Plays of the Day from the second Twenty20 international between New Zealand and West Indies, in Wellington

George Binoy15-Jan-2014The wrong clothes
The batsmen hit plenty of sixes into the crowd but fans in orange t-shirts had been dropping one-handed catches in the stands all day. The prize for catching one of those balls was NZD 100,000. And then, off the last ball of the second over, Jesse Ryder launched Tino Best high and far over deep midwicket with a monstrous pull shot. A man got under it and caught it with his right hand without any fuss. He was wearing a jacket, though, and without the sponsors’ orange tee he wasn’t winning any money.The turnaround
In the first T20 in Auckland, Andre Russell’s first ball had disappeared over the long-leg boundary off Brendon McCullum’s bat, and he went on to concede 23 in his only over. Today, however, Russell was up against Colin Munro and he got the batsmen to chip the ball to point to begin his spell with a wicket. His batting had improved vastly too: he’d bagged a second-ball duck at Eden Park but was unbeaten on 10 at the Westpac Stadium.The sacrifice
Andre Fletcher and Denesh Ramdin had a busy partnership going when Fletcher drove to deep cover in the 18th over and set off for a run. He seemed content with one but Ramdin wasn’t. He returned for the second, but with Fletcher unresponsive both batsmen were at the non-striker’s end. Ramdin began to turn around but Fletcher held up his hand and walked out of the crease to sacrifice his wicket. Ramdin repaid the gesture by scoring 55 off 31 balls.The six and drop
It was the second delivery of New Zealand’s chase and the first Jesse Ryder was facing, from the tall fast bowler Jason Holder. The ball pitched on a length around off and middle stump, Ryder moved his front foot across a touch, and with tremendous hand-eye coordination flicked the ball far over the square-leg boundary. It was an incredible shot and yet he played it off his first ball. The next delivery, however, Ryder drove tamely to cover where Johnson Charles caused Holder more anguish by dropping a sitter.The missed run-out
In the fifth over, with five fielders in the circle on the off side, Ross Taylor pushed towards cover and ran. Brendon McCullum rightly sent him back, and though Taylor stopped and turned quickly, he was in danger. Walton had got to the ball quickly and collected cleanly. He had plenty of time to line up the stumps but his throw missed. Taylor had given up and was fortunate to have the opportunity to add to his score of 5.

India had no answer to the Sri Lankan bowlers at the death, particularly Lasith Malinga, whose wide yorkers were worth their weight in gold

Alan Gardner in Mirpur06-Apr-20143:56

Cullinan: SL brought out their best game on big day

At the end of the 15th over, India were 95 for 2. They had erected a platform, Virat Kohli feverishly throwing up scaffolding while Yuvraj Singh pulled on his overalls and got ready to go to work. Nuwan Kulasekara bowled the next over and Kohli rattled 14 off the first three deliveries, as India moved friskily into three figures. Keep going at that sort of rate and they would set a useful 160-odd, enough to put the pressure on to a Sri Lanka batting attack that has developed a few creaks.Kohli finished the over on 70 from 50 balls. He would end the innings being run out for 77 from 58. The last four overs of the India innings dragged them under like a dead weight. Yuvraj never got going, and practically played a match-losing knock, as Kulasekara, Lasith Malinga and Sachithra Senanayake colluded in a T20 closing spell for the ages. Kumar Sangakkara, whose unbeaten half-century clinched the match, said he had never seen anything like it.If Quentin Tarantino’s film was about cricket, it would star Malinga bowling the final overs. He is Sri Lanka’s life assurance policy. Here he filled the 18th and 20th with yorker after yorker, mostly wide, occasionally trying to play the xylophone on the batsman’s toes, all virtually unhittable. Yuvraj poked and prodded; at the other end Kohli twiddled and fumed. MS Dhoni could barely touch him, either, while two of the runs that did come at the end were byes, when even Sangakkara was foxed.Lasith Malinga donned the cloak and scythe to put India’s chances to bed•ICCYuvraj had already taken three balls to get off strike to Senanayake in the 17th, then Kohli was kept down to two singles from the remaining two balls. Twice Malinga sneaked dipping full-bungers past Yuvraj, as Sri Lanka ticked up the deliveries without conceding a boundary.Malinga had the triple burden of captaincy, expectation and the memory of 2012. “Past is past,” he said dismissively afterwards, when asked about the final against West Indies two years ago, when his second over was taken for 21 and his third 19. Flamed by Marlon Samuels, he ended with figures of 0 for 54. This time he was wicketless again, but not trophyless. Past is past, now.With 12 balls to go, Kulasekara returned, changing ends. Yuvraj spooned a full toss to long-off, who must have considered whether dropping it and allowing the batsmen to run two was a better option than taking the catch. India had lost their lead balloon but the gravitational forces were by now too strong. This is supposed to be the time of the innings that bowlers lose the thread and completely unspool; instead, Kulasekara targeted the inner edge of the tramlines unerringly and tightened the game even further.Malinga bowled a wide in the final over, almost as if out of pity. Dhoni couldn’t hit the first three legitimate balls, one of which slowed down to flirt with off stump on its way through. Kohli finally managed to get on strike for the last delivery of the innings, having faced just seven of the preceding 23. No boundaries had been scored and none would be. Worse, Kohli was dismissed by a direct hit trying to squeeze one last concession out of Malinga. Four overs, 13 singles, a two, two byes, a leg bye and a wide.Sangakkara had one word for the display: “immaculate”. It denied India a score approaching competitive, somehow managing to vacuum-wrap the Man of the Tournament and neuter his team-mates. Kohli had a medal hung round his neck come the end but not the one he wanted; Yuvraj had an albatross.”Those last four overs were immaculate,” Sangakkara said, “I haven’t seen four overs like that bowled to a guy on 70-something off 50 balls and to a guy like MS Dhoni who can hit any ball out of the park, for them not to be able to get bat on ball for four overs, 24 balls, that just goes to show the quality of our bowling attack and the hard work that they’ve done, the planning before this game and how we executed that. I think that really set up the win, chasing 130, you’d take that any day on any wicket but to restrict a side like that we needed something special and our bowlers produced it.”Faced with India’s prince and one of their grand old dukes, Malinga, Kulasekara and Senanayake thought nothing of deference. Afterwards, it was Dhoni who had to pay tribute. “You should give credit to the Sri Lankan bowlers,” he said. “They executed their plan brilliantly. They were looking for wide yorkers and all the balls were perfect wide yorkers. I think they only bowled one wide, other than that they were right on mark, which made it all the more difficult for our batsmen to score freely.”Two years ago in Colombo, West Indies resuscitated their chances in the latter stages to set Sri Lanka a target that was beyond their reach. This time around, fittingly, it was Malinga with the hooded cloak and scythe, and India’s chances that were put to rest.

One of the brightest talents to emerge from the IPL has impressed with his ability to stay on top of the best batsmen and team-mates have been impressed by his all-round ability

Amol Karhadkar03-Jun-2014It was early on in the 2013-14 Ranji Trophy season when Gujarat faced Delhi in Surat in a league game. Parthiv Patel, the Gujarat captain, was stunned by the confidence of a young left-arm spinner who was playing his first game of the season, and second first-class match. Aside from the miserly spell of 6 for 55 off 45 overs, Parthiv was struck by Akshar Patel’s desire to bowl at the best opposition batsmen. That too against Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir, who were both both fighting for India comebacks and perhaps as hungry as the youngster from Nadiad, a small town in Gujarat (about an hour’s drive from Ahmedabad).”Ever since he knew he would play, he was constantly asking me to let him bowl to Gautam and Viru as much as he could,” Parthiv told ESPNcricinfo. “For a youngster who was relatively new to first-class cricket, having not cemented his place in the side to be gunning to bowl at two of the best batsmen in India, he had to be supremely confident about his abilities. And he proved that even during that match.”While Akshar, a lanky left-arm spinner who considers himself a batting allrounder, dismissed Gambhir in the first innings, he fooled Sehwag in flight and got him stumped in the second.Almost seven months down the line, Akshar has emerged as the youngest sensation in Indian cricket, thanks to his impressive performance in the seventh edition of the IPL. His 17 wickets at a stingy economy rate of 6.17 – the best for a bowler who played more than three matches – for Kings XI Punjab helped him not only emerge as one of the leading spinners of the tournament but also be adjudged with the Emerging Player of the tournament. More importantly, just before Kings XI featured in their maiden IPL final, Akshar was named in India’s squad for the three-ODI series in Bangladesh, to be played later this month.Many would have been surprised at Akshar being preferred over the likes of Glenn Maxwell, David Miller and Mohit Sharma for that award but those who have seen his terrific surge in the last three years are not surprised. Mukund Parmar is one of them.Parmar, a prolific run-getter in domestic cricket, was the batting consultant at National Cricket Academy and was watching Akshar shape into a “valuable allrounder” since 2010. It was in 2011-12 that as Gujarat’s chief selector, Parmar thought he should be tried out at the senior level. “He is an outstanding fielder and a quick learner, so we thought he should be given a go in the limited-overs format, so we included him in the one-day team,” Parmar said.It was just before the 2011-12 zonal one-dayers when Parthiv first saw Akshar. Since Parthiv was a member of India’s ODI squad, he didn’t play the zonal one-dayers but trained with the team for a couple of days. “What impressed me about him right away was his accuracy and ability to extract bounce off the wicket. He was also an outstanding fielder. And when I saw him batting, I realised that he is a special talent,” Parthiv recalled.After an impressive outing in the one-dayers and Twenty20s, the teenager was straightaway drafted into the Ranji Trophy team the following season, when Parmar was the coach. But after making his first-class debut against Madhya Pradesh, Akshar had to be released for the Under-19 games. The selectors wanted to groom him in the U-19 championship, and he didn’t play any more Ranji games but returned to the senior side in style for the one-dayers and Twenty20s.Impressive performances in both the limited-overs formats not only earned him an IPL contract with Mumbai Indians but he was also shortlisted for a camp at the NCA that featured 20 cricketers who had just crossed junior cricket ranks but needed further grooming. It was in that camp, also Sanjay Bangar’s maiden prominent coaching assignment, that the Kings XI coach was convinced about Akshar’s ability.Soon after, Akshar proved his bowling skills yet again by picking seven wickets in India Under-23’s triumphant ACC Emerging Players’ trophy campaign. When he joined Gujarat’s training camp after returning from Singapore, Parthiv could see the transformation.”I could sense he had evolved into a terrific reader of the game. That coupled with his ability to adapt to any situation of the game made him into a permanent fixture in the Ranji season. I am sure he can be a reliable allrounder at No. 7 even in the longer format. And he has shown that during the Ranji season,” Parthiv said.Akshar finished the Ranji season with 29 wickets at 23.58 and 369 runs at 46.12 from seven games. And as he displayed in his 65 against Mumbai on a turning track in Valsad, he has the ability to turn the game even with the bat, though his side fell narrowly short.

Andrew Flintoff’s impending return leads ESPNcricinfo’s countdown on the things that mattered in the latest round of matches in the NatWest T20 Blast

Tim Wigmore02-Jun-20145
A welcome sprinkling of razzmatazzFighting against middling weather, the looming Test summer and the football World Cup, the Blast will take all the razzmatazz that is going.Enter Andrew Flintoff. On Friday his much-anticipated T20 return was confirmed. A day later he made his return to club cricket. Playing for St Anne’s, he took 3 for 26 from 12 overs – getting faster the more he bowled – before he “blocked one” to long-off.When Flintoff reappears in the Roses match at Old Trafford on Friday – potentially the best atmosphere the county game can offer – it will be 1748 days since his last professional game. In T20, it seems, you can never say never.Look who is back•PA PhotosAs an unconventional route in to this year’s Blast, Richard Oliver’s is scarcely more orthodox. At 24, it has taken him a fortnight to leap from Minor Counties player to an integral part of Worcestershire’s T20 side: 77 in Friday’s win over Northants took his tally to 158 runs in four innings in the professional game. Rarely have so many people been able to name the captain of Shropshire.English cricket has invariably seemed unhealthily distrustful of late-blooming talent. Bryce McGain’s tale – he went from IT worker aged 35 to Australian Test cricketer aged 36 – would be unimaginable here.The Blast may be an important way of nurturing late developers: by encouraging sides to look for alternative sources of talent to reduce the strain on their squads; it provides hope that they will not be lost to the game. Especially now that the Unicorns (a side of amateurs) no longer play against English counties in one-day cricket, there is copious undiscovered talent available.Not that Oliver is about to attract as much attention as Flintoff. There will be those willing him to fail, while cynics decry that, having won four of their first five games, Lancashire’s use for him is for ticket sales alone.So why is he doing it? By his own calculation, he is a man who “if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither knew victory nor defeat”; Flintoff quoted the words of Theodore Roosevelt, the former US president, on Twitter.For all the doubts, Flintoff’s return should be lauded as an unfettered good news story for county cricket; the same is true of Kevin Pietersen’s Surrey comeback on Friday. We might even get the Flintoff v Pietersen showdown the Blast craves.4
Pitch imperfect High scores are the lifeblood of English T20 cricket. Few come in the hope of seeing cunning medium-pacers thrive on turgid pitches. That outcome was too common a sight last Friday.Only in Cardiff, where Sussex posted 178 (and still lost), did a side score more than 145 in their first innings. Outside Wales, the average first innings total was 131. If the lack of searing heat provides some mitigation, it is a reminder that counties need to be more proactive in preparing the sort of pitches to produce the exciting cricket that spectators want.Can the ECB, so conscious of the importance of the Blast succeeding, do more to help counties prepare wickets with pace and bounce – and even reprimand those who are unwilling to do so?3
Ray of light in Yorkshire’s financial gloomHeadingley has finally been granted planning permission to install permanent floodlights, with Yorkshire hopeful they will be completed for next season. For delighted fans the upshot will be later starting times on a Friday night.At its worst, it can take the best part of an hour to get to Headingley from the city centre at rush hour, especially with so few parking options, so 5.30 Friday starts act as a roadblock to many attending. If this boosts attendance by an average of 3,000 per game then, when booze sales are added, Yorkshire could conceivably gain close to £500,000 a season.Player focusKevin O’Brien in Ireland garb•Associated Press

Three years after smiting England in the World Cup, Kevin O’Brien has developed into one of the more astute T20 nomads around. Four overs in the London derby yielded only 18 runs – and a brilliant return catch. His bowling may be less obtrusive than his batting, but it is crafty and quietly effective, awash with cutters and cute changes of pace. Surrey have him for another six weeks before he goes to Trinidad & Tobago Red Steel, an apt choice of teams considering O’Brien’s hair colour, in the Caribbean Premier League. “There’s no better place to play cricket than in the Caribbean,” O’Brien says. But he still aims to add the IPL to his collection of T20 leagues. “Hopefully one day if I can get my timing right and perform well close to the auction date I’ll get over there.”

2
Darren’s delightDarren Sammy enjoyed a winning start to county cricket against Sussex. His contribution was useful rather than decisive – three overs for 18 runs; and an unbeaten run-a-ball 9 to take Glamorgan to victory, but there is the definite sense of more to come. Much is made of the destructive capability of his batting, but his nagging cutters may be rather better suited to English pitches than those in the IPL, when he leaked 157 runs from 14 overs.The optimism at Glamorgan transcends even Sammy’s effusive smile. They achieved the rare feat of beating Hampshire at the Ageas Bowl on the Blast’s launch night. Their chase of 178 against Sussex was set up by Jacques Rudolph, belying championship struggles for his second consecutive T20 half-century, before Chris Cooke celebrated his 28th birthday with a demonstration of power.Add in the all-round nous of Jim Allenby, and a crafty pace-bowling pair in Graeme Wagg and Michael Hogan, and Glamorgan can have justifiable hope of replicating their effort in last season’s CB40, when they reached the final.1
The T20 specialist England forgotEyes are firmly fixed on higher-profile comebacks, but Andrew Flintoff and Kevin Pietersen would do well to match Owais Shah’s return to English cricket. It was a considerable surprise when no county signed Shah in his new guise as an itinerant T20 specialist. But Hampshire gave him a short-term deal, initially as cover for Michael Carberry, and have been rewarded with 116 runs without dismissal from Shah’s three innings.The visit of his last county, Essex, brought out Shah’s old swagger: his unbeaten 50 contained three sixes as Hampshire cruised home. Not that it would have been any surprise to those familiar with his formidable T20 record: he averages 34 and needs just 21 more runs to be the sixth man to 5000 T20 runs. If only his fielding was a little less shoddy, Shah could yet be England’s answer to Brad Hodge.

An unstable batting order and inconsistent showings with the ball affected Sunrisers’ progress

Kanishkaa Balachandran26-May-201411:04

Isa Guha: Dhawan did not lead from the front

Bhuvneshwar Kumar: consistent across all conditions•BCCI

Where they finished

Sixth, with six wins in 14 games.

What went right

Not much went to plan for Sunrisers Hyderabad as a unit, but there were noteworthy individual performances. David Warner was their best batsman and with 528 runs was the tournament’s fourth-highest run-scorer at the end of the league stage. Bhuvneshwar Kumar was the standout Indian bowler, exceeding expectations both in the UAE and in India.

What went wrong

Sunrisers had invested in big names at the auction but failed to get the balance right. A strong top order with the likes of Shikhar Dhawan, Warner and Aaron Finch was followed by a weak middle order. Warner’s batting position was not stable. He started out in the top order, but had to be demoted to cover the slack in the middle. Sunrisers experimented by sandwiching a young Indian batsman, KL Rahul, between the openers and Warner and while it was successful in one match, Sunrisers could not apply it on a consistent basis.One of the reasons for the constant shuffling was the indifferent form of the captain Dhawan. In the closing stages, Sunrisers relieved him of the captaincy to help him focus on his batting and Darren Sammy took over. The plan worked in helping Dhawan get his rhythm back but the team had bigger worries. Having lost four games in the halfway stage of their campaign, they had plenty of catching up to do to make the playoffs and hence had to not only sweep their remaining games, but also rely on other results to go their way. Having lost three successive games at home in Hyderabad – where they had a good record in 2013 – the situation got desperate. They recovered lost ground with two successive wins, but it proved to be too little too late.Aside from the batting, another factor in Sunrisers’ underwhelming performance was the ineffectiveness of their best bowler Dale Steyn. Steyn enjoyed better returns in the UAE, but in India he was very expensive – he was hit for more than 20 runs in an over on four different occasions in this tournament, by AB de Villiers, MS Dhoni, George Bailey and Yusuf Pathan – and not as penetrative. Fatigue may have been an issue in his case, having played all 14 matches straight after the World T20. Bhuvneshwar carried the attack but support was not forthcoming from Amit Mishra and Ishant Sharma.

Key stat

Sunrisers Hyderabad scored 1943 runs in the season, the smallest aggregate among all the teams. They also hit the fewest boundaries – 239.

Best player

While many Indian bowlers struggled to maintain their rhythm when the IPL shifted from the UAE to more challenging conditions in India, Bhuvneshwar Kumar was the only consistent one. Bhuvneshwar managed to maintain an economy-rate of under seven in both countries and his average remained more or less the same. Batsmen found it difficult to negotiate his movement with the new ball and yorkers at the death, and with 20 wickets, he was not only the best Indian bowler but also the joint leading wicket-taker with Sunil Narine at the end of the league stage.

Worst player

After an impressive showing at the World T20, Amit Mishra‘s form dipped in the IPL. Having three IPL hat-tricks to his name, he did not meet expectations this time with seven wickets in 10 games. The biggest black mark against him, though, was his economy rate of 9.06. In 2013, it stood at an impressive 6.35. In this edition, he went wicketless in six out of ten games.

Surprise package

With Mishra slipping off the radar, Karn Sharma stepped up and turned in another impressive season for Sunrisers. Karn played all 14 games and took 15 wickets with a best of 4 for 38. He was often brought on to restrict the flow of runs and is among a crop of budding Indian legspinners who have impressed in the tournament.

Memorable moment

Their game against Rajasthan Royals witnessed one of the most comical run-outs. Amit Mishra tried to sneak a bye off James Faulkner but his partner Irfan Pathan wasn’t interested. Mishra was already halfway down the pitch and had to turn back. The wicketkeeper Sanju Samson had plenty of time to affect a run-out but he missed the mark. Faulkner too had his chance and as Mishra’s luck would have it, the fast bowler also failed to knock down the stumps. Third time lucky? No. Mishra showed no urgency whatsoever to get back and casually looked at his partner. That meant there was enough time for Samson, who finally got his aim right to find Mishra short of his crease. All three characters had their moment of embarrassment but among them, Mishra would not want to see that replay ever again.

Unused players

Ashish Reddy, Ricky Bhui, Manpreet Juneja, Chama Milind, Prasanth Parameswaran, Amit Paunikar, Brendan Taylor.

Helmed by an overburdened head coach and weighed down by inconsistent selection, Zimbabwe’s faults were glaringly obvious in their heaviest-ever defeat to Australia

Liam Brickhill in Harare25-Aug-2014″Get ready for a broken f***ing window,” Mitchell Johnson didn’t say to Elton Chigumbura as he strode out to bat, though a warning to the television commentators, who were sprayed by shards of glass after Johnson’s monstrous mow down the ground smashed a press-box window, might have been charitable. Charity, however, has never been the Australian way.For Zimbabwe, charity clearly begins at home and their meek showing surely helped Australia ease into the tour, if they had any rust to shake off after a five-month lay-off. Australia have only been in the country since Thursday, but there was more intensity to their centre-wicket practice at the Country Club on Saturday than there was at any point during this match – until Johnson shattered the peace.The press-box windows are made of shatterproof glass, but a similarly massive hit several years ago had weakened that pane. No one had seen fit to replace it, presumably reckoning the odds of someone hitting the exact spot were slim indeed. The brittleness of Zimbabwe’s cricket team stems from a similar selection of dents, cracks and fault lines – and none of them have been repaired either. Along comes the world’s top-ranked one-day side, and Zimbabwe are duly shattered into little pieces. For at least a decade, Zimbabwe have masked their weaknesses and papered over their cracks, without ever settling on a lasting solution. As Tatenda Taibu put it before he walked away from the game: “ZC are just painting a house that has no foundations.”A South African side might let you get away with that without overly heavy punishment. Like a big brother easing off as he notices tears welling in the eyes of a younger sibling, it now seems South Africa went somewhat easy on the Zimbabweans – despite the 3-0 scoreline from their one-day series. There was no such clemency from Australia, whose ground-and-pound strategy was evident in Maxwell’s relentless hitting and Johnson’s equally unforgiving bowling, with both contributing to Zimbabwe’s 198-run defeat: their largest against Australia.Zimbabwe are not being helped by the inconsistencies in their selection. Richmond Mutumbami, asked to open against South Africa, was shunted to No. 7 while Zimbabwe field-tested yet another unsuccessful opening partnership in Tino Mawoyo and Sikandar Raza. Brendan Taylor, dropped for the third ODI against South Africa, was brought back but wafted nervously to slip before he could make an impact. Earlier, Chigumbura had done his best to juggle a bowling attack missing Brian Vitori, Neville Madziva, Luke Jongwe and Shingi Masakadza – all of whom played against South Africa as part of what coach Steve Mangongo called Zimbabwe’s “best possible XI”.Mangongo, it is hoped, has a firm grip on the whys and wherefores of Zimbabwe’s selection decisions. He better, given he and Givemore Makoni now make up the entire selection panel after Wayne James was removed on Friday. The idea that “no one is safe” has permeated the team’s recent selections, but the result of that is that Zimbabwe can find no peace either on or off the field. What effect must playing for one’s place in every match have on a team for whom confidence has never come easily, and for whom defeat is a fact of life?”Pressure is always there,” Mangongo insisted in the post-match press conference. “Whether you’re playing game one, game 20, game 200, pressure is always there. And if you don’t perform, I don’t see any science in you playing.”Yes there will always be people given a run, but there are also certain people who have been given enough of a run that, yes, they will be dropped. Simple and straightforward. But there is no guy who has played one game and then gets dropped the next game. But if you have played more than 50 games and you don’t perform and you don’t execute your role, you have got no justification whatsoever to be in the team.”Mangongo will himself be no stranger to pressure, given his role as head coach and selector combines the batting, bowling, fielding and strategic coaching roles all on his own, with previous batting and bowling coaches Grant Flower and Heath Streak now working with Pakistan and Bangladesh respectively.”It’s extremely difficult; absolute nightmare,” admitted Mangongo. “I know for a fact that Zimbabwe Cricket administrators are working on that, so hopefully we will have the right set-up as we go along. But yes you cannot have a head coach trying to coach batting one-on-one, bowling, spin, fast bowlers, team strategy, gameplan, you name it.”Perhaps Zimbabwe’s most notable achievement was managing to keep their over rate in check despite having to fetch the ball from beyond the boundary 15 times. They will at least have the week to re-group before their match against South Africa on Friday. Australia’s only worry, if one can call it that, is that their squad only contains one specialist spinner and despite the fact that the Harare Sports Club pitch is likely to play slow and low throughout the series, Nathan Lyon was their most expensive bowler.Mitchell Marsh, who chipped in with a wicket to complement his 89 at no. 3, shrugged off suggestions that Australia might be a spinner light.”The way all the bowlers bowled today, they took pace off the ball at the right time and I think that’s going to be key on this wicket,” said Marsh. “There’s a lot of experience in our changing rooms, they’ve played on these sorts of wickets all around the world, so I don’t think it’s anything too new.”

The team environment is, in victory or defeat, now more relaxed and, as a consequence, the players are more likely to produce their best form

George Dobell18-Aug-20149:00

‘Moeen Ali’s bowling a huge positive’

Peter Moores approach helped Alastair Cook emerge from his problems•PA PhotosThere was an interesting insight into the mood of the England squad during a press conference at The Ageas Bowl.Perhaps because it was a final question, perhaps because it was almost dismissed as an after-thought, Peter Moores, the England coach, provided an answer that, on reflection, may well have had greater significance than it appeared at the time.Asked if England had hit rock bottom after defeat to India in the second Investec Test at Lord’s, Moores replied: “Who knows what rock bottom is? But it is probably not losing a cricket match.”Contrast that with a question put to Andy Flower towards the end of the Ashes series in Australia. Asked whether the England camp was “happy”, Flower looked quizzical and replied something along the lines of “I’m not sure that is relevant. But there is a positive working environment, yes.”While it might be unwise to draw too many conclusions from such scant evidence, it does support the sense of recent weeks that, after many months of building pressure and impending doom under Flower’s leadership, the arrival of Moores has acted like a breath of fresh air. Defeat is no longer a disaster. Victory is no longer the ultimate. The England team environment is, in victory or defeat, now more relaxed and, as a consequence, the players are more likely to produce their best form.Such an interpretation is harsh on Flower. No coach, with the possible exception of Duncan Fletcher, has ever provided so much to an England team and his role in taking England to No. 1 in all formats, to the regular Ashes wins and a first global trophy, should never be underestimated. England owe him a great deal and Moores would be the first to credit him.But, along with many others in and around the squad, something changed in Flower towards the end of the Ashes. Bent out of shape by disappointment and worry and weariness, the smile was replaced with a grimace, the light touch was replaced by an iron grip and joy in the squad was replaced with anxiety and fear. The desire to win, or at least not lose, was stifling. The desire to control limited any expression or movement.New players felt paralysed in the environment. Old ones felt exhausted. The sight of the team forced into a punishing – and yes, that is the right word – fitness session in the heat of Sydney two days before the final Test, said it all. Flower had nothing left to offer but hard work and fierce determination. They are not, by any means, bad qualities. But they are not enough. All the subtly had been lost. England were all stick and no carrot.It is not that Moores will work the squad any less hard. They will still be obliged to improve their fitness and their skills. They will still be challenged. And they will continue to miss Flower’s advice and insight.But, over the course of seven Tests this summer, we have seen a new spirit emerge in the England team. We have seen a team in which inexperienced international players – the likes of Chris Jordan, Liam Plunkett, Gary Ballance and Moeen Ali – are made to feel comfortable – compare it with the experience of Boyd Rankin or Simon Kerrigan – a team where the spirit of the new players had lifted the spirit of the older, more jaded players, where players have been allowed to settle in and, over time, start to perform to somewhere near the best of their ability. All that reflects well on the environment around the squad.More than that, though, we have seen Alastair Cook begin to grow as a leader. We saw a man who started to trust his less experienced bowlers and spare his more experienced ones. And, more importantly, we saw a man who dealt with extreme pressure with a great deal of determination, a phlegmatic attitude and more than a little dignity.Yes, he slipped up occasionally. But many would have snapped back far more forcibly at the likes of Shane Warne and Piers Morgan. And, in the moment of victory, he was graceful and generous to his beaten opponents and successful team. His batting might still be a concern, but he was, in leadership terms, increasingly impressive.Perhaps the influence of Moores was important here, too. With Moores gently encouraging but allowing the players to develop in their own way, Cook has been able to find his voice as captain. Flower was wonderful. But he cast a large shadow. And not much grows in the shadows.Flower, of course, is not the only man to leave the England dressing room in recent times. Kevin Pietersen has been another high profile departure and some might argue that it is his absence, more than Flower’s which has contributed to the partial revival.Either way, it was interesting to hear Moores play down his own part in England series win and mention Cook’s “humility” as a key ingredient in his development as captain.”Alastair has the No. 1 quality that anyone needs to get better quickly,” Moores said. “And that is humility. When he’s been successful, he still wants to get better and learn. Now as long as he is in that position – and I can’t see it ever changing – he is going to grow quickly.”One person doesn’t change an environment, so credit goes to everyone involved. That includes the coaches, like assistant Paul Farbrace and fast-bowling coach David Saker, but it’s mainly about the players.”They come under pressure during the Tests. But led by Alastair Cook, how they have handled themselves has a huge effect on each other. We’ve seen all through the summer young and less experienced players coming in and doing well at different times, which is great. In the second half we’ve seen the merging of a team where the senior and the less experienced players have come together to find a way of playing and create some pressure on the opposition.”It’s too early to say that this is going to be our Ashes XI. But we are very pleased with their development as a team. With the XI we have at the moment, we have forged a very tight bond and a way of playing.”I don’t expect anyone to write us up as the best in the world. We’re still at the start of the journey.”

Stats highlights from the third day of the first Test between Pakistan and New Zealand in Abu Dhabi

Bishen Jeswant11-Nov-20144 Number of 50-plus scores by New Zealand openers in 2014. All four of these have been by Tom Latham. New Zealand have tried four different opening combinations in 2014; no other team has more.0 Number of 50-plus opening stands for New Zealand in Tests in 2014. India and Zimbabwe are the other teams that also have none. New Zealand’s openers posted 33 runs in their first innings, which was their first 23-plus opening stand in 12 innings. The last time they posted more, was also 33.2 Number of father-son pairs from New Zealand who had scored Test hundreds before Tom Latham today. The two previous pairs are Richard & Walter Hadlee, and Hamish & Ken Rutherford. The latest additions to this list are Tom and Rod Latham.8 Number of instances when Pakistan have batted first and taken a 300-plus first-innings lead. Two of the eight instances have come in their last two Tests, against Australia and now New Zealand, both in Abu Dhabi.6 Number of balls played by Ross Taylor to score zero. He has never before played more than two balls for a Test duck. Geoff Allott holds the record with a 77-ball duck against South Africa in 1999.103 Runs scored by Tom Latham in New Zealand’s first innings. He is the third youngest New Zealand opener (22 years and 221 days) to have made a Test century, and the youngest in the last 35 years.3 Runs scored by Kane Williamson today. He has five single-digit scores in his last 19 Test innings, with three of those being scores of exactly three.

ESPNcricinfo presents the plays of the day from the third one-day international as England register a win

Andrew Fidel Fernando and Alan Gardner in Colombo03-Dec-2014The dash to first baseRangana Herath played two characteristic baseball shots in his three-ball innings, then took the gag a little further on the final ball of the innings. Spotting a short one from Chris Jordan, he aimed a swipe over a straight midwicket, and took off for the run. Having top-edged the ball just past the 30-yard circle, Herath had a chance to run two, only, he had somehow dropped his bat at the striker’s end, and was compelled to turn down a risky second.The swindleEver the opportunist behind the stumps, Kumar Sangakkara’s anticipatory shuffle-and-take to dismiss Ravi Bopara was tantamount to stealing his wicket, rather than earning it fairly. Rangana Herath had been walloped over his head for six the previous ball, but when Bopara shaped to play a paddle sweep, Sangakkara smelt blood and began slinking to the leg side. Bopara’s shot came virtually off the face, and a, ended up in Sangakkara’s gloves instead.The lifeJoe Root had held the latter part of England’s chase together, and when Dhammika Prasad had him caught at cover for 40, Sri Lanka believed their chances of defending their score had risen substantially. But their joy was to be erased by technology. Unsure of whether Prasad had overstepped, the on-field umpires requested the third umpire’s assistance, and Prasad was found to have bowled a no-ball, by perhaps no more than an inch. Root survived and went on to hit the winning run. That Prasad over ended up lurching England 21 runs closer to victory.The calamity callWith Moeen Ali skipping along at a strike rate of nearly 150, England just needed a couple of batsmen to stay with him. Alastair Cook did a capable job but Alex Hales, back in the side and asked to bat at No. 3, proved less reliable. He almost got himself in bother backing up off the fourth ball of the 15th over, falling over and having to scramble for the crease, but worse was to come. The next delivery was driven firmly by Moeen wide of Herath, never the most nimble of fielders, at mid-off and he had to dive to stop it. However, with Moeen charging down the pitch, Hales had turned to watch the ball and then decided to return to his crease – leaving Moeen to sprint desperately back in the direction whence he came. It was a futile effort, as Sangakkara took a smart catch and whipped off the bails, Moeen having run almost two by himself. He was left to continue his trot back to the dressing room.The gotcha momentSangakkara, playing probably his last ODI in this part of the country and having cruised past 13,000 career runs, looked in the mood to toy with England for most of the innings. In the second over of the batting Powerplay, Sangakkara decided to cut himself a generous slice of Chris Jordan’s bowling: first he clubbed a fullish ball over midwicket; then, when a fielder was moved to plug that area, he leaned back and ramped a short delivery down to vacant third man. Next he went leg side again, thrashing a couple more to wide long-on. Then he was out, mistiming a pull to mid-on as Jordan cut his fingers over a slower ball. Sangakkara looked as shocked as anyone – it may have cost him a few but Jordan had got his man.

Ryan Harris and Nathan Lyon might have strengthened Australia’s World Cup squad, while the inclusion of injured captain Michael Clarke could prove a distraction

Brydon Coverdale11-Jan-20151:18

‘We’d like to see Ryan go to England and keep those Ashes’

After Australia raised the Border-Gavaskar Trophy in Sydney on Saturday night the chairman of selectors, Rod Marsh, approached Ryan Harris for a chat.”Rhino,” Marsh said.”Don’t worry mate, I know,” Harris replied.The message Marsh was going to deliver was that Harris was not in Australia’s World Cup squad. It was in one sense no surprise, for Harris has not played a one-day international for nearly three years. In another sense it was an opportunity missed, for Mitchell Johnson and Harris must be the pair of bowlers Australia’s World Cup opponents would least like to face.You can understand the decision made by Marsh and his panel. Harris is arguably Australia’s most important bowler for the upcoming Ashes tour of England, where he was their Player of the Series in the 2013 campaign. He is 35 years old, prone to injury, and will always carry with him an ongoing knee issue that required surgery last year.Marsh said that Harris had “had his time” in ODI cricket. His last match for Australia in the format came against Sri Lanka in February 2012, so long ago that he shared bowling duties with Brett Lee. But five years after his last Test, Chris Rogers was called up at 35 for Australia’s 2013 Ashes tour. The selectors viewed the Ashes as the Test pinnacle and saw Rogers as a man who could help them; the World Cup is the ODI peak and Harris could have done the same.”We’d really like to see Ryan go to England and bowl his heart out again in Test cricket and keep those Ashes,” Marsh said. “He’s that important to the team in Test match cricket. I know there’s nothing bigger than a World Cup … He would have loved to have been in the side but I think he also realises that he would have struggled.”It will be interesting now to see how Harris is managed over the coming months. Had he been in the World Cup squad he would have played at most nine days of ODI cricket from mid-February to the end of March. The intensity of a World Cup notwithstanding, the benefits of leaving him out will be diminished if he returns to Sheffield Shield cricket with Queensland. But he can’t be completely cotton-woolled, and if he plays anywhere, why not for Australia?Harris was fit enough to play the Sydney Test but has not been picked in the World Cup squad, while Michael Clarke was not fit enough to play at the SCG but has been chosen to lead Australia in the World Cup. It is a strange contrast, for Clarke must surely be as important to Australia’s Ashes plans as Harris, and in some ways appears even more physically fragile.Nathan Lyon and Ryan Harris are important Test players but neither was picked in the World Cup squad•Getty ImagesAs the incumbent ODI captain it would have a big call to leave him out of a home World Cup, but given his ongoing hamstring and back injuries it will be no surprise if he breaks down again during the tournament. Then the race to get him fit for the Ashes will begin, and the whole saga will play out one more time ahead of another big event.By handing Clarke a deadline to prove his fitness by Australia’s second match against Bangladesh, the selectors have given him a reasonably short rein. He can miss only the tournament opener against England before losing his place. But the uncertainty over his recovery time-frame will become a distraction for the Australians in the lead-up to the World Cup.Should Clarke fail to prove his fitness, Cameron White would be the logical replacement. Fourth on the Matador Cup run tally this summer with two hundreds and two fifties from seven games, White has the experience and poise to slot seamlessly into Australia’s campaign if called upon. After all, this is a man who has even captained Australia in ODI cricket in the past.Remarkably, White has not played an ODI since April 2011, having been part of the World Cup squad that competed in India and Sri Lanka that year. Only five members of Australia’s 2011 World Cup squad have made it into the group for this year’s tournament: Clarke, Johnson, Steven Smith, Brad Haddin and Shane Watson.Australia’s spinner in 2011 was Jason Krejza, called up with only one previous ODI to his name due to injuries to Nathan Hauritz and Xavier Doherty. Now, Doherty gets his opportunity to play in a World Cup, having been preferred to Nathan Lyon for the specialist spinner’s position.It was a curious decision, for Lyon was trialled during the one-day games in Zimbabwe and the UAE this year and across six matches took 10 wickets at 25.30 at an economy rate of 4.43. In the past year, Doherty has also played six ODIs for only half of Lyon’s wicket tally – five at 45.20 and an economy rate of 4.26.Lyon was also the leading wicket taker from either side during the Australia-India Test series and is brimming with confidence. In 2013, Marsh was part of a selection panel that picked Doherty for Australia’s Test tour of India because he had impressed them in ODIs; now Marsh seems unwilling to apply the reverse criteria in Lyon’s favour.Perhaps the selectors wanted options to spin the ball both ways, giving Doherty the edge with offspinning allrounder Glenn Maxwell a certain selection. There is every chance that Maxwell will be Australia’s primary spinner in many of their World Cup matches, with Doherty only coming into contention if conditions suit.Most of this World Cup squad picked itself, but it is hard to believe Australia’s chances would not be improved by the presence of Lyon and Harris in the group.