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Gary Kirsten is flying home to South Africa for a short break, while the rest of the squad will also go on short trips ahead of the Adelaide Test

Firdose Moonda at the Gabba13-Nov-2012Despite their shortcomings in the drawn Brisbane Test, South Africa have not scheduled extra practice sessions before the second match begins on November 22 in Adelaide. The squad will split up tomorrow and reconvene on November 18, with coach Gary Kirsten making a whistle-stop trip back to South Africa to visit his family.”We’ve got eight days before the next Test and we try to keep people refreshed,” Mohammed Moosajee, South Africa’s team manager, told ESPNcricinfo. “Usually, we work on needing four days of preparation for any Test.”Kirsten is the only one making that long a journey. He will leave Brisbane on Wednesday morning for Cape Town, spend three nights with his wife and three children, and will return to meet up with the squad in Adelaide on Sunday. The other members of the tour party are staying in Australia, with some headed to the Great Barrier Reef, others to the Sunshine Coast and the rest remaining in Brisbane.Assistant coach Russell Domingo, middle-order batsman Jacques Rudolph, physiotherapist Brandon Jackson and performance director Paddy Upton will be diving at the world’s largest coral reef. The bulk of the squad, though, will be on the beach. Graeme Smith, Jacques Kallis, AB de Villiers, Faf du Plessis, Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel are driving up the coast.Alviro Petersen is headed directly to Adelaide to spend time with a friend, while Hashim Amla, Imran Tahir, Vernon Philander, Rory Kleinveldt, Robin Peterson and Thami Tsolekile will stay in Brisbane and make the occasional day trip. Dean Elgar, who was added to the squad after JP Duminy’s Achilles’ injury, will meet up with them on Thursday. Duminy has a follow-up visit with the surgeon who performed his operation on the same day and is due to return home to South Africa at the weekend.Taking short breaks during tours has become the norm for South Africa under Kirsten, whose work-life balance philosophy has been implemented by the board. Since he took over in June last year (his first assignment was only in November), every series apart from the two-Test one against Australia has had a break long enough to allow the players rest and, in the case of overseas tours, time to explore.Against Sri Lanka at home at the end of the last year, South Africa dispersed after the first Test in Centurion and reconvened for the Boxing Day Test, which they lost. In New Zealand, a three-day result in Hamilton allowed some of the squad to visit Lake Taupo. In England, there was time for excursions, with the squad managing a trip to the Olympics, and at the World Twenty20 in Sri Lanka they took a few days off in Bentota.South Africa have had a travel intensive year with five months away from home, including tours to New Zealand, England, Sri Lanka and Australia. They have been implementing a flexible player management program and allowing time off wherever possible. Jacques Kallis, for example, was rested from the one-day leg of the England tour, although he played in the Tests and T20s. Instead of remaining with the squad, as he might previously have done, he went to New York to visit his partner. Other players who took part in all formats in England and played in the World T20 were given a total break from cricket on their return home.This is not the first time a coach has left the squad during a series. Allan Donald missed the drawn match in Wellington, while Kirsten was absent for some parts of last year’s Cape Town Test when his daughter was born.

Pakistan were to throw at least one limited-over international on the 2010 tour of England, a court was told on Monday

Richard Sydenham at Southwark Crown Court10-Oct-2011Pakistan were to throw at least one limited-over international on the 2010 tour of England, a court was told on Monday, and only the timing of the ‘s expose seemed to prevent such a result from occurring.Mazhar Mahmood, the undercover investigative journalist who sparked the alleged spot-fixing controversy, was appearing as a prosecution witness at Southwark Crown Court on the fourth day in the trial involving former captain Salman Butt and fast bowler Mohammad Asif, who are alleged to have bowled pre-determined no balls. They deny the charges.A recording from secret microphones of agent and alleged conspirator Mazhar Majeed was played in chunks throughout Monday and one aspect dealt with the intention to fix results during either the five-match 50-over series or the two Twenty20 games.It can be safely assumed he was not referring to Test matches because in earlier recordings Majeed had told of how important it was that his “best friend” and key client Salman Butt won Tests so he remained in his position for a long time. Shahid Afridi was Pakistan captain in the 20 and 50-over formats at that time.Those matches followed the four-match Test series that England won 3-1. The newspaper, though, exposed the alleged corruption on the Saturday of the fourth and final Test at Lord’s. The jury, also following the recording with a written transcript, heard Majeed’s vague boasts about his corrupt intentions.”We have been working towards the next month for a long time,” Majeed was heard saying in one segment.And in a previous sequence on the same recording, he had said to the reporter while chatting in a parked car off the Gloucester Road in London: “We’re doing two results soon, within a month.”The journalist confirmed his intentions by asking: “So Pakistan will lose and then what?”Majeed replied: “Pakistan will lose but you know when Pakistan, like a game, you know as a cricket game it goes backwards and forwards, yeah, it’s your responsibility to put it on at the right times because there’s gonna be times in that game, it doesn’t matter what the odds are before, there’s gonna be times in that game when Pakistan are the favourites.”When Mahmood inquired whether there would be any mistakes and if there was a danger that his (fictitious) Far East backers would lose their money on false information, Majeed said: “They will do their job, don’t worry.”Majeed was also heard to earlier promise the journalist “four or five brackets for the Lord’s Test” and two no-balls, which were meant as a tester for Majeed to demonstrate his influence over the players he controlled.A bracket is a ten-over sequence when bettors might punt on a certain amount of runs in a set period or a number of no-balls, for instance. Majeed said a fixed bracket cost between £50,000 and £80,000. The jury was told last week that Majeed priced a fixed Test result at £1 million, a fixed one-day international at £450,000 and a Twenty20 international at £400,000.The case continues.

Shelley Nitschke, the Australia allrounder, has been named the Women’s Cricketer of the Year at the ICC Awards in Bangalore

Cricinfo staff06-Oct-2010Shelley Nitschke, the Australia allrounder, has been named the Women’s Cricketer of the Year at the ICC Awards in Bangalore. In the eight ODIs she played during the period under consideration – August 24, 2009 to August 10, 2010 – Nitschke scored 342 runs at an average of 57, and took 12 wickets. She also played in 10 Twenty20 Internationals, scoring 265 runs and taking ten wickets.Nitschke won the award ahead of team-mate Ellyse Perry, West Indies’ Stafanie Taylor and England’s Katherine Brunt. She was also part of the victorious Australian women’s side in the ICC World Twenty20 earlier this year.Accepting the award from Australia batsman Michael Hussey, Nitschke said: “This year has been fantastic and to cap the year off with winning the ICC Women’s Cricketer of the Year is brilliant. A huge part of increasing people’s following of us has been our playing double-header matches with the men’s sides, and to be playing Twenty20 cricket on a global stage has also helped us immensely.”There was another special honour for women’s cricket, as former England batsman Rachael Heyhoe-Flint became the first woman to be inducted into the ICC Hall of Fame.

Club state that “lengthy and challenging process” has enabled reimbursement

ESPNcricinfo staff07-Feb-2025Middlesex claim they have recovered £100,000 in ¬unauthorised payments made to their former chief executive Richard Goatley, but declined to comment after an eight-month investigation by Metropolitan Police concluded that “no criminal offences could be identified”.Goatley, who continues to deny any wrongdoing, had lodged a personal injury claim against Middlesex in April 2024, claiming that the club had been pursuing a campaign of harassment against him. In 2021, he suffered a stroke during a committee meeting at Lord’s in 2021, and had been forced to resign due to ill health.Middlesex went on to record a loss of £952,000 in 2021, with their net assets shrinking from approximately £2 million to £179,000. In part this was due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, although the club’s pensions contributions were also wrongly paid for 12 months, which was claimed to have caused a further £350,000 deficit in their books.In 2023, under the leadership of Goatley’s successor Andrew Cornish, the club was placed into “special measures” by the ECB, having been fined £50,000 for financial irregularities and handed a suspended points deduction.In May 2024, shortly after his High Court filing, Middlesex reported Goatley to the police, alleging that about £70,000 in unauthorised expenses had been paid into his personal bank account.In a statement, a Met police spokesperson acknowledged that Middlesex had made allegations of fraud against Goatley, adding that the “nature of the alleged offences were complex and required careful consideration”.”After a thorough and detailed assessment, officers decided on Wednesday 29 January that no criminal offences could be identified,” the spokesperson continued. “The case will be reopened should further investigative opportunities become available.”In a statement, Goatley said he had always maintained his innocence, adding that the police’s finding were “welcome” and came as “no surprise”. He confirmed that he will be continuing his civil claim against Middlesex. The club continues to deny any wrongdoing.Responding to the developments, Middlesex said they were pleased to confirm the recovery of the missing funds after a “lengthy and challenging process”, adding that they comprised £57,000 of cheques paid into Goatley’s bank account and a further £43,000 of ineligible payments made into his pension fund.”We are grateful to the bank and insurance company involved in ensuring that these payments were refunded to the club,” the statement continued. “We have no comment to make on the decision that the Metropolitan Police have reached and their reasoning for doing so.”This story was updated on December 1, 2025, following a clarification of the timeline of events

Lanning makes the shock decision to retire at age 31 having missed Australia last three series due to a medical issue

Alex Malcolm08-Nov-2023Meg Lanning has made the shock decision to retire from international cricket effective immediately, aged 31.Australia’s captain had not played for her country since lifting the T20 World Cup in South Africa in February. She missed Australia’s tour of the UK due to an undisclosed medical issue and did not play in the recent T20I and ODI series against West Indies despite being fit, having returned to play WNCL cricket for Victoria.Lanning is currently captaining the Melbourne Stars in the WBBL and appears set to continue to play domestic cricket.Related

• 'I was in denial' – Meg Lanning reveals health battle that caused her international retirement

• Healy and Brown named for India tour, Cheatle recalled, but no captain yet

• 'Thank you for what you've done for women's cricket' – The cricketing world reacts to Meg Lanning's retirement

• Lanning makes a successful return to cricket with a brisk half-century in WNCL

• Lanning 'relieved' to have retired after thinking about it for 'quite some time'

“The decision to step away from international cricket was a difficult one to make, but I feel now is the right time for me,” Lanning said. “I’ve been incredibly fortunate to enjoy a 13-year international career, but I know now is the right time for me to move on to something new.”Team success is why you play the game, I’m proud of what I have been able to achieve and will cherish the moments shared with team-mates along the way.”I’d like to thank my family, my teammates, Cricket Victoria, Cricket Australia and the Australian Cricketers’ Association for their support to allow me to play the game I love at the highest level. I also want to say a huge thank you to all the fans who have supported me throughout my international career.”Lanning has taken several breaks from cricket in recent seasons for a variety of issues. In 2022, following Australia’s Commonwealth Games triumph, she took a leave of absence from the game and worked as a barista at a local coffee shop in Melbourne. She missed Australia’s tour in India in December of that year before returning for the build-up to the 2023 T20 World Cup.Lanning made her international debut as an 18-year-old in 2010 and has played 241 matches for Australia including six Tests, 103 ODIs and 132 T20Is. She will go down as one of the most successful captains in cricket history having captained Australia to four T20 World Cup titles, an ODI World Cup title and a Commonwealth Games title. She led her country in 182 matches across her career having been handed the role as a 21-year-old in 2014.Meg Lanning with the ODI World Cup trophy•Getty Images

She became the youngest Australian female to score a century, aged 18, when she made 104 not out against England in just her second ODI. She went on to become arguably the greatest female ODI batter of all time. She has scored 15 ODI centuries, with New Zealand’s Suzie Bates (12) the only other player with more than nine.Of the 11 women with more than 4000 ODI runs, Lanning has the highest average of 53.51, with India’s Mithali Raj the only other player to average over 50. She also had a staggering strike rate of 92.20.Lanning is the second-highest run-scorer in women’s T20I history behind Bates. She made 3405 runs at 36.61, striking at 116.37, with two centuries.The only thing missing from her glittering personal resume was a Test century. She played just six Tests in a 13-year career and only made two half-centuries with a highest score of 93 against England in 2022.Cricket Australia CEO Nick Hockley paid tribute to Lanning after her announcement.”One of the finest cricketers Australia has produced, Meg’s supreme achievements with the bat have been matched by her inspiring leadership,” Hockley said.”As one of the best players in the world over a long period of time, Meg has made an immeasurable impact and led a generation which has helped revolutionise the game.”Under Meg’s leadership, the Australian women’s cricket team has built a legacy of global dominance and has been at the forefront of growing the game and inspiring the next generation of cricketers all around the world.”A seven-time World Cup winner and Commonwealth Games gold medallist, Meg retires from international cricket having achieved everything there is to achieve and we thank her for the immense contribution she has made.”We look forward to celebrating Meg’s distinguished international career at an appropriate time.”

Shaheen Afridi has been included in both travelling parties, to continue his rehab from a knee injury while with the team

Umar Farooq03-Aug-2022Hasan Ali has been dropped from both Pakistan’s squad for the ODI series in the Netherlands as well for the Asia Cup T20Is later this month. Naseem Shah has been named in both squads. Shaheen Shah Afridi, who missed the second Test in Sri Lanka last month because of a knee injury, has been included in both squads, with a PCB statement saying, “his rehabilitation programme will be overseen by the team trainer and physiotherapist, who will also decide on his return to international cricket”.Babar Azam continues to be in charge of both the set-ups, with Shadab Khan as his deputy.Hasan’s form across formats in the last year has been middling at best, with his T20I bowling strike rate moving to 23.2; he has picked up eight wickets in nine games in this period. In the three ODIs he has played in the last 12 months – all at home between March and June this year – he averaged 76.50 with the ball, picking up two wickets overall. Earlier this year, in the PSL, he had a bowling average of 40.55 and had an economy rate of 10.84 as he got nine wickets in nine games for Islamabad United.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

“We have done our homework, especially for the players who have served Pakistan well and have won so many games for the country,” Mohammad Wasim, the men’s chief selector, said when asked about Hasan. “To give them a longer run is a part of the plan, but then there is the stage when you realise that now is the time we think he needs a break for his own and the team’s betterment.”So we had a similar thought process with Hasan Ali, to give him an extended run, but now we think he needs to regather himself and return as a match-winner. We hope going forward we will find the same old Hasan Ali.”It has been a downward spiral for Hasan since last year’s T20 World Cup, where he dropped a catch that could, potentially, have won Pakistan the semi-final against Australia. He ended the tournament with five wicket in six bowling innings, at an average of 41.40 and an economy rate of 9.00.Naseem, who has never played ODIs or T20Is, has taken Hasan’s place after a good performance in the two Tests in Sri Lanka last month, when he picked up seven wickets on not-very-helpful pitches. Naseem had struggled with fitness issues till recently, but has come back stronger.”Naseem Shah is a quality bowler, and we have seen him in domestic white-ball cricket,” Wasim said. “He has got express pace and we wanted to include an attacking option; it is important to take wickets in white0ball cricket. He has that ability. He can swing the ball, he has got pace, and if we talk about his temperament, we have seen the evidence in Tests.”He was a good replacement for Hasan Ali, and we hope he can take his success from red-ball to white-ball cricket.”ESPNcricinfo Ltd

Agha Salman, the middle-order batter who made his international debut in the Test series against Sri Lanka last month, now has a chance of making his ODI debut in the Netherlands.The selectors have also kept faith in PSL sensational Mohammad Haris, the wicketkeeper-batter, for the ODIs. He made his debut in the home series against West Indies in June, but failed both the times he got a chance to bat, scoring 6 and 0 from the middle order.He has, however, been identified as the back-up to Mohammad Rizwan behind the stumps, which will likely ensure more opportunities, at least in the short term. Haris shot to prominence at PSL 7, scoring 166 runs in five innings at a strike rate of over 185 for Peshawar Zalmi. At the 50-over Pakistan Cup last year, he scored 289 runs in eight innings at an average of 41.28 and strike rate of over 100 for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.The selected players will assemble in Lahore on August 6 for a six-day training camp. The ODI side will leave for Amsterdam in the wee hours of August 12 for the three-ODI series – the matches are on August 16, 18 and 21, all in Rotterdam – and the T20I specialists will reach Dubai on August 22, where they will be joined by the T20I members of the ODI squad.

Josh Shaw and Ryan Higgins lead way with ball for hosts on green-tinged surface

ECB Reporters' Network08-Apr-2021The opening day of the new LV= Insurance County Championship season saw Bristol over 20 degrees cooler than Chennai, where Rory Burns last walked out in a competitive match, and Surrey felt a chill all day as they made 220 for 9 against Gloucestershire.Josh Shaw, with 4 for 48, and Ryan Higgins, 3 for 35, ensured the home side did not squander winning the toss on a green-tinged pitch. They were denied the chance to finish Surrey off inside the day by late rain.They may even feel a touch disappointed, having conceded 32 boundaries. Higgins, beginning the season averaging just 21 with the ball, was the chief exception, leaking only 35 runs from his 19 overs.”We’re really happy with that,” Shaw said. “We wanted to bowl on that wicket and we’re pleased with how we’ve gone. We probably weren’t at our best but when you’ve got Surrey 220 for 9 not quite firing it’s only a good thing.”Ryan Higgins mentioned changing the angle of the seam for a delivery and I tried it and managed to get a wicket so that was a nice one.”The challenge for Burns was the diametric opposite of that which he faced in India, as the players walked out in conditions that might have felt more like January. But he nonetheless failed, with an angle through the slips for four before he edged to second slip driving at one from David Payne that swung away. Ollie Pope also drove loosely, to backward-point, for 22 in Surrey’s struggle.With England’s batsmen having not contributed, 38-year-old former South Africa stalwart Hashim Amla, now an overseas player with Kolpak registrations ended, guided his side to 91 for 3 at lunch with a series of punchy cover drives and punishment of George Scott’s wide deliveries. He reached an 85-ball fifty, but soon after the break was driving flat-footedly at Shaw and palpably lbw for 56.Ben Foakes, lbw for 26, beaten by one from Higgins that nipped back, and Jordan Clarke, sharply held by wicketkeeper James Bracey standing up to Higgins for 8, quickly fell to leave Surrey in a hole at 144 for 6.From which point regret might linger for Gloucestershire as Jamie Overton made a streaky 40 – edging Payne just wide of second slip and Scott also narrowly past at catcher at takeable height. He went on to flick Shaw to fine leg to raise a batting point but eventually fell dragging Payne into his off stump trying to force off the back foot.Jamie Smith, one of Surrey’s brightest young things, also lost his off stump, for 20, to one that nipped back from Shaw and the same delivery accounted for Gus Atkinson in just his third first-class match.”It wasn’t easy. Being ultra-critical we could have got a few more but I think we’re still right in the game,” Overton said. “You got yourself in and felt a little settled but one just did something out of the blue.”But you can still score on this pitch and we let ourselves down with not taking a couple of partnerships on a little longer.”

Earlier, a Mitchell Starc five-for had knocked over New Zealand for 166

The Report by Alagappan Muthu14-Dec-2019Stumps An important half-century for Joe Burns, an inevitable one for Marnus Labuschagne, a five-wicket haul for Mitchell Starc and a lead of 417 runs. Australia had plenty going their way on the third day in Perth. New Zealand, meanwhile, braced themselves to fight against the current and they’re going to have to keep at it for another two whole days.As gutsy as Kane Williamson and his men are, that looks an impossible task, especially considering the vagaries of the pitch. Three days of wear and tear has introduced uneven bounce into play. When Steven Smith is beaten by one keeping low and another rearing up in the twilight session, you know the ball is doing tricks. And this, by the way, was a ball 46 overs old.Australia did excellently to earn the iron grip they have over this Test match. Such was the faith they had in their fast bowlers that they went out to the field on Saturday afternoon and immediately settled into a short-ball plan.Marnus Labuschagne uses the depth of his crease to go square off the wicket•Getty Images

Starc and Pat Cummins were the only ones left standing. Josh Hazlewood had already been sidelined with a hamstring strain. The heat was in the 40C range again. New Zealand were already five down, but their lower-order rarely ups and folds like a deck chair. There was a chance it could have gone all wrong, that the two big quicks would be bowled into the ground and Ross Taylor, who was well past fifty, could have marshalled the resources he had left to some semblance of safety.But what really happened was, after swaying out of the way of a ball that was coming for his nose, BJ Watling was slow to get in line with the follow-up delivery and was bowled. A man who had come into this game with Test scores of 77, 105*, 205 and 55 had been one-twoed by Cummins’ ruthless precision. He has 52 wickets this year, 14 more than his nearest rival.Taylor took on the short ball but his biggest test came at the hands of Nathan Lyon. The offspinner’s first over included a ball that scythed through the gap between bat and pad and nearly bowled Taylor. Ever since then, he began to look unsure of his scoring options because he was unsure how much the ball will spin. Eventually, a beautifully tossed up offbreak took Taylor’s outside edge as he played inside the line and he was caught for an otherwise flawless 80. With that being the only substantial score of the New Zealand innings, they were bowled out for 166.Mitchell Starc is applauded off the field by his team-mates after his 13th five-for in Test cricket•Getty Images

Having given up a lead of 250, there was very little New Zealand were in control of, but even there they were found wanting. Labuschagne was given a life when he was on 4 when a mis-hit pull shot against Neil Wagner was dropped by Colin de Grandhomme running back at square leg. For the next several moments, the fielder just lay there on the ground, face down, contemplating what could have been. This was a mere three overs after they had worked out David Warner for 19 off 63 balls. There was a moment to be seized there, just as there was late on the second day when they began batting under lights, knowing full well that if they could have survived that initial burst, batting in daylight would have been much easier. By the way, Labuschagne went on to make 50 off 81 and push his Test tally up to 1000 after only 12 Tests.New Zealand wouldn’t be faulted for the effort they have put into this Test match, especially considering they had only a handful of days to prepare for these conditions, but they haven’t been able to win the key moments in this game.Burns did though. He left the field in the first innings when he needn’t have and he played like a man conscious of that fact. Being stuck on 0 for 22 deliveries didn’t fluster him. Scoring opportunities drying up as the pink ball got soft didn’t affect him. There were a few balls outside off stump that had him fishing but outside of that he was solid for most of the time he spent at the crease to make 53 runs. His dismissal – a Tim Southee bouncer got too big on him and he could only fend it away to gully – only served as another reminder of the amount of life there still in this pitch.Umpire Aleem Dar receives treatment after hurting his knee•Getty Images

Banging it in was how Wagner got rid of both Labuschagne and Smith and then Australia went from 1 for 131 to 6 for 167 at stumps. Banging it in was also how Starc completed his five-for. He looked to have bounced de Grandhomme out – umpire Aleem Dar certainly thought so – but when the batsman took the option of DRS, replays seemed to indicate the ball might have just gone off the helmet on its way to Smith at second slip. HotSpot couldn’t catch the ball that high up. Snicko showed a flat line but the ball and glove were so close as they passed each other that third umpire Marais Erasmus felt the evidence he had wasn’t conclusive enough to overrule the on-field call.Pretty much the same thing happened when it was de Grandhomme bowling and seemed to have knocked out Warner with a bouncer, but umpire Dar didn’t give it out on-field and replays indicated the ball had bounced off the batsman’s shoulder and into second slip’s grasp. Dar’s time in the spotlight wasn’t done just yet as he found himself being tackled by Mitchell Santner who was trying to provide cover for a throw at the stumps in the 36th over. It really was a funny old day.

KL Rahul and Rishabh Pant made centuries for India – and for a while they threatened to bring down a target of 464 – but it was not to be as England’s depth once again gave them a win

The Report by Alagappan Muthu11-Sep-2018England got everything they wanted on the final day at the Oval – victory by 118 runs, a last stirring send-off for the retiring Alastair Cook, and a record-breaking 564th Test wicket for James Anderson. But they were made to wait. And fret.The day lasted far longer than they might have liked, and there was a scary rhythm to it. Eerie quiet followed by a CRACK. The sound of mouths hitting the floor. Another CRACK. The beating of hearts against chests. CRACK. CRACK. CRACK. India came to the ground as the team that needed to survive 90 overs. But by tea, they were taking a proper stab at a target of 464. Nothing in the vicinity had ever been chased in the history of Test cricket.The equation read 166 off 33 overs, and there were two centurions at the crease. KL Rahul got there abandoning most of his caution. It had served him poorly in England, leading him to average 16 until the start of this Test. Attacking the ball, on the other hand, brought him 149 runs. Rishabh Pant might have come to the same conclusion after recording a 29-ball duck in Southampton. He reached his maiden Test hundred off only 117 deliveries, with a six over deep midwicket. India started to believe.Madness doesn’t begin to cover what they did in the 44.3 overs they were together, just as madness doesn’t begin to cover the ball that broke that 204-run partnership. Adil Rashid – for long the forgotten asset – ran in from around the wicket at the right-handed Rahul, and pitched the ball in the rough some three feet away from the line of the stumps. The batsman cleared his front leg and prepared to flick the ball away, except it spun. It spun viciously, ridiculously, and unbelievably to tip the bail down from the off stump.England were effectively a bowler short – Stuart Broad was on the field with strapping on his right side, a souvenir from taking Jasprit Bumrah bouncer on the ribs – and it almost seemed like they were content to wait for the second new ball to make a play. Their two most prolific wicket-takers bowled only nine of the first 49 overs. The others resorted to bouncers – a strange tactic on a slow pitch. There were even times when Rahul batted without a slip.India had no pressure to deal with as they ransacked 131 runs at 4.37 per over in the middle session. But there was just too much time on the clock. And too many runs to go after. It all ended – in rather slapstick fashion – with No. 10 farming the strike from No. 11, and two balls later getting his middle stump knocked back. Anderson roared in triumph – he had just deposed Glenn McGrath as the most prolific fast bowler in Test cricket – and ran into the arms of his team-mates. They asked him to lead them off the field, but he insisted that Cook should get that honour, and then choked up during an interview when asked if he would miss his mate.There was – realistically – only one winner possible after Cook and Joe Root had struck fairytale hundreds. But it was fun as Rahul and Pant made everyone think about what if. They got together at 121 for 5 with more than two sessions left to play. But both men took the match situation and smuggled it out of sight. Nobody who watched their partnership would have realised that they were playing for the team that was behind in the match, and the series.Rahul launched fast bowlers over the top. The lack of pace in the pitch assisted him in fixing a problem against the inswinger, as did his adjusting his front foot stride, taking it down the pitch instead of across, and slowing down his bat-speed, at least while defending. But whenever there was width, he did not hold back. There was a six off Ben Stokes that was downright majestic, standing tall on the back foot and cutting the ball to smithereens.Pant looked special when he flayed spin along the ground, and weird when he hit in the air. He just puts so much into the swing that he literally falls over, meaning even his lofted drives over cover end up looking like skewed sweep shots. A much more proper rendition of it, over midwicket, crowned him the first Indian wicketkeeper to hit a century in England. These two were India’s top-scorers in the 2018 IPL. A few months on, they put on India’s highest partnership in a Test series in England.But the lower order could do only so much to mask a scorecard that once read 2 for 3. India’s biggest problem in this series – especially when it was alive – was a lack of runs from their top order. Rahul’s century comes as hope for the future, but it won’t quite wash over the fact that this team has once again fallen short away from home.

Solomon Mire’s belligerent 112 and half-centuries from Sean Williams and Sikandar Raza helped Zimbabwe run down Sri Lanka’s 316 and register the highest successful chase by any team in the country

The Report by Andrew Fidel Fernando30-Jun-2017
Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsSolomon Mire and Sean Williams razed Sri Lanka with a third-wicket partnership of 161•AFP

A belligerent 112 from Solomon Mire set Zimbabwe on track, Sean Williams’ 65 provided stability, and Sikandar Raza’s sparkling 67 not out laid out the finishing touches as a fearless Zimbabwe ran down Sri Lanka’s score of 316 to make history in Galle.Not only was this Zimbabwe’s first ODI victory against Sri Lanka on the island, it was also the first time any team successfully pursued a score in excess of 300. In the end, the chase seemed virtually nerveless. Raza and Malcolm Waller accelerated through the final overs to reach the target with the only six of the innings, with 14 balls to spare and six wickets in hand.Nothing Sri Lanka tried in the back half of the innings worked. Angelo Mathews tried switching his bowlers haphazardly, bringing his wicket-takers back early, and bowled seven men in the innings, but none could shake Zimbabwe’s resolve.As ever, dropped catches will haunt Sri Lanka. Mire was dropped on 17 and 94 – the first of those a difficult opportunity to the wicketkeeper, but the second a straightforward chance to Lasith Malinga, who made a mess of an overhead catch from short fine leg. Williams was also dropped on 13 by Danushka Gunathilaka at point. Had that chance been taken, Williams and Mire would only have had 37 together. Instead, their third-wicket stand of 161 off 133 balls would form the spine of Zimbabwe’s rousing victory.Perhaps you could argue that Sri Lanka should have scored more than 78 in the last 10 overs, given the number of wickets they had in hand, but that is a minor quibble. With Kusal Mendis hitting 86, Gunathilaka joining him for a century stand, and Upul Tharanga making 79 not out, the batsmen largely did their part.Zimbabwe’s innings began inauspiciously, Hamilton Masakadza gloving a legside Malinga ball to the wicketkeeper, before Craig Ervine top-edged a sweep off Akila Dananjaya to deep square leg just after the first Powerplay had finished. With the score at 46 for 2 in the 11th over, 317 looked distant indeed. But in that same over, Mire hit successive boundaries, and followed those up with a reverse sweep for four soon after.Suddenly, batting began to appear much easier. Mire and Williams rotated the strike fluently, and Sri Lanka’s two inexperienced spinners were perhaps guilty of a little indiscipline – Aponso particularly expensive through those early overs. Dananjaya at least seemed to draw regular mistakes from the batsmen, and perhaps could have been used more intensively when Sri Lanka were searching for wickets. By the time he was brought back, the match had largely slipped.It was the legside Mire preferred by far – 87 of his runs coming there. He was ruthless on anything that strayed into his pads, but fetched plenty of balls from wide outside offstump as well. Williams strove largely to turn the strike over. Between overs 15 and 30, the pair added 108 runs, and that, effectively, is where the match was won.Although both batsmen were gone by the end of the 35th over – Mire having completed his maiden ton in the 31st – Raza had the time to work himself into the innings, before he heralded his charge with three boundaries off Asela Gunaratne in the 39th over.Kusal Mendis became the joint second-fastest Sri Lankan to 1000 ODI runs•AFP

What was probably most impressive about the 102-run stand that took Zimbabwe home was how toothless they made Sri Lanka’s bowlers seem. Malinga’s slower balls were expertly parsed, and his swinging yorkers were not merely defused; some were heavily scored off. The spinners were manipulated and picked off, and even Nuwan Pradeep – who was Sri Lanka’s best bowler in the Champions Trophy – began to err towards the death. Zimbabwe, in playing intelligent, percentage cricket, took the game firmly by the collar, and Sri Lanka wilted quickly under pressure.For much of the chase, Zimbabwe needed about a run a ball, but when Waller hit three fours in the 43rd over, bowled by Aponso, he brought the equation down to 33 off 42 deliveries, and it was always going to be a cakewalk from there. Raza completed his half century in the 45th over, and wound up hitting the winning blow over long-on.It had seemed inconceivable that this total would be mowed down with so many balls to spare when Sri Lanka’s batsmen had walked off the field. Their innings was founded on a flowing 117-run second-wicket stand between Mendis and Gunathilaka – Mendis nearly flawless until his leading edge was sharply snaffled by Graeme Cremer in the 32nd over.The two had negotiated Zimbabwe’s coterie of spinners on a track that afforded some slow turn, and had seen out the moving new ball. Gunathilaka drove effortlessly, while Mendis swept and pulled disdainfully. Crossing 28 with an especially ravishing shot through midwicket, Mendis became the joint second-fastest Sri Lankan batsman to 1000 runs, one innings slower than Roy Dias, who had achieved the milestone in 27.Later in the innings, Tharanga would cross 6000 career ODI runs as well, batting from the No. 4 position after ceding his opening spot to Gunathilaka. Mathews cracked 43 off 30, and Gunaratne made a spry 28, but they were all let down by the bowling and fielding effort.On the bowling front for Zimbabwe, seamer Tendai Chatara returned the best figures of the innings – and indeed the game – claiming a wicket at either end of the innings, and going at only 5.44 an over.