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Power issues caused the cable car she was on ‘to drop a little bit and swing’

Valkerie Baynes23-Feb-20231:17

Moonda: Big crowd expected at Newlands for Women’s World Cup semi-final

England are targeting a calm performance in their Women’s T20 World Cup semi-final against South Africa on Friday, but opening batter Danni Wyatt’s nerves were frayed in the lead-up during an incident involving a cable car she was travelling in down Table Mountain.Wyatt revealed during a pre-match press conference in Cape Town on Thursday that a cable car she was travelling in while descending the peak on Wednesday afternoon “decided to drop a little bit and swung”.Related

• England have the upper hand but South Africa have home support

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Members of the England Women’s team were queuing for the cable cars, which transport visitors up and down the 1,086m mountain, when they saw one stop on its way up, which Wyatt said had made her “nervous”. It was shortly after Wyatt and Sophia Dunkley had boarded a car to descend that the incident occurred, stemming from a technical problem with a hydraulic back-up motor used to operate the cars when power to the usual electric motor is cut during load shedding. South Africa has been increasingly hit by load shedding, where the power supply is rationed to different areas throughout the day and night because demand outweighs capacity.”Going back down yesterday, there were a few technical issues that made me very nervous before we boarded the cable car,” Wyatt said. “And then it decided to drop a little bit and swung. It was a very terrifying experience. I don’t think I’ll be going up that mountain again anytime soon.”Wyatt said it wasn’t her first visit to Table Mountain, having been there “about seven years ago” but the incident on her latest visit had put her off returning.Danni Wyatt: ‘I’m not going on that cable car ever again. It’s the load shedding, once the electricity goes, that’s it.’•ICC/Getty Images

“I think that’ll be the last time,” she said. “I’m not going on that cable car ever again. It’s the load shedding, once the electricity goes, that’s it. Staying away from it. I’ll take the stairs.”Asked if she screamed, Wyatt replied: “Yes, I did. I think everyone did. Well, literally everyone. A lot of people were shaking.”Wahida Parker, managing director of the Table Mountain Aerial Cableway Company, said: “Table Mountain Cableway Company uses a hydraulic back-up motor during load shedding that replaces the electric motor that operates our cars and their movement. This motor experienced a technical problem on Wednesday, which caused our cars to get stuck on the line.”We adopted two approaches simultaneously to resolve the problem. Our technicians worked to find the fault so that we could get moving as soon as possible, while at the same time, we contacted the City of Cape Town to ask that the power to our area be restored so that we could bring our passengers down safely and quickly.”We pride ourselves on providing visitors with a positive and enjoyable experience, and what happened on Wednesday is not what we aim for. We sincerely regret the experience that passengers had who were stuck in our cars. We are happy to confirm that all the passengers safely reached the upper and lower stations.”

CSA wants players to prioritise immediate international and domestic commitments

Danyal Rasool08-Jan-2022South Africa will not issue NOCs to any centrally contracted players for the Pakistan Super League. Graeme Smith, Cricket South Africa’s Director of Cricket told ESPNcricinfo that the board had opted to prioritise CSA domestic competitions.”It is true that contracted members of the proteas team had their NOCs for the Pakistan Super League refused due to the Proteas international schedule and domestic competitions which must always be prioritised,” Smith said. “With an away tour to New Zealand and a home tour against Bangladesh, our contracted players have to be available for their national team duties first and foremost. The same applies with regard to our domestic franchise tournaments which will be starting up soon.”If and when opportunities in other international T20 tournaments arise and the timings and fixtures do not clash with our own, CSA will happily approve NOCs, as we have always done in the past.”CSA’s decision to bar centrally contracted South African cricketers doesn’t directly affect any players picked up in last month’s PSL draft; Marchant de Lange, Imran Tahir and Rilee Rossouw, the three South Africans part of PSL squads, are not centrally contracted by CSA.However, the replacement draft, due to be held before the start of the PSL, had been relying on the availability of South African cricketers, an option no longer available to the league. The PSL is understood to have been keen on using South African cricketers to bolster their squads, but those hopes have now been dashed.The replacement draft saw the PSL pick primarily local players, with Mohammad Huraira (Islamabad United) and Sahibzada Farhan (Karachi Kings) among the more significant recruits. Multan Sultans picked David Willey, Johnson Charles and Ben Dunk, while Quetta Gladiator’s big-name replacement signing saw Shimron Hetmyer drafted in.Replacement draft picksIslamabad United: Musa Khan, Zahir Khan, Muhammad Huraira
Karachi Kings: Sahibzada Farhan, Jorda Thompson, Muhammad Taha
Lahore Qalandars: Muhammad Imran Randhawa, Aqib Javed, Ben Dunk
Multan Sultans: David Willey, Rizwan Hussain, Johnson Charles and Dominic Drakes
Peshawar Zalmi: Mohammad UmerQuetta Gladiators: Ghulam Mudassar, Luke Wood, Will Smeed, Ali Imran, Shimron Hetmyer

Mark Wood also handed white-ball contract only after limited Test appearances in 2020

Andrew Miller30-Sep-2020Ashley Giles, England’s director of men’s cricket, believes that Jonny Bairstow still has the hunger to regain his Test place, despite his exclusion from the ECB’s list of red-ball contracts for 2020-21.Bairstow, who turned 31 this week, has played just one Test match in the past 12 months, making scores of 1 and 9 against South Africa at Centurion after being called into the team as a late replacement for Ollie Pope, one of the men who has now taken his place on that contracts list.Bairstow had previously been omitted from England’s Test squad to tour New Zealand last November, after averaging 23.77 in a low-key Ashes series – a far cry from his form in the 2016 calendar year, when he amassed 1470 runs at 58.80 in 17 Tests.ALSO READ: Pope, Crawley, Sibley earn maiden Test contractsHe has instead been awarded a white-ball contract, having reaffirmed his status as one of the world’s premier limited-overs batsmen with a series of commanding displays this summer against Ireland, Pakistan and Australia, against whom he scored his tenth ODI hundred in the final match of the season at the Ageas Bowl.With Jos Buttler tightening his grip on the Test wicketkeeper’s role against Pakistan, and with a trio of young batsmen – Pope, Zak Crawley and Dom Sibley – earning their first Test contracts following their recent breakthrough performances, Bairstow’s route back to the Test side is not an easy one, but Giles backed him to fight for his place nonetheless.”He’s taken it as well as you could expect, because it’s hard news to hear, but I hope it leaves him very hungry to continue, and have a really important part to play in the future of English Test cricket,” Giles said. “It’s a knock for him I’m sure. Johnny’s played one Test match in the year, and we only have so many contracts that we can award.”It’s a tough call to make because Jonny has been very good servant for the team, but he remains a really important part of what we do. He’s a white-ball centrally contracted player and one of our most dangerous players in that format, and that hasn’t changed, but we’ll do everything we can to support him getting back into that Test team.Another notable absentee on the Test list is Mark Wood, who appeared to have confirmed his arrival in red-ball cricket when he was named player of the match twice in the space of three overseas Tests last year, following a pair of searingly quick displays in St Lucia and Johannesburg.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

Despite his ability to bowl well in excess of 90mph – a trait which makes him one of their most precious assets in the lead-up to next winter’s Ashes tour – Wood featured in just three Tests all told in the past 12 months, including a solitary outing in England’s defeat against West Indies at the Ageas Bowl in July.And, given the financial constraints being imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic – ones which may yet require England’s players to take a pay cut this year – Giles admitted that there were others ahead of Wood in the pecking order for a contract right now.”He’d certainly be my plans and I’m sure he’s in the selectors’ plans,” Giles said. “The impact Mark Wood has is huge when he’s on the field, but in terms of that pecking order, Sam Curran for example, may be seen as someone who’s in and out of the team, but he’s played eight Test matches, and has also impacted every match when he takes the field.”Wood, like Bairstow, has been handed a white-ball contract, and as Giles noted, that will still enable the ECB to keep a close eye on his form and, most pertinently, his fitness, given the frequency of the injuries that have pockmarked his career.”He plays across formats, he’s still under our umbrella,” Giles said. “He’s a fully white-ball contracted player, so we look after him. And we understand his shock ability. When he’s on form and when he’s on the field we need to look after that, and having him available for an Ashes series is really important to us.”England’s winter itinerary remains up in the air, with no confirmation as yet of any plans for their tours of South Africa, Sri Lanka and India. But with Australia’s Big Bash set to take place in December and January, Giles said that Wood may well be free to play a part in that tournament, in spite of the injury risks.”We’ll treat every case as an individual,” he said. “Ultimately we are his employer and paymasters, but it will be a discussion and collaboration. We want to do what’s best for Mark Wood. It doesn’t make any sense him just sitting on the sidelines all the time when he’s fit, but we need to get that balance and workload right.”One continued area of concern for England is the absence of a contracted Test spinner, especially with tours of the subcontinent looming for England. Despite his recent dip in form, Moeen Ali has retained his white-ball contract, but there’s no place on either list for Jack Leach or Dom Bess, who who have been awarded incremental contracts instead.”It is an area that we still need to work on,” Giles said “Jack and Dom have played important roles for us, and Dom made really good progress this summer, but again there are only so many awards to be made. I hope we see one of those guys develop over this next 12 months again, because I’d love to be offering a full contract to one of our spinners, definitely.”England’s outstanding spinner of the past 12 months, albeit in white-ball cricket only, has been Adil Rashid, who appeared to be fully recovered from the shoulder injury that hampered his impact at the World Cup. He has not played Test cricket for England since the first Test in Barbados in January 2019, which was also his most recent first-class appearance, but Giles admitted England had not ruled out considering him for the challenge of beating India overseas.”Those conversations are always ongoing with the coach and selectors,” he said. “We need to give ourselves options. The challenge of winning in India is a big one – I don’t think anyone’s underestimating that – but the more variation we can have in our attack, the better.”We’re lucky with the impact Adil’s had on white-ball cricket particularly, but I hope he still has the desire, and I’m sure he still has the ability, to have an impact in red-ball cricket as well.”

Australia’s bowlers conceded their highest total in World Cup cricket and their batsmen were unable to bail them out

Alagappan Muthu09-Jun-20191:28

Shikhar Dhawan walks the talk at ICC events

As it happenedThere was a masterclass in batting at The Oval. Shikhar Dhawan overcame a weakness to score 117. Steven Smith showed none as he made 69. Hardik Pandya was pure unfettered power. David Warner fought demons. And Virat Kohli, as always, was method over madness.That the Oval pitch offered nothing to the bowlers dulled the contest a little bit, but India showed immense awareness with the way they paced their innings and for that alone they deserved victory.There was no inkling at the start of the day that Australia would concede 352 – a new low for them in the World Cup.Shikhar Dhawan raises his bat to the crowd as he walks back to the pavilion after his dismissal.•Getty Images

Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins understood that there wasn’t any help for them and so were quick to pull their lengths back and keep a tight line around the off stump, and occasionally resorted to cross-seamers, bouncers and yorkers to surprise the batsmen.For the first seven overs, Dhawan and Rohit Sharma sauntered along at 3.14 per over. Then came Nathan Coulter-Nile. And three boundaries in six balls. India’s victory is owed entirely to their batsmen recognising moments like these. They were like the muscle car revving up in front of the stop light.Dhawan, especially. He had a big bulls-eye on him. A weakness against left-arm pace. And he’d have to deal with one of the best exponents of it in recent times. He’d been lbw to Trent Boult and Mustafizur Rahman in the warm-up games because of his front foot going too far across, but here a simple change – batting on leg stump, and even occasionally outside – helped him stay beside the ball and survive Starc’s menace.There were other obstacles in his way. Namely Cummins. The right-arm quick hurt Dhawan’s left thumb with a bouncer and the batsman kept yanking his bottom hand off his bat every time he was forced to drive. The physio’s magic spray helped but to play through pain for nearly three hours – he didn’t come out to field in the second innings – was a monumental effort. And it came with a fitting reward. A sixth century in ICC tournaments. Of all batsmen from anywhere, only Sourav Ganguly and Sachin Tendulkar have more.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

India did a great many good things in this game. They identified Australia’s fifth bowler (Marcus Stoinis) and their lead spinner (Adam Zampa) as weaknesses and carted them for 112 runs in 13 overs. A lot of that was Hardik’s doing. The score read 220 for 2 when he walked out in the 37th over and the fifth ball he faced went to the boundary. Later, he hit a straight drive so hard that the bowler Coulter-Nile just ducked. It came back to him in the air and cricketers are supposed to catch those but human beings tend not to want their heads knocked off by a piece of leather.ESPNcriinfo’s Forecaster had India reaching 332 at the halfway stage of their innings. Hardik’s 48 off 27 balls straight up lol-ed at data analytics.Amid all this, Kohli scored 82 off 77 balls, his 50th ODI fifty. It was actually a bit of a scratchy innings. His most eye-catching moment was actually when he went up to the Indian fans in the crowd and told them off for calling Smith a “cheater”.The former Australia captain wasn’t around when they won the ODI series in India three months ago and kickstarted a 10-match winning streak, and he was in the mood to make up for lost time. His footwork, especially against spin, was both instinctive and precise. And even when he found himself in a tangle, like when Chahal surprised him with a dipping yorker or Hardik with an lbw-written-all-over-it low full toss – his hands somehow placed the bat at exactly the place it needed to be.Smith made 69, looking in perfect control. Warner, though, looked every bit a batsman still getting used to the rigours of international cricket again. He could have been bowled by Bumrah’s first ball if the zing bails had worked, and went on to play as many as 48 dots. The man’s capable of scoring Test centuries in that time but here he just couldn’t line up India’s bowlers.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

Bhuvneshwar Kumar was the one responsible for that. His control – bowling back of a length but never giving the left-hander room to cut or pull – meant Australia couldn’t get the kind of rapid start that might have made this more of a contest. And when it was threatening to be one as Smith and Glenn Maxwell put on a rip-roaring partnership, he came back to pick up two wickets in two balls in the 40th over to essentially kill the game. Alex Carey whacked the fastest fifty by an Australian in World Cup cricket, but even that couldn’t make up for the early damage.There was debate before the World Cup about Bhuvneshwar’s place in the XI because he doesn’t always bowl upwards of 140 kph and because the white ball doesn’t swing very much. But his value as a death bowler should not be underestimated. Not only does he have the variations necessary – yorkers, bouncers, slower balls – he knows exactly when to use what. To go at five an over and pick up three wickets in a game that yielded 668 runs was sublime work.

The Sri Lanka fast bowler has not joined the Rajasthan Royals squad because of a back complaint, and is set to undergo further tests

Andrew Fidel Fernando09-Apr-2018Fast bowler Dushmantha Chameera is in doubt for Sri Lanka’s Test tour of the West Indies in June, due to a back complaint.He has also been ruled out of at least the first three weeks of the IPL, and remained in Colombo instead of joining the Rajasthan Royals squad. Further medical tests will determine the exact length of his layoff and recovery.”He has had some back stiffness, so we expect it to be three more weeks at least before he can return to bowling,” Sri Lanka chief selector Graeme Labrooy told ESPNcricinfo. “We’ll reassess after that and see where he is.”Initial tests were inconclusive but did not out a stress fracture, the likes of which had kept Chameera out of action for several months in late 2016. The injury was sustained last week during first round of the Super Fours Provincial Tournament – a tournament Chameera will now take no further part in.For Royals, who had bought Chameera at his base price of INR 50 lakhs (approx. USD $77,000), his absence is unlikely to be a major loss, given the presence of other overseas quicks Ben Stokes, Jofra Archer and Ben Laughlin in the squad.If it transpires that Chameera is out of the tour of the West Indies, however, Sri Lanka will go into that series without the pace-bowling firepower they would have liked, with Nuwan Pradeep and Shehan Madushanka also under injury clouds. The first of the three Tests begins on June 6.

Matthew Renshaw has been speaking with Matthew Hayden in his pursuit of success on his first tour of India

Daniel Brettig09-Feb-20171:34

Dravid: Hayden had a hunger to learn

When Matthew Hayden was sweeping his way to a career-defining Test series in India, Matt Renshaw was four years old. Sixteen summers later, Renshaw is grooving a similar method to combat R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja on a tour that could secure his future in the Australian side for many years to come.In keeping with the studious method he has employed to emerge as a highly promising Test-match opener, Renshaw spoke with Hayden more than once before his departure. At Australia’s training camp in Dubai, he has been working on making the most of his left-handedness and considerable reach by sweeping the spinners to distraction.”I think the sweep will be a big one for me,” Renshaw said in Dubai. “I will just try to stay low and use my reach. As a tall bloke, I probably have got that advantage over some of the other guys.”I can get to the turning balls faster than short guys without moving my feet too much, so I’ll try to use that as much to my advantage as possible.”This planning began at the National Cricket Centre in Brisbane before Renshaw’s departure, as he worked on spinning pitches in the nets alongside Steve O’Keefe and the former England spin bowler Monty Panesar. Hayden had sought out a similar environment in 2001 before flying to India.Hayden’s broadest advice to Renshaw was to soak up as much knowledge from the trip that he could, both for use in the series but also for future assignments beyond.Renshaw has scored 315 runs in four Tests, including a top score of 184, at an average of 63.00•Getty Images

“I had a couple of conversations with him [Hayden] over the phone and he’s really good,” Renshaw said. “He has just told me to embrace it over there and get as much experience as I can. I’m 20 years old and going over to play in one of the hardest places in the world. So I will just try to embrace it and enjoy the challenge. You hear certain things from certain players but you never know until you get over there. So looking forward to the challenge.”Other voices in Renshaw’s impressionable ears have included Australia’s batting coach Graeme Hick, who himself made a step forward in his own international career by making his first Test century in India in Mumbai in February 1993, amid an otherwise wretched tour for Graham Gooch’s Englishmen.”Hicky has been really good just trying to get me to stay low and work on different things and keeping it as simple as possible. That’s a big one for me in any cricket really, just keep it simple,” Renshaw said. “It has been really good just trying to work on different plans, just trying to replicate what will happen over there with different plans and different tactics.”As with Hayden and Hick, this will be Renshaw’s first experience of Test cricket in India. While there is some conjecture over whether Renshaw will make way for Shaun Marsh at the top of the order, the younger man is preparing to play – and that includes sparing a few thoughts for the threat of seam and swing in addition to spin.”I love going over to different places and challenging myself and trying to learn different things,” he said. “I watched a bit of the England series and trying to work out what they were trying to do. But we seem to forget they’ve got quick bowlers as well and reverse swing will come into it as well.”Australia play the first of the four Tests against India in Pune on February 23.

Dushmantha Chameera’s bouncers punched massive holes in the New Zealand batting line-up and left Sri Lanka with a great chance of securing a first-innings lead in Hamilton

The Report by Alagappan Muthu18-Dec-2015
Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsFlying high: Dushmantha Chameera was unstoppable in a spell of 6-3-4-3•Getty Images

Test cricket’s thrill escalates with a fast bowler on the prowl and Dushmantha Chameera had his best day in the jungle against New Zealand in Hamilton. His maiden five-for tore through their batting line-up and all that was left was the final wicket pair, staring at a deficit of 60 runs.It was his spell right after lunch that became the fulcrum on which the match spun. Sri Lanka had been in slumber for much of the first session. They took 13.1 overs for 28 runs, and lost three wickets to be bowled out for 292, and then spent the rest of the morning like a lightweight boxer thrown in a heavyweight fight – working within limitations and hoping for a mistake. After lunch, however, Sri Lanka did that thing all underdogs try and do. They punched and punched and punched, and were close to knocking their opponent out.New Zealand lost five wickets for 72 runs in the second session and that slide began once Angelo Mathews woke up to the fact that he had the fastest bowler in the match. Chameera bounced Tom Latham out in minutes. Would the same tactic work against the No. 2-ranked batsman in the world? Yes, Kane Williamson was caught at deep square leg for 1. Would it work against a world-record holder? Ross Taylor, who had struck 290 against Australia last month, bagged a duck. Chameera, with three Tests’ experience behind him, had hustled New Zealand’s in-form batsmen back into the dressing room and 81 for 0 became 89 for 4.BJ Watling and Mitchell Santner did their best to fight, keeping each other company for 19 overs and scoring 40 runs. Both batsmen managed the short ball better, though Sri Lanka helped them by underusing their main threat. They faced only 10 deliveries from Chameera, who was put on ice for 21 overs after tea in addition to a 20-over wait to get his first ball of the match.Perhaps it was a case of injury management. Sri Lanka’s quicks have a history of breaking down, and it may have weighed on Mathews’ mind. Chameera is a case study himself – after making just as startling an impression on Test debut in July, he spent the next few weeks out with a side strain.That was the last thing on anyone’s mind when he bowled seven overs at a stretch before tea, getting the ball around the batsman’s ear, and rarely missed his mark. His fastest delivery of 146 kph came in the sixth over of the spell.By the time Chameera was done, McCullum may well have been nursing a bruised hand considering all the fending he had to do. Taylor and Williamson may be nursing bruised egos, and Latham would have suffered the most pain watching it all from the dressing room because it was his wicket that derailed the innings. He had surveyed the change in field – short leg and leg slip installed close, deep square leg and long leg posted back – and yet the first short ball he got, he tucked it to Dimuth Karunaratne’s hands at leg slip.Martin Guptill had just completed a pretty fifty, but next ball he was caught at slip trying to slog Rangana Herath for a six, when long-on was back.The short-ball attack was continued by Nuwan Pradeep who got McCullum to top edge a hook to the boundary rider at fine leg, but he had overstepped by an inch. Sri Lanka looked to their senior to be their savior again, and Herath had McCullum inside edging to silly point seven balls after his reprieve. Kusal Mendis was the man under the lid, staying low and reaching to his right to claim a sharp catch minutes before tea.Until then the day had gone New Zealand’s way. There were only three Sri Lanka wickets standing when play began half an hour early and the slips were lined up like a shooting gallery, only these targets wanted to be hit. In humid conditions and with the seamers deciding to plant six balls on the same spot, business was booming. Their biggest scalp came within the first half hour.Latham moved to his right to hold on to a low catch and Mathews, who had passed 4000 Test runs, was walking back having added only 14 to his overnight 63. Mathews felt like he had to play Southee’s angle into him from wide of the crease, and though he did so with soft hands, New Zealand’s cordon had moved up since the first day when one catch fell short of Taylor at first slip.Another reminder of the first day occurred when a Neil Wagner bouncer struck Suranga Lakmal’s right shoulder and then dropped onto the base of middle stump. Again the bails did not fall, but it didn’t cost New Zealand much. Wagner tried the short ball again and Lakmal fended a catch to gully. Bracewell, as he had done in Dunedin, picked up the last wicket of the Sri Lanka innings.New Zealand’s openers began steadily in their 81-run stand. With the sun beating down on a glorious day in Hamilton, the sideways movement was diminished. Guptill and Latham spent the first nine overs working that out – 19 runs, with only three fours. Having sussed the conditions, the openers took 42 runs off the next 11 overs, with nine fours and two sixes.The bounce and pace in the pitch, however, was outstanding. So Sri Lanka simply set their tearaway loose.

You can be hero and villain on the same night. Ask Amit Mishra and Ashish Reddy

The Report by Sidharth Monga25-Apr-2013
Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
One more stump for picket fence in the backyard•BCCI

You can be hero and villain on the same night. Ask Amit Mishra and Ashish Reddy. Reddy scored a whirlwind 36 off 16 balls to help Sunrisers Hyderabad get 59 off the last four overs and give them something to bowl at. Mishra kept them alive with the wickets of Michael Hussey, M Vijay and Suresh Raina. However, Mishra, promoted to No.5, wasted 21 balls for just 15 runs, and dropped MS Dhoni even before he had opened the account. Reddy was given the last over to bowl with 15 to defend, and a now-rampaging Dhoni to face. Reddy completely froze, and bowled the most predictable slower balls imaginable for Dhoni to win it easily.Spared villainy was Dwayne Bravo who bowled length in the final overs to allow Reddy those runs, but more crucially batted like a rabbit in the headlights, manufacturing – as the IPL’s wont has been – a thriller out of nowhere. He played out a maiden from Karan Sharma – who registered this IPL’s most economical four-over figures of 0 for 8 – in the 16th over. Then he holed out on the bowling of Ishant Sharma for a near game-changing 7 off 16.The man who well and truly snatched heroism from villainy was Dhoni. He too began dozily, playing six dots before he top-edged Dale Steyn to long leg where Mishra missed him. How Dhoni made Sunrisers pay for it. Firstly, after Bravo’s maiden left Super Kings needing 46 off last four, Dhoni hit two sensational and consecutive pulled sixes off Steyn, who at times bowled at close to 150 kph. One over midwicket, and the other dragged from wide outside off to clear long-on. This was brutal hitting against the best bowler in the world.Bravo, though, turned it around again, and Sunrisers went to Steyn to bowl the 19th over with 27 runs to play with. Dhoni played another calculated over. Steyn bowled with third man and fine leg up to defend areas down the ground. Dhoni dabbed the first past short fine leg for two, and square-drove the second over point for four. The third one he slogged over deep midwicket. This was the first time Steyn was hit for three sixes in an IPL innings, and only the second time in any Twenty20 game.Steyn came back, though, with Ravindra Jadeja’s wicket, and left Super Kings needing 15 to win off the last over. Darren Sammy, the IPL debutant, was the only man who had bowled earlier on the night and had an over to go. Cameron White, though, went to Reddy. Perhaps he was thinking if this was Reddy’s evening, it might be his night too. It wasn’t.Reddy began with a back-of-the-hand slower ball that was almost off the pitch. He ran up again, and tried the same slower ball again. Dhoni missed, but it was not as though he had not picked it. Reddy had got lucky Dhoni didn’t connect. Reddy, though, tried it again, and Dhoni smacked it clean out of the ground. Eight off four now. Reddy was clearly nervous. He tried the normal yorker now, and missed his line by feet. Five wides. Hang on. Dhoni admits to having touched it. So three off four now becomes four off three. Dhoni pulled the next slower ball to beat long-on and bring the win that put Super Kings level with Royal Challengers Bangalore at the top of the table.Watching all this, Shikhar Dhawan would be wondering whatever happened to what should have been a special Sunrisers debut for him. He came out from a month in the cold storage, braved a blow in the unmentionables, scored a fifty to give Sunrisers a total to bowl at, but ended as a footnote on a night Dhoni went from 0 off 6 to 67 off 37.

AB de Villiers and Saurabh Tiwary hit 24 off the final over, bowled by Nehra, to pull off an improbable win, Royal Challengers Bangalore’s first in four games

The Report by Abhishek Purohit17-Apr-2012
Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsAB de Villiers played a match-winning cameo, together with Saurabh Tiwary•AFP

Chris Gayle was going at around a run a ball against some tight bowling. Then he calmly decided to shift gears. The bowling ceased to matter; five consecutive sixes came against the bowler with one of the best economy-rates in the IPL, Rahul Sharma. Treating that Rahul over as an aberration, Pune Warriors responded with more tight bowling, with Ashish Nehra yorking Gayle. But AB de Villiers and Saurabh Tiwary hit 24 off the final over, bowled by Nehra, to pull off an improbable win, Royal Challengers Bangalore’s first in four games.For more than three-quarters of the game, the Royal Challengers had played catch-up to the Warriors. After Robin Uthappa’s 69 took the visitors to 182, they had kept the Royal Challengers, and Gayle, in check for 12 overs. Gayle and Virat Kohli, game-changers both, had crawled along in a partnership of 30 in 35 deliveries. The asking-rate had ballooned to over 13, with 111 needed from 50. It claimed Kohli, who found deep point as he tried to hit out.Kohli’s dismissal fired up Gayle, who was on 37 off 35 then. Rahul bowled short, he bowled full, he went around the stumps, he went wide of the crease, he went wide of Gayle. To no avail. Five consecutive sixes later, the asking-rate was down by more than a couple of runs.Warriors were stunned but they recovered quickly. Ashok Dinda, battling a painful side strain, conceded just 12 in two overs, including seven off the penultimate one with Royal Challengers needing 28 from 12. In between, Nehra had, for once, found the perfect yorker to send Gayle back for 81 off 48.De Villiers and Tiwary kept the Royal Challengers in the hunt, hitting a six each to take 16 off the 18th over bowled by Angelo Mathews. Dinda’s final over, the19th, seemed to have left Royal Challengers too much to get in the 20th over – 21.De Villiers scrambled outside off to play the scoop off the second delivery in the final over, arming it past the wicketkeeper for four. Nehra delivered a low full toss and a length ball next. De Villiers smoked one straight down the ground for six; the next one was scooped nervelessly for another six over fine leg. With three needed off the last ball, Tiwary swung a length ball over the long-on boundary even as the rain came pouring down. Marlon Samuels, who had gone for under three an over, had two overs left.Somehow, the Royal Challengers’ batsmen had delivered after their bowlers had once again conceded a substantial score. Uthappa did most of the scoring with a power-packed half-century at the top of the order with Jesse Ryder and Samuels chipping in with smaller contributions.The opening partnership between Uthappa and Ryder was worth 63 in seven overs. By then, Uthappa was in complete control. He timed three consecutive reverse-sweeps off Dilshan, with two of them beating short third man. He was put down by KP Appanna at long-off, a tough diving chance off Vinay Kumar in the 12th over but departed in the next as he sliced Daniel Vettori to point. The Warriors went at the same rate of around nine an over after Uthappa’s dismissal with Samuels smashing the spinners for a couple of sixes. As it turned out, though, even 13 an over wasn’t enough to deny Gayle, De Villiers and Tiwary.

Former ICC chief Malcolm Speed says the Associate nations’ lock-out for the 2015 World Cup is “insular and backward-looking”

Daniel Brettig06-Apr-2011The ICC’s decision to stage the 2015 World Cup without any provision for Associate members smacks of “insular, backward-looking” attitudes among the game’s custodians, former chief Malcolm Speed has said.The scaling down of the tournament to a 10-team event in 2015, in Australia and New Zealand, without so much as a qualifying tournament for smaller nations, has been met with plenty of opposition. The saddest element of the decision, said Speed, was simply that it reflected a persistent retreat from global gains made earlier in the 21st century.”I don’t have a problem with the 10-team World Cup. I think other formats have been tried and haven’t worked, but I do have a problem with the 10 teams qualifying automatically,” Speed told . “I would’ve preferred a system where the last two full-member countries in the one-day rankings are challenged by the top two Associate members, but it seems that’s not going to happen.”It’s consistent with the thinking I saw at the executive board towards the end of my tenure, but certainly not with the thinking earlier in my time, when there was a much broader view of the future of world cricket.”Self-interest is a powerful force at any meeting of nations, as Speed discovered to his detriment when his time as CEO was terminated in 2008. While making it clear there were useful voices at work on the ICC executive, Speed said that they did not, in this instance, speak loudest. “The decision strikes me as an insular, parochial decision that just perpetuates the 10 full-member countries, who are actually full members because they are Test-playing countries.”They’re not full members because they’re ODI-playing countries, they are chosen because they can sustain Test cricket. But other countries are then excluded from the major one-day tournament, so I think it’s a very insular, backward-looking decision.”Speed has just published his memoirs, , in which he discusses the politics of World Cups and the mixed blessing of India’s dominant position as the unrivalled financial leviathan of the game. “It’s the major operational benefit for the game, but it’s also the major governance threat,” he said of India’s power. “It’s the sort of opportunity any other sport would gladly welcome, as has cricket, but it brings with it some serious difficulties.”