the Perth Scorchers on the opening day of the tournament.Harris has moved around the order during her WBBL career and as an opener has twice hit powerful centuries – including the fastest in the competition’s history, off 42 balls – but last year’s returns of 212 runs at 17.66 need to lift this season if the Heat are to cover for the loss of Beth Mooney.ALSO READ: WBBL opening day round-upIn the lead-up to the opening match, Jonassen, the new Heat captain for this campaign, told ESPNcricinfo that Harris had put in “significant work” during the off-season and had “started to thrive on having that greater responsibility.””I think it’s just about batting a little bit smarter in that middle order,” Harris said after her Player-of-the-Match award. “It’s definitely a mindset change for me, and a little bit of a change of role. If I was playing up front I was generally told to just have a good crack and get ahead of the game as quickly as I could. Now that I’m sitting in the middle order the four [fielders] are already out so it’s about trying to get in and go deep in the innings.”As you saw today, I struggled at the start to get off strike, but in the past I’d have panicked a bit and either run past one or had a crack at one early. I thought [Sarah] Glenn bowled very well to me early and made it hard for me to get away. Then HG [Heather Graham] bowled nice under-the-bat yorkers so I had to stay a little bit patient. [I was] chatting to Georgia Redmayne in the middle and just tried not to panic. I know I have that ability to catch up so it’s just about finding that now.””I’ve been watching a lot of MS Dhoni’s innings and took a bit of inspiration for him. He’s a fantastic finisher, he might get behind but at the end they win games and he’s ahead of the count. I’m definitely hoping to do something similar to that. Watching those types of players, they are pretty cool.”On the incident that caused her “shiner”, Harris was able to offer a few more details. “I might have been mucking around in the hub on the golf simulator, I know I’ve shut it down so I apologise to everyone in the hub, it’s because of me,” she said.”I middled a ball on a drive and didn’t have a chance to look up before it rebounded off the net and snotted me in the face. I thought I was hard done by not to end up on the fairway, it showed me in the water.”She might be sticking to cricket drives rather than golf drives for the next few weeks.

The former captain said Angelo Mathews should have been leading Sri Lanka, but he had to give up because he caved to cricket politics

Andrew Fidel Fernando26-May-2019Mahela Jayawardene had been invited to play a role in Sri Lanka’s World Cup campaign, but declined largely because he is still disillusioned with the general direction Sri Lanka Cricket has been going in.Now a two-time IPL-winning coach, Jayawardene has in the past produced plans to overhaul Sri Lanka’s domestic cricket system, only for SLC to reject those proposals. Last year, a committee featuring Jayawardene, Kumar Sangakkara and Aravinda de Silva had also produced a report on Sri Lankan cricket, with recommendations on governance as well as domestic structure. Those recommendations have been almost totally ignored.Jayawardene said he had been asked twice to play a role in Sri Lanka’s backroom for the World Cup – once by Sri Lanka’s sports minister, and once by SLC’s CEO towards the end of the recent IPL.”I was [invited] but I have several other commitments. More than that, I didn’t understand the role I am expected to play,” Jayawardene told . “There’s no point in me getting involved tactically, or whatever, if I don’t have a say in the whole structure. The team is selected and everything is done and dusted. There is no room for me to come in and add something.”I am still happy to contribute in my little way with the management of the team, but nothing to do with the SLC. That’s something I have told myself as well. I just don’t have the appetite to come and work for anybody when I know that it’s not the right place for me.”Jayawardene had been especially dismayed by SLC’s failure to seriously consider the recommendations put forward by his committee last year; that report had been commissioned by Sri Lanka’s sports ministry.”We created a professional cricketing structure spending eight months,” he said. “We offered to set it up for them but they rejected it. We did it because we don’t want to lose our cricketers going to Australia and to league cricket in England. We need those experienced players in our system.”There are some teams in our first-class system where the average age is 25, which is sad. When we played, we had so many senior cricketers to guide us. Without them in our system, we cannot build a strong domestic cricket structure. And without doing that, there’s no point in building stadiums.”Jayawardene also criticised aspects of Angelo Mathews’ and Dinesh Chandimal’s leadership, whose failures he believes contributed to the rapid recent turnover of captains in the Sri Lanka side. Mathews was captain of all Sri Lanka teams when Jayawardene retired in 2015, but since then, Chandimal, Thisara Perera, Lasith Malinga, Chamara Kapugedara and – most-recently – Dimuth Karunaratne have held the reins. This instability is often given as one reason for Sri Lanka’s serious decline in ODIs.”The only advice we gave Angelo was not to give in to cricket politics,” Jayawardene said. “He needs to be a stronger leader, to be with the players and do the right thing. But he gave in to cricket politics. He allowed other people to make decisions and did not stand up for his players. I am being honest. I have told him this as well and he accepts it. If he hadn’t given in, we would probably not be in this situation today. Even if I see him today, that’s the only complaint I will have against him.”The number one rule in Sri Lanka is, if you are the captain, lead by example, and do not allow any outsiders coming into that set-up. That’s the only way we ran the show and survived. It was unfortunate and it was not easy, either. You need to deal with a lot of unwanted elements. But if you are a strong character, that’s something you have to do. I have nothing against him. He is a brilliant cricketer and a wonderful person but he did not handle this situation well. He should be the one who is leading this team at the World Cup. He had to give up because it was too much for him. But it was his fault.”I think [Chandimal] was another victim of cricket politics. In the sense, he was another player like Angelo Mathews who was snared to elements behind the scene and went along with them rather than taking control of the team and being a strong leader.”Responding to Jayawardene, Mathews put out a tweet saying he was “surprised” to see some of the comments but his priority was the World Cup, and he urged Jayawardene to help the Sri Lankan team “with his knowledge and encouragement in this crucial time”.

The schadenfreude is subtle in the hosts’ camp, but its there. They know Australia are in a bad position, so they sniff a maiden home-series win against this opposition since readmission

Firdose Moonda27-Mar-2018South Africa’s coach Ottis Gibson hopes brazen ball-tampering will not take place in a team he is in charge of, but was careful not to moralise as the Australia players await their fate ahead of the fourth Test.”Look, I would hope that it never happens under my watch,” Gibson said. “I’m not going to sit here and say that we’re whiter than white or anything, but we’ll try and play the game within the rules of the game. We know where the rules are, and the imaginary line that we talked about for the whole series, we feel like we know where that is and we’ll try not to cross the line.”In the last five years, South Africa have been found guilty of ball-tampering three times, all before Gibson became involved last September, and he will be aware of their far-from-squeakly-clean reputation. Faf du Plessis was caught rubbing the ball on his zipper in the UAE in 2013 and then shining the ball with mint-infused saliva in Australia in November 2016; Vernon Philander was found to be digging his thumb into a ball in Sri Lanka in 2014. On two of the three occasions, the guilty player accepted his sanction but on the third, du Plessis’ Mintgate, he appealed (unsuccessfully) and asked for clarity over what constitutes a foreign substance being applied to the ball.Several players, including Steven Smith, admitted to shining the ball in the same way and that is not the only method used to try and facilitate reverse swing. “Every team since the beginning of reverse swing, everybody tries to get the ball reversing,” Gibson said. “They skim it in, they bounce it in, they try and get it rough. The spinner gets his hand in the dirt and rubs it on the ball. Everybody has a way of getting the ball to go a little bit further. Because the ball will reverse naturally and then everybody has a way of trying to get it going a little bit further.”As for why teams feel the need to accelerate the process of reverse swing when it is something that will inevitably happen, Gibson said that it may arise due to “maybe be a bit of desperation”.2:28

A history of ball-tampering in cricket

In the Newlands Test, the same one in which Cameron Bancroft was caught using sticky tape to try to rub gains of sand on the ball, South Africa tried some accelerating methods of their own. They were spoken to about throwing the ball onto the pitch from the outfield, something which can speed up how quickly the leather gets scuffed up. Umpire Nigel Llong could be heard telling du Plessis and wicketkeeper Quinton de Kock, who was catching the ball on the bounce, that the practice “had to stop”. South Africa did not need further reprimanding and no action needed to be taken.But in Australia’s case, by the time the umpires came to know about Bancroft’s actions in tampering with the ball, the rest of the world knew too. Bancroft was spotted on television cameras in the 43rd over of South Africa’s second innings, with the hosts 185 runs ahead and only two wickets down. The chance to win the series had not slipped away from Australia at that stage, but it seemed to be heading that way and Smith admitted that he felt the ball was not doing enough, which led to the tampering.For Gibson, Australia have fallen on their own sword because they were blinded by a desire to dominate play. “The Aussies have said themselves that the brand of cricket they play is to win at all costs, and when you have that mindset… when you look at the Ashes, they were never really behind in many of the games. They won quite comfortably,” Gibson said. “Here they were behind a couple of times and perhaps that desperation came into it for them. It’s a shame that something like this had to happen for them to have a look at themselves. We just leave that to them and we’ll focus on winning the next game.”The schadenfreude is subtle in the South African camp, but its there. They know Australia are in a position from which they may not be able to recover and so, a first home-series win against them since readmission is closer to becoming a reality.South Africa won’t care whether that win comes against an Australian side that includes Smith or not, with a side that includes David Warner or not, or with a side that is mentally shot or not. That’s not my problem,” Gibson said. “We’re trying to win the series so from our point of view we hope that they’re very shattered.”And then he tempered his views with praise for an opposition attack which, tampered ball or not, he still has admiration for. “I’m still a huge fan of their bowling attack – they’ve got three six-foot-six fast bowlers bowling 140,” Gibson said. “I thought Pat Cummins was excellent in the last Test match, 24 years old, kept coming in all the time, got crucial wickets in both innings and then I see him running around the boundary diving around. So I’m still watching their bowlers and thinking, ‘That’s a very good bowling attack they’ve got.'”Pat Cummins made the breakthrough with the new ball•Getty Images

South Africa have a similarly strong pack and with the Wanderers set to offer some assistance to the quicks, the battle-lines remain drawn where they were when this contest began. It was supposed to be a clash of the quicks. It has descended into several other stoushes involving sledging and shoulders and shaming of a players’ wife and CSA suits getting suspended and some sections of the crowd being labelled “a disgrace” by Darren Lehmann, who now finds himself being called the same thing. It has been a series played in what the ICC may say was in a spirit very contrary to the game.As it gears up for its final show, Gibson hopes things can calm down but, on the evidence of the last four weeks, reaching any kind of quiet is only to brace for the next storm.”This one has had an edge to it that is different to the Ashes. At the end of the Ashes you sit down and have a drink together. Against India, it was a tough series but at the end of every game the guys came and had a drink,” Gibson said. “We haven’t had that opportunity yet with the Aussies, for whatever reason, because after every Test match there has been some sort of drama – someone had to go see the match ref, there was some conflict between the teams, stuff like that.”Cricket is still, at the end of the day, a gentleman’s game. Hopefully in the next Test we’ll get some way back towards being a gentleman’s game and we can have a beer.”

Monty Panesar has been recruited by Cricket Australia as a spin-bowling consultant for their tour of India next month, after spending his winter as a club cricketer in Sydney

ESPNcricinfo staff16-Jan-2017Monty Panesar has been recruited by Cricket Australia as a spin-bowling consultant for their tour of India next month, after spending his winter as a club cricketer in Sydney.Panesar, 34, played an integral role in England’s memorable series win in India in 2012-13, claiming 17 wickets with his left-arm spin in the final three Tests to help engineer a come-from-behind triumph.However, he made the last of his 50 Test appearances at Melbourne during the 2013-14 Ashes, and was not considered for selection for England’s recent 4-0 defeat in India, despite making a return to first-class cricket for Northamptonshire last summer following a spate of well-documented personal issues.Panesar’s recruitment to Australia’s ranks came at the behest of Pat Howard, Cricket Australia’s high performance manager, whose team were whitewashed 4-0 on their last tour to India four years ago, and recently succumbed to a 3-0 loss in similarly spin-friendly conditions in Sri Lanka.According to the Australian, Panesar will travel to the Centre of Excellence this week to work with left-arm spinner Steve O’Keefe, as well as Matt Renshaw, the opening batsman who was cleared of concussion on Sunday, following the incident that led to his withdrawal from action during the third Test against Pakistan.”Having Monty come up is a nice way to kickstart the squad’s thinking about playing in India,” Howard told the newspaper. “We want the batsmen to be thinking about what the bowlers will be trying to do to them over there and Monty can engage them that way as well as with the bowlers.”Phil Jaques will run the sessions with Matt, Monty and SOK, Phil has some nice ideas about how to challenge the batsmen,” Howard added. “In Australia we love big turners, but the successful bowlers like [Rangana] Herath and [Ravi] Ashwin are more likely to get you lbw or bowled than any other way, their accuracy and their length is absolutely outstanding.”Panesar was one of nine wickets for O’Keefe during their ongoing Grade match between Manly and Campbelltown Camden at the weekend.”He was brilliant on the weekend and must think cricket is an easy game after taking 9 for 54,” Panesar said.

Former Rajasthan Royals offspinner Ajit Chandila has been banned for life from all official cricketing activities for his role in the IPL 2013 spot-fixing case

ESPNcricinfo staff18-Jan-20161:14

Ajit Chandila: Timeline from 2013 to 2016

Former Rajasthan Royals offspinner Ajit Chandila has been banned for life from all official cricketing activities for his role in the IPL 2013 spot-fixing case. Former Mumbai batsman Hiken Shah, who had been suspended by the BCCI in July 2015 for making an “illegal approach” to a player, was handed a five-year ban.

The BCCI anti-corruption code clauses Chandila breached

• 2.1.1 Fixing or contriving in any way or otherwise influencing improperly, or being a party to any effort to fix or contrive in any way or otherwise influence improperly, the result, progress, conduct or any other aspect of any match or event.

• 2.1.2 Seeking, accepting, offering or agreeing to accept any bribe or other reward to fix or to contrive in any way or otherwise to influence improperly the result, progress, conduct or any other aspect of any match or event.

• 2.1.3 Failing or refusing, for reward, to perform to one’s abilities in a match.

• 2.1.4 Soliciting, inducing, enticing, instructing, persuading, encouraging or facilitating (a) any participant to commit an offence under any of the foregoing provisions of this Article 2.1 and/or (b) any other person to do any act that would be an offence if that person were a participant.

• 2.2.2 Soliciting, inducing, enticing, instructing, persuading, encouraging, facilitating or authorising any other party to enter into a bet for the direct or indirect benefit of the participant in relation to the result, progress, conduct or any other aspect of any match or event.

• 2.2.3 Ensuring the occurrence of a particular incident in a match or event, which occurrence is to the participant’s knowledge the subject of a bet and for which he/she expects to receive or has received any reward.

• 2.4.1 Providing or receiving any gift, payment or other benefit (whether of a monetary value or otherwise) in circumstances that the participant might reasonably have expected could bring him/her or the sport of cricket into disrepute.

A release from the BCCI said Chandila was “held guilty of misconduct and corruption”, having breached seven clauses of Article 2 of the BCCI’s anti-corruption code relating to corruption and betting. Shah, the release said, had breached three clauses of Article 2, all related to corruption.The BCCI’s disciplinary committee had met in Mumbai on Monday, and pronounced the penalties against the two.This is the first definite action taken against Chandila by the BCCI, since the Indian board suspended him in May 2013 following his arrest by Delhi Police for his alleged involvement in corruption in the IPL. While the others arrested at that point – former Royals players Sreesanth and Ankeet Chavan – were banned from cricket by the BCCI on September 13, 2013, a decision on Chandila was deferred as there was no chance for Ravi Sawani – who led the BCCI’s probe into the matter and whose report formed the basis for the board’s actions – to question him; he had been in police or judicial custody since his arrest on May 16 till September 9, 2013, when he was granted bail, while Sreesanth and Chavan were out on bail since June 11. Since then the BCCI has been embroiled in internal turmoil and engaged in an administrative makeover stemming from the spot-fixing scandal, possibly pushing Chandila’s case on the back-burner.On the legal front, charges against all three players were dropped by a trial court in Delhi in July 2015, on the court on grounds of lack of sufficient evidence for prosecution under the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA). The court’s decision did not have an impact on the life bans imposed by the BCCI.Shah, meanwhile, it is understood, had approached a Mumbai team-mate ahead of IPL 2015. He was found to be in breach of Articles 2.1.1, 2.1.2 and 2.1.4 of the BCCI anti-corruption code (see sidebar for details).

A victorious Sri Lanka will play in Cardiff on Thursday. A humbled Australia will start pondering the Ashes, and the state of disrepair their cricket has fallen into

The Report by Daniel Brettig17-Jun-2013
Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
Mahela Jayawardene was in dazzling form, caressing his way to an unbeaten 84•Associated Press

A victorious Sri Lanka will play in Cardiff on Thursday. A humbled Australia will start pondering the Ashes, and the state of disrepair their cricket has fallen into. Led by Mahela Jayawardene’s silken unbeaten 84, Sri Lanka stuttered into a Champions Trophy semi-final against India by defeating a collective whose captain Michael Clarke watched disconsolately from The Oval balcony.Their slim chances of qualifying long since expired, Australia offered a last gasp via Clint McKay and Xavier Doherty, who added 41 for the final wicket. They were only separated by a blinding return catch from Tillakaratne Dilshan, whose exultant celebrations underlined the anxiety that had crept into a team who looked comfortable winners for most of the journey.Once Jayawardene had lifted Sri Lanka to 253 for 8 after an uncertain beginning, passing 11,000 ODI runs on the way, Australia’s chances of qualifying became largely theoretical. India in their pomp might have been a chance to reach 254 in 29.1 overs, but not a team that had failed to top 250 in two previous matches and been distracted by all manner of off field woes, from Clarke’s fragile back to David Warner’s choices of drinking spots and punching bags.This left Angelo Mathews’ team to ride out a brief spell of hitting from Glenn Maxwell, a doughty rearguard from Adam Voges, and a pesky last stand by the final wicket pair of McKay and Doherty, who conjured the second best partnership of the innings. As in India earlier this year, this served mainly to expose the appalling lack of application shown by many of the batsmen.Australia’s troubles were best summed up by their stand-in leader George Bailey, who dozed off at the wrong moment and found himself run out, helping to end a Champions Trophy defence that never really began. Apart from the emergence of James Faulkner they have precious little to show for the past two weeks.Sri Lanka’s innings had flirted with mediocrity in the face of some diligent bowling until Jayawardene’s delayed arrival, which signalled a late innings surge. Lahiru Thirimanne had been promoted ahead of Jayawardene at an uncertain 20 for 2, and the switch allowed the senior man to make merry in the later overs against the older ball after Thirimanne composed an important, steadying 57.Given the scenario confronting them, Australia’s batsmen were forced to play on instinct, and Shane Watson’s cover drive from the first ball of the innings made for a promising portent. But as has become the norm Watson flattered to deceive, bowled in the second over when making a hare-brained attempt to cut Nuwan Kulasekara off the stumps.Phillip Hughes showed himself adept at edging past the bails, twice gaining boundaries in those fortuitous circumstances. But the use of only half the bat did not suggest permanence, and it was no great surprise when he glided Kulasekara into Kumar Sangakkara’s gloves.Having come in at No. 3, Maxwell offered entertainment, cracking five boundaries and one six in the manner that earned him his exorbitant IPL contract. But Sri Lanka always had Lasith Malinga to use in case of emergencies, and he duly yorked Maxwell in his first over after the Victorian had swung once too often.Bailey has been a middle order resuscitator of sorts in the two previous games, but the team has not responded fruitfully enough to his leadership. He was to slip up badly here, dawdling in mid-pitch when trying to pinch a leg bye and finding himself run out at the non-striker’s end by Kulasekara’s direct hit.The innings then petered out in a manner sadly familiar to those who have watched Australia away from home in recent months. Only Doherty and McKay gave the impression they genuinely cared to win the contest, something not so surprising when observing the recent record: they have not won overseas in an international match in any format this year. Quite apart from the problems unearthed by Warner’s Birmingham misadventures, this is no trend to take into an Ashes series.Overcast skies and a desire to know his eventual target had encouraged Bailey to send Sri Lanka in. Mitchell Johnson’s first two deliveries of the match were poor; the first clattered to the backward point boundary, the second scuttling to fine leg off the pads. But his third was straight and too quick for Kusal Perera, who was clearly lbw.Sangakkara hinted at the genius that had guided Sri Lanka to a stirring chase against England on this ground last week, but found himself tied down by McKay’s persistent line and subtle movement. Having already chanced a desperate single, Sangakkara was offered a fraction of extra width and lashed out, but managed only to slice a drive to Maxwell.At that moment Australia could envision a slim target, but Thirimanne was sent in to steady the innings in Dilshan’s company, leaving Jayawardene in reserve. A serviceable job was done, gaps found every now and then the Australian bowlers were not gifted any wickets. It took Doherty to split them with a ball that straightened just enough to take an edge, Watson diving alertly to his right at slip.Mathews played a halting innings in Jayawardene’s company before losing his off bail to a nicely pitched delivery from Faulkner, but Dinesh Chandimal was busier and more effective in a fifth-wicket stand of 65 in 56 balls. The Australians did not bowl too much that was loose, but were left to marvel at Jayawardene’s knack for manipulating the field as the score mounted.In what is becoming a pattern as familiar as Australian defeat, the wicketkeeper and agitator Wade became embroiled in a profane joust with Jayawardene. Ninety-nine Sri Lankan runs from the final 13 overs meant the Australians could start thinking less about niggle and more about the Test matches to come.

ESPNcricinfo previews the IPL match between Kolkata Knight Riders and Pune Warriors in Kolkata

The Preview by Devashish Fuloria04-May-2012

Match facts

Saturday, May 5, Kolkata
Start time 1600 (1030 GMT)Kolkata fans’ dilemma – Sourav Ganguly or home team?•AFP

Big Picture

Although it is just one of the IPL’s innumerable league games, the match between Kolkata Knight Riders and Pune Warriors at Eden Gardens has attracted special attention because of one player. Sourav Ganguly is coming home, ironically as captain of the away team. He is capable of rousing the passionate Eden Gardens crowd to feverish levels; his iconic status in Kolkata is comparable to Sachin Tendulkar’s in Mumbai. Ganguly’s return is expected to test the loyalties of the fans: home team or local legend?If the India-South Africa ODI in 2005 is any indicator, Knight Riders could find parts of Eden Gardens cheering the opposition captain. Back then, during the height of the Ganguly-Chappell fracas, India were booed because Ganguly had been dropped from the squad. He was snubbed in the 2011 auction by Knight Riders and a similar scenario this time is not improbable, but passions may have cooled like Ganguly form has waned.Ganguly, and Warriors, need all the inspiration they can get. They are second from bottom in the league, having lost six out of their previous seven games. In their most recent loss, to Mumbai, Warriors failed to chase 121, with Ganguly struggling to 16 off 24 balls. However, any revival against the most economical bowling attack this season will require resolve: Sunil Narine, the Knight Riders spinner, has taken 12 wickets and has an economy of 5.53, the second best after Lasith Malinga. But Warriors’ hopes lie in plotting the fall of Knight Riders’ batting, which has lacked substantial contributions from everyone except Gautam Gambhir. With another Bengal cricketer, Ashok Dinda, back to fitness Warriors’ bowling attack is better equipped to trouble Knight Riders.The home team has been in good form coming into this game – four wins in a row – and they would aim to stay close to Delhi Daredevils at the top of the table. The stage is set for Ganguly’s homecoming but fans will need to hope that the weather stays clear.

Form guide

(most recent first, completed games)
Pune Warriors: LLLLW
Kolkata Knight Riders: WWWWL

Players to watch

Gautam Gambhir, the Knight Riders captain, has scored 365 runs with four half-centuries, and he has done it at strike-rate of 143.70, while his other hard-hitting teammates have struggled to force the pace.Michael Clarke is new to the Warriors camp but he is expected to turn things around for a struggling team. He looked comfortable in his first two two games, but he will want to convert those starts. His class against spin could be key to negotiating a tricky Knight Riders attack.

Stats and trivia

• Sourav Ganguly has scored 496 runs in IPL matches in Kolkata at an average of 41.33. In IPL 2010 alone he scored 331 at an average of 55.16.
• Yusuf Pathan has hit 77 sixes in his IPL career. However, only three of them have come this season.
• Knight Riders’ bowling is the most economical this season, giving away only 6.79 runs per over. Warriors are fourth with an economy of 7.61.
  

  Quotes

  “Any match at Eden Gardens is my home match”

  “If we’re winning without him contributing much, it’s a good sign for the team”

Brain Evans, universally known as Ginger, a fast bowler for Glamorgan who went on to became a major force in Minor Counties cricket, has died at the age of 74

ESPNcricinfo staff17-May-2011Brain Evans, universally known as Ginger, a fast bowler for Glamorgan who went on to became a major force in Minor Counties cricket, died earlier this month at the age of 74.His 2nd XI debut for Glamorgan came as a 17-year-old in 1953 and he also made a name in South Wales club cricket, but he had to wait five years for his first county appearance. In 1960 and 1961 he took 82 and 87 wickets and briefly formed a dangerous new-ball pairing with Jeff Jones. But his career was blighted by injury issues which ultimately forced him to retire early in the 1964 season.Evans subsequently played for Lincolnshire, helping them win the Minor Counties Championship in 1966. He was a professional for Ross Sports Group in Grimsby until 1971.Even when he quit playing he retained his close links with the game as an umpire, a county official in Lincolnshire, and as groundsman at Ross Sports Group.In all he took 251 wickets at 27.04 in 88 matches, with a career best of 8 for 42 against Somerset in 1961. He also scored 1535 runs at 13.70.

Virender Sehwag has backed Yuvraj Singh to make a speedy comeback to the Indian team following his axing from the squad for the Asia Cup

Cricinfo staff09-Jun-2010Virender Sehwag has backed Yuvraj Singh to make a speedy return to the Indian team after his axing from the squad for the Asia Cup. Sehwag also said that his shoulder had healed completely as India prepare to head to Sri Lanka next week.”Times like these come because of [a lack of] form, but I’m sure he will sort out his fitness and batting skills and make a comeback soon,” Sehwag said. “All he needs is to spend time on his own and think about his game.”Yuvraj averaged 24.70 in his last 11 ODIs, and had a highest of 43 in 14 games in IPL 2010. His fitness in the recent past has come in for criticism and he was also issued a show-cause notice by the BCCI for an alleged pub brawl in St Lucia following India’s exit from the World Twenty20. Kris Srikkanth, the chairman of selectors, said fielding and fitness were two important factors considered when picking the Asia Cup squad.Sehwag overcame his fitness issues in time to make the Asia Cup squad. A shoulder injury sustained during the IPL had ruled him out of India’s ICC World Twenty20 campaign and the opener was rested from the ongoing tour to Zimbabwe to give him time to recover. He said the rest and rehabilitation had worked. “My shoulder has healed,” he told CNN-IBN. “I worked on my shoulders in the National Cricket Academy in Bangalore and I’m fully fit now.”Sehwag also backed the younger Indian batsmen, saying they would overcome their susceptibility against short-pitched bowling in due time. “People said the same thing about me. Give them some time and they would get better as they get experienced. Once they play more than 100 ODIs, they would do well. [Suresh] Raina, Rohit [Sharma], Gautam [Gambhir] – they would be ready by the time you have the World Cup.”

Quick bowler wants role in World Cup but says control and variety will be key to success

Andrew Miller29-Jun-2024Lauren Filer insists that England will not be getting ahead of themselves in their ongoing ODI series against New Zealand, despite a comprehensive nine-wicket victory in the series opener in Durham. Nevertheless, she admits that the T20 World Cup in October, and her potential role on those slower wickets in Bangladesh, will be a factor in her preparations for the rest of the summer.Filer, England’s fastest bowler, made her second ODI appearance of the summer on Wednesday, opening alongside Lauren Bell for the first time, with Kate Cross missing the series with an abdominal strain. She made a strong impact, bowling five powerplay overs for 18 and claiming the key early wicket of Suzie Bates, before passing the baton to England’s formidable trio of spinners, who claimed seven wickets between them in bowling New Zealand out for 156.England’s openers, Tammy Beaumont and Maia Bouchier, then picked off the bulk of those runs in a 137-run stand spanning 17.2 overs, to extend the team’s recent dominance over New Zealand, whom they beat in six matches out of eight across white-ball formats on their tour of the country in March and April.Related

• Heather Knight: New Zealand ODIs offer chance for World Cup experimentation

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• Dean, Beaumont, Bouchier lead New Zealand rout

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“We will definitely not underestimate New Zealand as a team,” Filer said on the eve of the second ODI in Worcester. “We know that they can hit a big ball and take wickets as well, so we’ve got to be careful. We don’t want to get too ahead of ourselves and throw everything at it, without actually thinking about it, but we’re just all up for our performance, and taking the momentum from the last game into the next one.”Filer herself took particular pride in her economy-rate (3.60) in the Durham fixture. Despite having been told by Jon Lewis, England’s head coach, that wickets were the key thing that she could offer, and that going for a few extra runs did not matter in the grander scheme of things, she conceded just two boundaries and one wide in her pacy new-ball burst, and admitted that it gave her a lift to perform her primary role with gusto without maintaining an extra level of control.”Lewy’s always told me that runs don’t matter as much,” Filer said. “But in Durham it was lovely to have that control. To only go at three and a half, it was really nice to see that on the scoreboard when when I turned around, because I wouldn’t have necessarily had that control this time last year.”It is evidence, Filer feels, of a greater understanding of her own game, and one that augurs well for a potential tweaking of her role at the World Cup, where there may be a greater need to mix up her lengths and paces to mitigate for the slower conditions.”On the pitch we played on in Durham – and most of the pitches in England – the top of stumps is the best option,” she said. “With the slower pitches, I’ll be using that quicker ball, but then it’ll be about having slower balls or yorkers, and anything that grips into the pitch, and using them wisely. I didn’t feel like I needed to do that in the last game, but moving forward, I might be able to show what I could do.”Lauren Filer celebrates the wicket of Suzie Bates in the first ODI•Getty Images

Filer’s raw pace, allied to her growing range of variations, means she could yet be deployed at the World Cup in a similar role to that which Jofra Archer performs for the men – with an impact at the top and tail of the innings, plus an ability to return in the middle of an innings if a breakthrough is required.”I’d love to do what Jofra does,” she said. “Obviously he has a great amount of control and his slower balls take a lot of wickets. But I’m trying not to look too far ahead. I wouldn’t say I’ve had a specific role given to me yet, but we’ll see where we’re at closer to the time.”I feel like I’ve worked quite hard on my accuracy, especially since my debut,” she added. “I think I’m in a good place with that. It’s about trying to move away from my stock ball and show my variations, and actually use them as a threat. When you come up against the best players, you’re not able to bowl the same ball all the time. So I’ll keep working on them until the World Cup.”Filer admits there’s no guarantees of a central role at the World Cup, especially given the ubiquity of England’s spin trio of Sophie Ecclestone, Charlie Dean and Sarah Glenn. “It’s so hard as a seamer, you really want to play but you can’t push any of them out of the team,” she said. “They’re just absolutely world-class. Even if one of them doesn’t have the best day, the other two will come flying in with three or four wickets.But whatever happens, Filer knows she’ll have the support of a dressing-room which she describes as “the best environment I’ve ever been in”.”It’s just somewhere that you can be yourself,” she said. “As a team, we trust each other to do the things we do well, and that’s really important. Even on a day when it doesn’t go well, knowing that you’ve got the support of your team-mates when you come off the field, and a shoulder to cry on, that’s something really special, and something hopefully we can carry on throughout the years.”