A standout debut first-class season. Big bucks at the IPL auction. Rising star of the IPL. It was turning out to be a fairytale ride for Shreyas Iyer. But then came the India A outings at home against Australia A, South Africa A and Bangladesh A, which put the brakes on Iyer’s ride and gave him a reality check.Not once in his six innings in the four unofficial Tests did Iyer pass 50, getting out twice on 49. But once he did eventually bring up a half-century, against Punjab on the first day, Iyer was at ease. “It was really important for me to cross 50, which happened yesterday only, and I was quite relaxed after that,” he said.Once his primary objective had been achieved, it was all about enjoying himself. Iyer tonked the Punjab bowlers at will to convert his first fifty of the season into his maiden double-hundred in first-class cricket. “I wanted to stay not out throughout, play session by session and not think about big score straightaway. Glad that I could actually execute that.”It wasn’t as if Iyer had lost touch during the India A series. Only once in those six innings did he get out early in his innings. In the remaining five knocks, he got starts but failed to capitalise. “What was going wrong was actually I was playing too much shots, erratic shots. Now am playing on the merits, respecting good balls.”During the last month ahead of Mumbai’s Ranji season, Iyer worked with his coach Pravin Amre on building an innings. In fact, for a player of Iyer’s abilities – someone who can find gaps at will – concentrating for longer periods of time was the key to converting starts into big knocks. For that, he started visualising more often.”Visualisation is the only thing I added [to my game],” he said. “I imagined that I am going to the ground, I am taking strike, which all bowlers I might be facing. I knew that these are the four bowlers they might be playing, so I visualised accordingly. I didn’t visualise that Yuvraj [Singh] would be bowling, that’s why I got out to him.”He might have been dismissed by Yuvraj, but a ruffle of the hair from the Punjab captain was a nod to a young career that has risen steadily over the last year.

When Wally Edwards first joined the Australian Cricket Board 19 years ago, its 14 directors squabbled frequently as representatives of their states, and were Balkanised even in their seating positions around the board table.

Challenge is to drive more people to the game, says Peever

David Peever, the new Cricket Australia chairman, felt it was important to drive forward the slew of recent changes in order to take the game to more people within the country.
“This is a key time for Australian cricket. A lot of significant change has occurred for the better on and off the field,” he said. “But in an ever changing world, I believe we have to work harder than ever before to maintain cricket’s privileged place as the Australia’s traditional summer pastime.
“For me, top of that list is encouraging more people to play the game. That means engaging young people, females and Australians of all of our nation’s diverse cultural backgrounds. I am keen that South Asian and other overseas-born fans who packed Australia’s grounds during the recent World Cup are able to maintain their passion for cricket as part of their adopted Australian lifestyles.”

“It was completely compartmentalised,” Edwards said. “I can almost remember where everyone sat. And it was state versus state basically, and a matter of how much you can take off the table. My job as a West Australian delegate was to get as much cash as I could back to WA.”It definitely wasn’t good for cricket when you look back on it. It was completely dysfunctional – it was hardly a board in that regard. You didn’t sit there and say ‘what’s best, let’s debate it and work out the best way forward’, it was more ‘we think they can operate on a $1 million less than that so we’ll all take a bit of money back’.”We kept the squeeze on management, and if they came up with a good idea that cost money that would definitely be voted out!”On Thursday at Cricket Australia’s AGM, Edwards signed off as chairman and left behind him a board of nine independent directors, chosen on basis of skills and compatibility to further the interests of Australian cricket in a unified manner. Edwards joined Sir Donald Bradman as the only chairmen to have played Test cricket, but no single figure in the history of the board has presided over more significant changes to the way the game is run.The chief executive, James Sutherland, knows this better than anyone. He reflected on the hoops management once had to go through. “Under the previous governance model it was frustrating and difficult,” he said.”The way I like to talk about it is when you had a proposal to put up it was always compromised by your thinking about how the voting would go, and who would like that and who would like this.”Instead of putting the optimal recommendation, you would put a compromise recommendation that kept everyone happy. Even when it came to debate it would get further compromise. But it was a progression over time.”In his farewell remarks, Edwards reserved a special tribute to the former Cricket Victoria chairman, Geoff Tamblyn, as a key figure in helping to usher through those reforms.He also observed that his predecessor Jack Clarke had been the man to commission the governance review that resulted in change. Asked to pay tribute to Edwards, fellow board director Tony Harrison said his chairmanship meant that in Australian cricket “parochialism is not quite dead, but it’s terminally ill”.Relations between board directors have improved notably, but so too has the link between the board and management. The independent director, Kevin Roberts, has stepped down to join CA’s management team, an unprecedented move that places him in line to succeed Sutherland whenever the CEO chooses to finish up.CA’s balance sheet was shown to be in rare good health, not least as a result of a season that featured a Test tour by India and also the wildly successful 2015 World Cup, which Edwards had no little pride in declaring “the best ever” and featured 20 sellouts among its 49 matches.Revenue for the year totalled Aus $380.9 million, resulting in a surplus of Aus $99 million for CA after its annual distribution to the six states. Of this, $60 million will be set aside for long-term, strategic investment. As the board’s CFO Kate Banozic put it, “there is a lot of money in the bank right now”.Of course the cycle of global tours means there needs to be – this summer’s tourists New Zealand and West Indies will not turn in anything like the same cash as visits by India – and Edwards is hopeful that his legacy will feature better cricket played by more nations around the world to ensure the financial reliance on Indian tours is lessened. He remains defiant about ICC reforms that have been heavily criticised by the documentary ‘Death of a Gentleman.’But as of Thursday night, such concerns are no longer those of Edwards, who noted the significance of the man replacing him. David Peever, the former managing director for Rio Tinto in Australia, will be the first CA chairman not to have risen through the ranks of state and national boards.Due in large part to the CA board reforms of the past five years, Edwards was able to say of Peever that “success is assured, it’s just a matter of how much”.

Neil McKenzie will join South Africa’s support staff as a batting consultant following his retirement from cricket nine days ago. McKenzie is currently playing in the Masters Champions League (MCL) and will discuss the details of his contract on his return from the UAE.”Yes I have accepted the position but will catch up with details when I get back,” McKenzie told ESPNcricinfo. It is understood his first assignment will be with the Twenty20 squad in preparation for the World T20 in India next month.Although Cricket South Africa is yet to confirm McKenzie’s appointment, at least one senior batsman is pleased the former international is involved. “I’d be happy with that, Neil was one of the’ names in the hat from what I hear. I played a lot with Neil, and I have very good memories of that,” Hashim Amla said ahead of the third ODI against England in Centurion. “He was an excellent batter, great cricketing brain. If he’s the guy who’s joining us, that would be fantastic. I’m sure he would be [pleased] as well, to be part of the South African team again.”McKenzie will become the fifth batting consultant in Russell Domingo’s tenure, which began in mid-2013 when the latter succeeded Gary Kirsten. At that time, Kirsten was signed on a 50-days-a-year deal with CSA, which ended in 2015. For the World Cup, South Africa employed the services of former Australia batsman Michael Hussey, who was also with them during the T20s in India late last year. Hussey could not stay on for the Tests, which is when South Africa’s batting problems began. They did not manage a single century in the four Tests and put on a top score of 214, which they matched when they returned home for the Boxing Day Test against England.In preparation for that match in Durban, Lance Klusener was roped in to work specifically with the lower order, even though the batting woes began at the top. Klusener, who is head coach at the South African franchise, Dolphins, was only involved for a couple of days and if he had any impact, it was negligible. Following the Durban defeat, and in the aftermath of harsh criticism, South Africa brought in former captain Graeme Smith, whom Amla believed would assist them throughout the rest of the series. Smith was also commentating for Test Match Special and SuperSport, and the conflict meant he only spent one net session with the team.South Africa did not have any other batting coach through the England series but after the final match, which they won, Domingo divulged that they had been trying to sign someone for months. “We’ve been looking for somebody and we’ve got somebody in mind. We are waiting for him to commit to us. We’ve had a few people who said they were interested but they wouldn’t commit to it simply because traveling is not that fun when you are away from your family for a long time, and when there is a lot of pressure and a lot of criticism you are faced with when things don’t go well,” he said.Whether that person was McKenzie is not known. McKenzie had been playing for Lions in their List A competition, after retiring from first-class cricket at the end of last season and then retired from all domestic cricket last week when he traveled to the MCL. He played 58 Tests, 64 ODIs and 2 T20Is for South Africa. His overall career spanned two decades with 280 first-class games, 298 List A matches and 155 T20s.

The one day series between the New Zealand and England is taking theappearance of one of those tales that old cricketers tell: the same story alittle more exaggerated each time. It goes like this. England bat first,fail to make enough of a score, New Zealand knock them off.Given that this pattern was already apparent England’s decision to bat onwinning the toss was a surprise. Their team was unchanged from the defeat atAuckland on Thursday. New Zealand replaced Katrina Keenan with Helen Watson.The first overs of the England innings set the pattern for what followed.The bowling was tight, the batting cautious. Only ten runs came from thefirst nine overs for the loss of Connor, lbw to one that nipped back off theseam from Rachel Pullar. Since being handed the poisoned chalice of theEngland captaincy in mid tour Connor has scored only 24 runs in fourinternationals.The other opener, Claire Taylor, had scored only four by the thirteenth overwhen frustration overcame her. Attempting a cross bat swipe off Ramel, shespooned a catch to Campbell at mid on.Charlotte Edwards timed the ball well until her leg stump was removed by aTiffen delivery that came in from the off when she was on 11. She was notthe last England player to be playing back when the slowness and movement ofthe pitch suggested that she would be better off on the front foot.Nicky Shaw cover drove the first boundary of the innings in the sixteenthover, following it with another straight away, before becoming as becalmedas the rest of the top order. Shaw fell in an unfortunate manner, treadingon her stumps in the process of pulling Emily Drumm.That Drumm (two previous overs in the series) chose to put herself on asearly as the twenty first over showed that with the series already won shewas going to take the chance to experiment. Her leg breaks were sometimeseccentric of line but claimed a second victim when Debbie Hockley took afine catch, turning and diving full length at silly point off the bat andpad of Laura Newton.Kathryn Leng was the only English batsman to try to take the game to the NewZealand bowlers, but those who were more cautious might say that it got herout, as Pullar caught a hard hit drive off her own bowling.Jane Cassar had come in at the fall of the third wicket. With Reynard andHolden out quickly and the score on 78-8 it was up to her to use up theovers and to take England to the outer edges of respectability. She did thiswell, producing the best batting of the innings, placing the ball well tokeep the score moving. Clare Taylor provided excellent support, the pairputting on 38 for the ninth wicket, the best partnership of the innings.Rachel Pullar was the pick of the bowlers, her brisk, testing seam bowlingearning figures of 10-2-15-3. Seven bowlers were used, though any five wouldhave got the job done. Catherine Campbell delivered a miserly eight overs ofoff spin for 12 runs, though none of the English batsmen thought of goingdown the pitch to her.The New Zealand fielding matched the bowling effort, a particularly goodexample being set by Hockley and Campbell, the two (how shall we put it?)most experienced members of the side.Though there was movement off the pitch for both spinners and seamers,especially from the town end, the England total was well below par for thefourth time in a row.The New Zealand batting set about its task with all the aggression andconfidence that England’s had lacked. As with the Australian men chasing asimilarly small total in Auckland yesterday, the approach was at times a bittoo cavalier, and wickets fell.Though England’s bowling was not as consistently accurate as New Zealand’sthere was enough evidence to suggest that if they ever get to bowl first orhave a decent total to play with they will pose a few problems. LucyPearson, the left arm opening bowler, got the ball swinging into the righthander and claimed two victims. Payne was lbw shuffling across while Drummfollowed a ball down legside to be caught behind.Dawn Holden, a slow left armer on her first tour, also impressed, bowlingwith a nice loop and considerable accuracy. She got Pulford stumped, luredinto the charge.With Rebecca Rolls (who had been promoted to open) also gone the Kiwis were53-4 and by no means home and hosed. This brought together Kathryn Ramel andHaidee Tiffen who had each taken two wickets with accurate medium pacebowling earlier. They now put on 63 for the fifth wicket with good shotselection, placement and running. Tiffen looks a fine young cricketer. Witha few more performances like this she can change her first name to Hadlee.Ramel was out just before the end, bowled by Shaw, who had earlier bowled aneleven ball over.New Zealand won by five wickets with sixteen and a half overs to spare.Seeing them for the first time this season, the impression is of acompetent, self-disciplined, well led team who will challenge Australiastrongly for the World Cup on home ground in Christchurch later this year.If England’s sponsors happen to read this, they should rest assured that theEngland team is determined, hard working and with an outwardly good spirit.It is also clear that they are chronically short of confidence, especiallywith bat in hand. Two key players, Collyer and Redfern, should return tostrengthen the side for the World Cup. Hard work is needed in theforthcoming series against South Africa.With New Zealand leading four-nil the final game in the series takes placeunder the lights in Napier on Tuesday.

A most accomplished batting performance by Middlesex, led by a splendidinnings from their captain Justin Langer, set a target which appeared far toodaunting for Nottinghamshire in this third round NatWest Trophy clash whichgave Middlesex an effortless victory by 128 runs.Langer, who has hit two centuries and had a score of 96 in the countychampionship this season, scored his first hundred in limited-overs matchesand was supported superbly along the way by the elegant Owais Shah and AndrewStrauss who chose to hit his highest score in One-Day cricket on his debutNatWest match.The three batsmen dominated the game during their time at the crease and madethe Nottinghamshire bowling look quite innocuous.At no stage during their brief reply, which lasted as few as 37 overs, didNottinghamshire’ s batsmen appear to be in control of the task that lay aheador, indeed, even look comfortable against an attack that gave very littleaway.Veteran pace bowler, Angus Fraser, who struck the early blows for Middlesex,finished his first spell of seven overs with 2 for 19 and was not required tocontinue with his good work later as Aaron Laraman with his medium pace hadaccounted for four wickets for 39.Nottinghamshire’s innings, which totalled only 146, never appeared to stage arecovery after losing 4 for 48 and whatever little hope they might have heldof putting up a reasonable reply, disappeared after the 31 run stand betweenChris Read and Usman Afzaal who were both run out in succession, Afzaal topscoring with 31. Read had gone first with 13 and having dropped two catchesearlier, in Middlesex’s innings, did not have a good match. It will not havebeen a good week for him, having also been excluded from the England One-Daysquad in the forthcoming International series.Earlier, Langer seemed to have done everything right to give his side a greatstart. Having called correctly at the toss, he decided to make first use of afine batting pitch and then featured in two excellent partnerships.Having lost Mark Ramprakash in only the third over, Langer and Strauss begana stand which dominated the Nottinghamshire bowling from the start. Langergot off the mark with a boundary to fine leg and Strauss pulled Paul Franksfor four, having also opened his account earlier with a boundary, off AndrewHarris.Despite the overcast conditions which prevailed for most of the morningsession, Nottinghamshire’s pace bowlers were unable to get any significantball movement that would cause much concern to either batsman. Harris hadconceded 25 runs in his first four overs and Chris Tolley who replaced himwas unfortunate to have Langer, on 15, dropped by Read behind the stumps offhis first ball.That was the only chance that the left-handed Australian was to give in hisentire innings during which he faced 126 balls. Runs came quickly, theyreached 53 from as many balls. The first ten overs had gone for 57 and atthat point the second bowling change took place. Paul Reiffel, who arrived inthe country two days ago from Australia as a replacement for the county’sinjured fast bowler, Shoaib Akhtar, was brought on for his first bowl forNottinghamshire.During his spell of ten overs for 52, without a wicket, there were signs thathe will take, not surprisingly, a little time to acclimatize and settle. Hisfirst spell of five overs had conceded 21, the same as Paul Franks whom, hehad replaced.Meanwhile runs were coming freely to Middlesex. Strauss reached 40 with apull off Reiffel after Langer had driven him to the extra-cover boundary. Thehundred was up from 126 balls and Strauss reached his first fifty inlimited-overs cricket for his county, from 73 balls.Langer reached his fifty in style, lifting Harris for six over mid-on andflicking the next delivery to the fine-leg boundary. The scoring rate rapidlyincreased with both batsmen going neck and neck, on 56, when Strauss fell toa catch at backward point off left-arm spinner Richard Stemp.The next partnership between Langer and Shah proved even more damaging toNottinghamshire with Shah forming an excellent understanding with Langer forrunning between the wickets. The two hundred of the innings came in the 39th.over, it’s the first time this season that Middlesex has reached this figurein One-Day matches.It took only 101 balls for the hundred of the partnership to come up andLanger’s century had taken 128 balls. He had hit six boundaries and a six offHarris who had later been hit for two more sixes by Keith Dutch.Finally, with the total on 235, Langer was run out, going for a second run,to the non-strikers end. One run later Shah, was stumped, just one short ofhis fifty which came from only 53 balls and was another entertaining knock inthe Middlesex innings of 274.

Loots Bosman and Deon Kruis combined to play Griquas right back into contention on the third day of their SuperSport Series match against the North West Dragons at De Beers Oval.Bosman’s maiden first-class century and four wickets in succession for Kruis left the match situation intriguingly poised with one day’s play remaining.The Dragons will resume their second innings on 142 for six – an overall lead of 171 – and with both sides harbouring hopes of recording their first win of the campaign.Bosman’s innings had begun on Saturday with his side deep in trouble at 68 for four as he strode to the wicket. That quickly became 115 for seven as wickets tumbled around the unflappable number six.He resumed an unbroken 40-run partnership for the eighth wicket with Zahir Abrahim on Sunday and the pair added a 51 before the latter was caught at the wicket having made 57. He was the fifth victim for Mark Levine.Craig Tatton followed almost instantly, but then Bosman found another willing partner in number 11 Wayne Kidwell who made ten of a last wicket partnership of 73 before he was run out.Bosman upped the tempo with Kidwell, striking four sixes and ten fours in a five-hour stay, finally reaching three figures after falling just four runs short in his debut season against Free State in 1997/98.The Dragons built positively on their 29-run first innings lead, openers Andrew Lawson and Hendrik de Vos putting on 52 for the first wicket before De Vos was caught and bowled by Tatton.A second half century partnership – this time for the third wicket – between Lawson and Glen Hewitt (39) took the Dragons to 115 for two before Deon Kruis returned to the attack to take four wickets in the space of 25 runs to bowl Griquas right back into the match.He sent back both the partners and then followed up by trapping Levine and Craig Light lbw with the score on 140 to leave the game teetering on a knife edge.

Maharshtra by virtue of their first innings lead picked up five pointsin their Under-16 Vijay Merchant trophy match against Baroda at theMotibaug Palace Ground on Monday.The hosts had to be content withthree points as the match ended in a draw.Earlier, Baroda won the toss and decided to bat first. The openersgave a decent start scoring 56 runs off 12 overs. Most of the batsmenmade good starts but failed to convert it into long innings. R Solankiwas the top scorer with 84 off 141 balls laced with 14 hits to thefence. Baroda were bowled out for 263 in 90.1 overs. S Agarkar pickedup five for 80. Aditya Sharma picked up two for 21.In reply, Maharashtra batted cautiously. Openers S Puranik (38) andAditya Sharma (16) put on 62 runs off 35.2 overs. C Suryavanshi and SGaikwad added a 102 run partnership for the third wicket off 29 overs.Suryavanshi topscored with 68 off 126 balls, with eight boundaries. SChavan chipped in with a useful 58 off 116 balls, hitting nine to thefence. A Bochare, Y Pathan and J Naikwade picked up three wickets eachfor 50, 68 and 73 runs respectively. Maharashtra were bowled out for308 in 118.3 overs.In the second innings, Baroda declared at 238 for two off 64 overssetting Maharashtra a target of 283. R Solanki continued his good formscoring an unbeaten 114 off 197 balls, hitting 18 boundaries. YusufPathan was unbeaten on 50 off 48 balls with eight hits to the fence.Opener R Patel chipped in with 63 off 134 balls. Maharshtra battedthe day for 33 overs ending the day at 92 for two.

Railways earned two points from a six wicket victory over Rajasthan in the Ranji One-Day Central Zone League tournament at Karnail Singh Stadium, Delhi on Wednesday.Railways won the toss and put Rajasthan in to bat. Rajasthan had an early setback losing both openers for 18 runs. The batsmen never recovered from the blow and lost wickets at regular intervals before succumbing to 170 all out in 49.5 overs. RJ Kanwat (35), Gagan Khoda (33) and Sanjeev Sharma (33) hung around but could not hold the innings together. TP Singh and Zakir Hussian ran through the lineup picking up three wickets each for 23 and 36 runs respectively.In reply, Opener Amit Pagnis made a fluent 80 off 84 deliveries, studded with seven hits to the fence. TP Singh made a quickfire 34 off 22 balls with five boundaries. Railways scored the 172 in 32.1 overs. RJ Kanwat bagged three wickets for 47.

Pakistan “A” has replied with 192 for 8 on the second day of 4-day unofficial test against Sri Lanka “A” at Rangiri Dambulla International Stadium on Thursday.Hasan Raza, with fighting unbeaten knock of 89, kept the visitors’ innings together. Misbah scored 40 and Yasir Arafat with 17, who was last man out, Paskistan was struggling to avert the first innings lead to home team.


Khalid Butt
Media Manager
14 June 2001

With some diligent batting in the final session, Sussex reached 301 for nine on the first day of their Cricinfo Championship match against Middlesex at Lord’s.The 56-run stand between Michael Yardy and Matthew Prior for the sixth wicket, in an hour and a half, may not have provided much entertainment, but it helped to give some solidity to the innings.The partnership ended with James Hewitt bowling Yardy for 46, compiled with some application, from 133 balls and three runs later, in his next over, Hewitt uprooted Prior’s middle stump. His 28 was also slow, coming in 97 minutes and it took Sussex to 251 for seven.With Mark Davis’ quick scoring the total went to 282 for eight and finally, with the second new ball, Angus Fraser took the ninth wicket on 294.Sussex, in the first hour after lunch, had lost two wickets when Phil Tufnell was brought into the attack. In his third over he had Chris Adams top-edging to slip and ten overs later he was fortunate to see a shot from Bastiaan Zuiderent hit Michael Roseberry at silly mid-off and rebound to the wicket-keeper for a catch. Sussex were 142 for three and Tufnell had taken two wickets for twelve.Just as Murray Goodwin and Yardy were consolidating the innings with a 50-run stand, off-spinner Paul Weekes struck twice with successive balls. Goodwin’s solid knock of 69 which spanned four and a quarter hours, ended as he pushed forward and missed. He had hit eight fours from the 185 balls.Weekes then had Umer Rashid caught at slip and half of the Sussex wickets had gone for 192.Earlier, having decided to bat first, Sussex seemed to be going well with 46 on the board when Middlesex claimed their first wicket this morning. Hewitt, having replaced Tim Bloomfield, whose five overs went for 25, got one to move away slightly from Richard Montgomerie to have him caught behind for 22.Bowling in overcast conditions and on a pitch with a little grass on it, Middlesex had no further success before lunch which was taken on 113 for one.Adams was in excellent form, reaching a sparkling half-century in the penultimate over before the break. It came from just 49 balls and included eight boundaries.Along with Goodwin, he kept the scoreboard moving with fine strokeplay, although the shot of the morning came from Goodwin when he square-cut Richard Hutton for four to reach 34.The hundred came from 161 balls, the second fifty was much quicker from only 65. But with Adams’ dismissal after lunch the more cautious Goodwin had slowed the scoring. After being down to 220 for five at tea, Sussex added 81 in the last session, losing four further wickets. Hewitt finished with three for 59.