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Crushing victory for Bangladesh Academy

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ScorecardBCB Academy may have escaped defeat by the skin of their teeth in the four-day encounters, but reversed the form book completely to thump South Africa Academy by 197 runs in the first one-day match in Bogra. The visitors asked the hosts to bat first and were left to rue the decision as Asif Ahmed and Mithun Ali added 125 runs for the third wicket to set the tone for a big score.The pair came together after the openers did their bit, at 60 for 2 in 12 overs. Mithun was the aggressor, smashing 87 in 67 balls with seven fours and two sixes. Asif focused on staying till the end, and was eventually dismissed in the final over for a steady 79, as Bangladesh reached 328. Sabbir Rahman and Nasir Hossain went berserk at the other end, hitting three sixes each, in their knocks of 33 and 52 respectively.South Africa Academy was rocked early by opening bowler Subashis Roy, who struck three body blows as the chase struggled to get off the ground. Sanjamul Islam then took over the baton, running through the middle order to finish with 5 for 28. The visitors’ struggle ended in the 34th over when they were bowled out for 131.

Kent decide against Clark

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Stuart Clark will no longer be coming to Kent as their overseas player for the first half of the 2010 season. Clark, 34, has recently returned to Australian domestic cricket after missing nearly three months with a back injury, and the county decided against taking a chance on his fitness.The county has released a statement indicating that Clark “is not where the club wants him to be fitness-wise so the decision has been reached that it is not worth the risk, on either part, in proceeding with the contract.””I’m very disappointed that Stuart is not coming to Kent because he offers so much – both on and off the field,” said Paul Farbrace, Kent’s team director. “I would like to thank him for his honesty throughout as it made the decision that much easier.”Clark has represented Australia 24 times in Test matches, taking 94 wickets at a miserly 23.86, but was discarded after Australia’s unsuccessful Ashes campaign last year. While conceding that his international career is in all likelihood over, he had identified a county stint as a new career objective and has also captained his state side – the New South Wales Blues – in the absence of regular skipper Simon Katich.”We are continuing to work on other options, as we have been for the last couple of months,” added Farbrace. “We had someone lined up, as a possible alternative, but he has just been named by his country in their World Twenty20 squad. We are looking for someone that will offer value for money, and is the right type of individual to bring into our dressing room, but won’t sign someone for the sake of it.”

Aldridge, Williamson star in nine-wicket win

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Graeme Aldridge’s incisive spell on the opening day, and Kane Williamson’s stroke-filled 170, paved the way for Northern Districts’ nine-wicket win against Wellington at Basin Reserve.Things went to plan right from the toss for Northern, as Wellington struggled to come to terms with Aldridge after being asked to bat. Openers Neal Parlane and Cameron Merchant fell early in the first morning and the hosts were never recovered. Chris Nevin’s fighting 53 took them close to 200, before Aldridge finished the innings with a six-for.When BJ Watling fell for a duck in Northerns’ reply, Wellington sensed an opportunity to claw back into contention. But their hopes were shattered by Michael Parlane and Williamson, who added 145 runs to give their side the advantage. Parlane fell shortly after reaching 50, but Williamson had his eyes set on a huge score. His attractive innings included 24 fours and came at a brisk pace to put Wellington out of the game. Useful contributions from Hamish Marshall, Daniel Flynn, Peter McGlashan and Aldridge pushed the visitors’ score to 400, a mammoth 203 runs ahead of Wellington.Fighting to make Northern bat a second time, Wellington’s batsmen made a marginal improvement in the second innings. Neal Parlane and Stephen Murdoch hit 70s but could not kick on to make more substantial contributions that may have given the visitors a tricky fourth-innings target. As it transpired, Northern needed only 42 runs and they raced home for the loss of Watling’s wicket.

Nannes keen to grab 'big opportunity'

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The only time Dirk Nannes has bowled for Australia was in front of a sparse crowd in Edinburgh in an ODI against Scotland last August. The match was so far off the radar back home in Melbourne that it wasn’t even shown on pay television. Things will be different when he steps out at the MCG for Friday night’s Twenty20 against Pakistan.Nannes was chosen in Australia’s squad for the two Twenty20s in England following the Ashes but the games in Manchester were washed out and he has had to wait five months for another opportunity. The 60,000-plus crowd expected at the MCG will be a far cry from the Scotland outing and Nannes knows that he can use the chance to press for a place in Australia’s ICC World Twenty20 squad to head to the West Indies in May.”That’s massive for me,” Nannes said of playing at his home ground. “I was pretty nervous in those few games in the UK. Unfortunately I didn’t get a go but fortunately a few weeks ago we played in front of 43,000 here [in a Big Bash game]. I’m sure there’ll be a bigger crowd again.”Any chance to play is a big opportunity. Every game you play in the Big Bash is a massive opportunity to prove yourself. Hopefully I get a few more opportunities after [Friday] and who knows. It’s great to be recognised to be in the Australian team and whether that, going forward, gets me a place to the World Cup that would be fantastic.”Should Nannes earn a ticket to the Caribbean it would complete a remarkable 12 months after he represented the Netherlands, the country of his parents’ births, at the World Twenty20 in England last June. His Dutch team fared better than Australia on that occasion, beating England in the tournament opener while Ricky Ponting’s men failed to win a game.Since then, the Australian selectors have focused on choosing Twenty20 specialists, especially those who have starred in the Big Bash. By that criteria, Nannes is incomparable. He is the leading wicket-taker in the history of the competition, with 31 victims at 15.77 and an economy rate of 6.43. He was also fearsome at the Champions League last year, with nine wickets at an average of 8.77.He is a difficult man to score off due to 150kph-plus speeds, an awkward left-arm angle and impressive accuracy. Although Nannes turns 34 in May, he is confident that he has a future in the shortest format, partly because as a former elite skier he came to top-level cricket late and didn’t play for Victoria until he was 29.”I’m a little bit different,” Nannes said. “I’m not your standard 33-year-old bowler because I haven’t played under-age cricket, I haven’t played representative cricket that much, so I really haven’t got the miles through my body that a normal 30-odd-year-old bowler has.”Australia have five Twenty20 internationals – this game against Pakistan, two against West Indies, and two in New Zealand – before the World Twenty20. One outstanding performance in that time could be enough for Nannes to head to the world tournament, where Michael Clarke and Cameron White will likely lead a side heavy on youth and possibly thin on Test and ODI experience.”It’s a bit of a different game,” Nannes said. “I think there’s a different mentality for sure, bowling Twenty20 as opposed to one-dayers. It’s probably the first time they [the selectors] have gone down that track. In England they picked a different side and unfortunately we got rained off, so this is the first time really the new-look outfit has a chance to shine.”

Onus on batsmen to pile it on

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Match facts

Indis have death bowling worries and the experienced Zaheer Khan will have to show the way•AFP

January 7, 2010
Start time 14.30 (08.30 GMT)

Big picture

Win the toss, win the match. That seems to be the norm so far for this tri-series, for obvious reasons: The dew has been the deciding factor for both games. It has affected the bowlers’ grip and forced the spinners to bowl it flat, reluctant to give the ball air for fear of bowling a friendly full toss. Imagine the plight for a team like Bangladesh, which thrives on its spinners. Mushfiqur Rahim, the wicketkeeper, said his team have been practicing with a wet ball in the nets to get used to the dew.Dew apart, Tuesday’s defeat to Sri Lanka was an eye-opener for India. Their death bowling has been erratic in recent one-dayers and it was reflected in the crucial final stages of the chase when they dished out full tosses and no-balls in attempting to target the base of the stumps. The Rajkot ODI – where they defended 414 by the skin of their teeth – was an example of excellent death bowling, but they haven’t been able to replicate that consistently. Even their best death bowler, Zaheer Khan, had a poor outing on Tuesday. With no bowling coach at their disposal, there may not be enough time to rectify that weakness but the best India and Bangladesh can do is to score a mountain of runs as a safety net.Bangladesh will be expected to be far more potent if they bowl first. They will have to look at ways to contain India rather than attack them, because they could leak runs in the process. Against Sri Lanka, their top order wilted after a good start more due to carelessness, before Mohammad Ashraful led the recovery. Bangladesh certainly have more on their plate, but they will feel a lot better if they win that toss.

Form guide (last 5 completed matches, most recent first)

Bangladesh LWWWW
India LWWLW

Watch out for

Harbhajan Singh: The one bowler who performed against Sri Lanka, with figures of 3 for 47. It wouldn’t have been easy to grip the ball under lights but two of his three wickets came with good use of flight. The Rajkot blitzkrieg is another example – he stood out with figures of 2 for 58 in ten overs, including the wicket of Tillakaratne Dilshan for 160. He’s had a good last ten games, with an economy rate of 4.39 and 15 wickets.Tamim Iqbal: He was Bangladesh’s in-form player in 2009, scoring 642 runs at 32.10 with a career-best 154 and two fifties. He looked poised for another fifty against Sri Lanka but threw it away with a reckless shot. He said recently that he’s trying to focus on occupying the crease for longer periods. If he puts that in practice, it will allow the rest to bat around him.

Team news

Bangladesh are likely to drop Shafiul Islam, who had a difficult debut – where he was smashed for 39 off five overs – for the experienced Syed Rasel.Bangladesh 1 Tamim Iqbal, 2 Imrul Kayes, 3 Mohammad Ashraful, 4 Shakib Al Hasan (capt), 5 Raqibul Hasan, 6 Mahmudullah, 7 Mushfiqur Rahim (wk), 8 Naeem Islam, 9 Abdur Razzak, 10 Rubel Hossain, 11 Shafiul Islam/Syed RaselIndia could retain the XI for the second game.India 1 Virender Sehwag, 2 Gautam Gambhir, 3 Virat Kohli, 4 Yuvraj Singh, 5 MS Dhoni (capt and wk), 6 Suresh Raina, 7 Ravindra Jadeja, 8, Harbhajan Singh, 9 Zaheer Khan, 10 Ashish Nehra, 11 Sreesanth

Stats and trivia

  • India have won 10 out of 11 ODIs against Bangladesh in Bangladesh. The home team’s only win came on Boxing Day in 2004.
  • Gautam Gambhir has an excellent record against Bangladesh, scoring 401 runs in six games including two hundreds, but Virender Sehwag hasn’t done as well, scoring only 304 runs in nine innings.
  • In 11 innings, Mohammad Ashraful’s highest score against India is 36. He has scored 214 runs in these innings, at an average of 21.40.

Quotes

“If the middle order performs and we have a flourish towards the end like we did in the first match, then a very good score is possible. If you are bowling second then it is very important for the new ball bowlers to get a couple of early breakthroughs. Otherwise it tends to get tougher and tougher as the wickets are great for batting.”
“Good yorkers and slower ones are always going to help you win the games but I am not too disappointed as it was tough to bowl yorkers here with the dew.”
MS Dhoni

Mashrafe Mortaza not picked for tri-series

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Bangladesh have omitted Mashrafe Mortaza from the squad for next month’s tri-series at home, despite his being named in the preliminary squad. Mortaza failed to recover from his knee injury and Shakib Al Hasan will lead the side with wicketkeeper Mushfiqur Rahim as his deputy. The squad also features two former ICL players, opener Shahriar Nafees and batsman Aftab Ahmed, and a fresh face in fast bowler Shafiul Islam.Mortaza damaged his knee during the first Test on the tour of West Indies in July. The injury ruled him out of the rest of the tour and the subsequent ODI series against Zimbabwe both home and away. However, he was selected in the 26-man preliminary squad – later reduced to 18 – for the tri-series and was named captain for the tournament as well as the home Test series against India. “Mortaza is 80 percent fit for cricket. We are not taking any risk with him,” Rafiqul Alam, the Bangladesh Cricket Board’s chief selector told .The two ICL returnees Aftab and Nafees last represented Bangladesh more than a year ago. Alam put their selection down to their performance in the domestic circuit. “They both performed well in the domestic cricket. Aftab is also a useful medium pacer,” he said. The 22-year-old Shafiul, the only player in the squad with no international experience, had impressed in the recently concluded Premier Division Cricket League. “He bowls well and is mature enough to cope with international pressure,” Alam said.The two other players dropped from the preliminary squad of 18 are fast bowler Shahadat Hossain and former ICL player Alok Kapali.Bangladesh squad: Shakib Al Hasan (capt), Mushfiqur Rahim (vice-capt and wk), Mohammad Ashraful, Abdur Razzak, Tamim Iqbal, Syed Rasel, Raqibul Hasan, Mahmudullah, Nazmul Hossain, Naeem Islam, Imrul Kayes, Rubel Hossain, Shafiul Islam, Shahriar Nafees, Aftab Ahmed.

ICL can't sue BCCI in London, says Delhi court

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The Delhi High Court has barred the ICL from suing the BCCI in British courts, denting its hopes of fighting for relief for those associated with the unauthorised league. The court order was on a plea filed by the BCCI for an anti-suit injunction against Essel Sports, promoters of the ICL.Last month Essel Sports had served a legal notice on the BCCI, seeking various reliefs including restraint orders and damages against the BCCI, the ECB and the ICC for having boycotted the ICL. The notice said that if it did not receive a “full and satisfactory substantive response” from the BCCI by December 7, it would file proceedings in the London court.In the interim, the Federation of International Cricketers’ Associations (FICA) also questioned how the ICL could go ahead with the legal costs of suing the various boards while it owed the players “millions of dollars”.

Adrian Barath brightens West Indies' gloom

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Seldom can positives be drawn from an innings defeat, particularly one sealed inside three days. Yet from the wreckage of West Indies’ lamentable Brisbane campaign has emerged a performance worthy of the highest order of recognition; one that augurs well for the future of the browbeaten game in the Caribbean and the Test format in general.Adrian Barath’s sublime second-innings century heralded the arrival of a batsman anointed by Brian Lara, his esteemed countryman and mentor, as a figure capable of breaking the region’s cycle of mediocrity. At just 19 years and 228 days, Barath became the seventh youngest batsman in Test history to post a century on debut, and the youngest ever West Indian, breaking the 79-year record held by George Headley. “I’m sure he’ll be proud of this achievement,” Barath said of Lara, who identified genius in the then 11-year-old during a net session at the Queen’s Park Oval.Barath’s innings on Saturday came at a time when his more seasoned team-mates were folding like laundry day to a ravenous Australian attack, and featured powerful cutting, the quality of which Lara himself would have approved. At the time of his dismissal, Barath had scored 104 of West Indies’ total of 154, and was recognised with the rarest of sporting accolades: a rousing standing ovation from the fiercely parochial Gabba crowd.Barath had an early taste of the celebrity realm he seems destined to inhabit when, while walking the streets of Brisbane this week, he passed by Britney Spears. Breathless, he returned to the team hotel to inform his fellow tourists of the pop starlet’s shortness in stature. “You’re not so tall yourself,” they replied.Barath is spotting Chris Gayle over a foot in height and, more pertinently, 82 Tests in experience. But whereas Gayle was coerced into a pair of cheap lbws and as many ill-advised video challenges, Barath took the attack to the Australian bowlers with assuredness and precision beyond his years. He raced into the 90s with a brutal pull to the boundary off Mitchell Johnson, and reached triple figures by cutting Shane Watson through point, also for four. Big game temperament in a small man’s frame.Already, Barath has achieved a feat that has thus far eluded Gayle in his Test career: a century against the Australians. His efforts, coupled with the determined half-century from fellow rookie Travis Dowlin in the first innings, signalled a welcome departure from West Indies’ of the past decade, in which a select group of senior batsmen were relied upon to prop up their underwhelming colleagues.”It’s a privilege to play for West Indies against Australia in Australia,” Barath said, his orthodontic braces gleaming in the television lights on account of his broad grin. “It was really emotional to me, very exciting and I enjoyed every minute of it.”Barath is a player to romance the purists, both for his appealing technique and his attitude to international cricket’s traditional format. With Gayle – the all-swing, all-bling poster child of the Twenty20 revolution – sitting to his right, Barath told reporters at the post-match press conference that, to him, Test cricket would always retain its primacy. CLR James, another son of Trinidad, could not have been more eloquent.”A lot of youngsters these days talk Twenty20 and 50 overs, but all the youngsters understand the stature of Tests as the ultimate form of the game, the true test,” he said. “Representing your country at Test level is the highest position in the West Indies. All young players realise that Test cricket is what it comes down to.”

Ryder bats for struggling McCullum

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Injured New Zealand batsman Jesse Ryder has come out in support of his limited-overs opening partner Brendon McCullum. McCullum recently lost the vice-captaincy against calls for him to move down the order – he averages 26.10 with just two half-centuries in 20 innings – but Ryder believes he should be persisted with at the top.”I think he should stay up there and I don’t see why people are saying put him back to seven because the records show that we do pretty well together up the top of the order,” he told tvnz.co.nz. “It’s not very often that we fail as a partnership and at this stage I think it’s been really good.”Daniel Vettori, New Zealand’s captain and a selector, has expressed his desire to push McCullum down the order in future in order to exploit the batting Powerplay.Ryder and McCullum have opened together 19 times and have added a century on five occasions and the left-handed batsman was keen to continue his alliance. “It’s good for both of us because our personalities combine well when we bat with each other out and he really is a calming influence on me,” said Ryder, who has been ruled out of the upcoming limited-overs series against Pakistan in the UAE.Ryder is undergoing rehab for his abdominal injury and is aiming to return to action for Wellington before Christmas.

Vettori determined to 'lead New Zealand in a final'

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Having already lost three key players to injury, New Zealand could be without Grant Elliott, Man of the Match against England, for the semi-final against Pakistan. Daniel Vettori, the captain, was confident though that New Zealand could overcome their semi-final jinx [only one final after eight appearances in the last four of global 50-over events] against Pakistan at the Wanderers on Saturday.”The momentum is with us, I think,” he said. “It’s a much more preferable to go into the semi-finals, knowing that we’ve won two big games and qualified top, whereas in the past we have scraped through. We go into the game with confidence. Their [Pakistan’s] spin bowling over the last year is very impressive. [Saeed] Ajmal and [Shahid] Afridi combine well, and coupled with a very good seam attack, and no obvious weakness in their batting, we know they can be a very good side. But they can be a little inconsistent like us, I suppose, and I’m hoping we can catch them on an off day.”Having already lost Jesse Ryder, Jacob Oram and Daryl Tuffey to injury, New Zealand are keeping their fingers crossed over Elliott. “Grant took part in training this morning and had an injection,” Vettori said. “It works when he bats but not when he bowls. We’ll leave it till the last possible minute before making a decision. It’s frustrating but we’re used to it. We’ve been through it before with New Zealand, even in the Twenty20 World Cup. It brought the group a little tighter and there was the realisation that the senior players have to step up more.”Having struggled to come to terms with slow pitches on a six-week-long tour of Sri Lanka, New Zealand have found the conditions in South Africa much more to their liking, especially in Johannesburg, where they beat both Sri Lanka and England. “There’s not really any secret to playing well here,” Vettori said. “We’ve come across very different wickets, and you have to have ability to adapt. This looks like a Sri Lankan wicket, with lots of runs in it. If so, we’re going to have to step up with the bat. We wanted to qualify top. That was a real incentive. Once we got in front, we wanted to finish it off. Wanderers has been good for us and we wanted to stay here, and have an extra day especially with our injuries.”On Thursday night, New Zealand won the Spirit of Cricket award at the ICC’s annual ceremony. Vettori, though, wants to leave South Africa with more than one bauble. “That will be the ultimate, if we can couple that with a major tournament. It means we are playing the game in the right spirit and winning games as well. There’s a perception that the spirit of cricket [award] goes to teams that are a little bit inconsistent and that’s probably fair for us at the moment. If we can turn it round and win a major tournament, it’ll be a great achievement for us.”Having lost in the semi-finals of the 2006 Champions Trophy [to Australia] and the 2007 World Cup [to Sri Lanka], Vettori also felt that the time was ripe to create some history. “We’ve always made the semi-finals and lost them,” he said. “We want to go past that, we want to change the script a little bit. Personally, it will be one of the most satisfying things I could achieve in my career if I lead New Zealand in a final. You never know what can happen after that.”There’s a lot of pressure on us to go past the semi-final, but they [Pakistan] are higher ranked and performing better than us of late. I always felt confident of making the last four, and this is a real test for us now.”Australia or England await if Pakistan can be overcome. “It doesn’t matter who we face in the final, we just want to get there,” Vettori said. “Any team will be tough. I suppose Australia have been playing the better cricket of late.”Nearly a decade ago, the brilliance of Chris Cairns inspired New Zealand to the only trophy win in their history. Vettori, who has carried forward the allrounder’s flame, has the opportunity to emulate his one-time team-mate. They may be rank outsiders, and a team ravaged by injury, but don’t write off these New Zealanders just yet.