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Group C
ScorecardSouth Africa scraped their way into the Super League by the narrowest of margins with a one-wicket win against England at Chittagong. England, though, still made it through as winners of Group C.South Africa had to win the match to qualify and they looked in control after bowling England out for 189. But they made hard work of the run chase, and it needed a nervy 20-run last wicket stand between Keagan Africa and Waylain September to secure the victory.Six different South African bowlers picked up wickets as Steven Davies, Man of the Match against Nepal, was the only batsman to reach 50. He was bowled for 63 after adding 83 with Ravi Bopara. England then lost their last six wickets for only 31 runs.The South Africa reply was anchored by opener Vaughn van Jaarsveld, who scored 76 to pave the way for Africa and Craig Alexander to edge the side to victory.Russell Domingo, South Africa’s coach, was relieved with the outcome. “The bowling and fielding departments are performing to expectations but our batting remains weak,” said Domingo. “The team’s performance will have to improve during the next phase of the tournament.”The result meant that South Africa and England will play in the Super League while Nepal – who beat South Africa two days ago – and Uganda go into the Plate Championship.

Cricket Australia has denied that the Australian government has put pressure on it to cancel Australia’s forthcoming tour to Zimbabwe. In a media release, James Sutherland, CA’s chief executive, emphasised that the decision of whether or not to tour Zimbabwe will not depend on what the government feels on the matter.”We welcome the government’s consistent position that the decision is ours to make,” said Sutherland. “Our long-standing position is that we are cricketers, and our visits have no other symbolism than that.” CA and the Australian Cricketers’ Association are due to visit Zimbabwe to assess the levels of security there, and Sutherland insisted that a decision to tour would be taken solely on the basis of that.”We are aware of the difficult situation in Zimbabwe, just as we are aware that there are diverse political, social and economic issues in other countries we visit,” he said.Earlier in the day, Alexander Downer, Australia’s foreign minister, had said in an interview to 3AW, a commercial radio station in Melbourne, that going ahead with the tour would “send the wrong message” to Zimbabwe.”We’d rather it didn’t go ahead, obviously the Zimbabwe government would be pleased if it did,” he said. “It would send the wrong message to Zimbabwe and to southern Africa, that oh well, we are not too happy with President Mugabe but it’s not that bad and, you know, the games can go on. I think frankly that’s a bit of a pity.”

Scorecard

Bangladesh enjoyed a third consecutive day of ideal acclimatization at Fenner’s. First, their 18-year-old seamer, Shahadat Hossain, bowled himself into contention for the first Test at Lord’s with figures of 4 for 33, and then, with a lead of 143, all five of Bangladesh’s top-order enjoyed valuable time in the middle, as the match petered out to a draw.After resuming on their overnight 190 for 5, Luke Parker and Josh Knappett extended their sixth-wicket stand to 134, before Parker was caught behind for 65 off Mashrafe Mortaza. That signalled the end of British Universities’ resistance, as Shadahat – the quickest of Bangladesh’s bowlers – got stuck into the tail. The final five wickets tumbled for 22, with Shahadat removing both Amit Suman and Monty Panesar for ducks.With more than two sessions of the day still remaining, the Bangladeshis could have contemplated a shot at a morale-boosting victory, but that was never in their gameplan. Javed Omar, fresh from a career-best 167 in the first innings, put his head down for a solid 39 and Nafees Iqbal chipped in with 46 – a breezier innings from a flashier player, but a mature performance nonetheless.Shahriar Nafees, the young left-handed opener who is seen as an outside bet for the Tests, then made an important half-century to atone for his first-innings duck, and shared in an 80-run stand with his captain, Habibul Bashar, whose 75 from 86 balls was the most authoritative innings of the day.Shahriar was run out shortly after completing his fifty, but before the close, there was just time for Rajin Saleh to familiarise himself with the conditions, as he finished unbeaten on 30. Bangladesh now travel down to Hove for the second of their three three-day warm-ups, with their spirits high and runs and wickets in the bank.

As Steve Harmison lurches into his latest crisis following an insipid performance in Hamilton, Allan Donald, the man who last summer was charged with trying to coax him into action, has revealed Harmison came to him and admitted he was ‘scared’.Donald was England’s bowling coach during the 2007 season but turned down the full-time position so that he could spend more time with his family and has joined Warwickshire as their bowling coach. The moment when Harmison opened up came at Old Trafford during the third Test against West Indies after he’d struggled to hit the cut strip.”He needed confidence,” Donald told the . “He needed to feel appreciated. I’ve never seen a cricketer as low as he was. He came off the field in the Test at Old Trafford and told me he was scared. It was so sad.”From his low point in the first innings at Old Trafford, Harmison did manage to regain some composure with an improved performance on the final day and in the fourth Test on his home ground at Chester-le-Street. However, just as he was finding some confidence another injury came along and he missed the rest of the summer. He has continued to suffered fitness issues, especially with his back, during the winter tours of Sri Lanka and New Zealand.Harmison’s fate is now in the hands of Ottis Gibson after Donald opted against a full-time role. “To be honest with you, I wouldn’t have taken the England job even if this role at Warwickshire hadn’t come up,” Donald said. “Working with the England team was fantastic. I thoroughly enjoyed it and feel I made a positive impact. And, I have to say, the ECB were brilliant. They are a highly professional organisation and, in many ways, everything about the job was great.”But I’ve been on the road for years. At some stage you have to put the family first. I want to see my children grow up.”

Inzamam-ul Haq, the Pakistan captain, today described Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s batting as “murderous” and reckoned that he was a player to be watched out for in the 2007 World Cup.The Indian wicketkeeper-batsman scored 219 runs in four innings at a stupendous strike rate of 137 in the just-conclude five-match ODI series, propelling him to number three in the latest ICC rankings among ODI batsmen. “He is [also] safe behind the wickets and can be compared with Adam Gilchrist though the Australian has proved himself as the best after years in commission”, Inzamam told PTI at Lahore.Despite the 4-1 loss to India, Inzamam believed that the Pakistan team has greatly improved over the past two years. “When India came here in 2004, our boys were young and inexperienced. They have since played a lot of cricket in other countries that has given them experience and confidence,” he said.He said that the atmosphere in the Pakistani dressing room too had definitely improved. “When you have confidence the atmosphere in the dressing room also improves”, he added. On venting frustrations in the field, he said, “I control my anger. If someone drops a catch and I get angry, will that catch come back to us? It won’t. Therefore it is better to be cool because that helps in better performance.”Looking back on the series, Inzamam said that India’s batting was undoubtedly their strength. On Suresh Raina, he said: “I did not get a chance to see him because the Indian top order did not let the pressure come on to Raina and the later batsmen. But I always believe that only the best players are picked to represent their countries and therefore Raina must be a good cricketer who will improve with every game. But consistency is the key and it applies to both, Raina as well as the selectors.” He felt Irfan Pathan was fast blossoming into the allrounder India so desperately needed to strike the right balance in one-day cricket.India’s bowlers, though, were quite inexperienced, he added. He also strongly backed Sachin Tendulkar. “He has shown by the way he batted that he is not on the decline. In my view, he is good enough for another four or five years.”He rated Tendulkar as one of the five best batsmen in the world along with Rahul Dravid, Ricky Ponting, Jacques Kallis and Brian Lara. On his own place in the pecking order – with an average of nearly 52 after 107 Tests and about 40 in 356 ODIs – he shrugged it off with a typically nonchalant, “Oh, Inzamam comes way behind them”.

The government of India has banned cricketers and other sports stars from displaying the national flag on any of their sporting equipments. The federal home ministry cited the Flag code of India which mentions that the tricolour should not be used on costumes or embroidered on cushions, handkerchiefs and dress material.The government decree has left many bemused including Sunil Dutt, India’s sports minister. “I personally feel the cricketers should use the tricolour as the national flag,” he told AFP. “It acts as a morale-booster. But I have to follow orders. It is the home ministry which takes decisions with regard to issues involving use of the national flag.”The announcement means that Sourav Ganguly will have to go without his usual pair of gloves with streaks of saffron, white and green. Sachin Tendulkar will also not be able to sport his helmet with the tricolour embossed in front. Tendulkar and Ganguly have agreed to follow any instructions from the government. Bishan Bedi, the former Indian captain, also backed the move and said, “The national flag is most important and should be duly respected. You can’t put the helmet with the India flag alongside your shoes. I don’t see it as a motivation tool, national pride or patriotism. It’s all in the heart.”But Yuvraj Singh could’t hide his disappointment. “I take great pride in playing with the national flag on the helmet,” he said. “It’s a different feeling altogether.”

Cricket writer Peter Robinson has died at his home in Johannesburg at the age of 54. He had been suffering from cancer.Robinson was sports editor of The Citizen at the time of his death, and he had previously worked for The Star, The Sunday Independent, Sports Day, This Day, and the Natal Witness. He was also the South African editor of Cricinfo for a number of years.”Robbo was a naturally gifted writer, someone for whom the words just flowed,” former colleague Guy Hawthorne told news24.com. “He was a superb columnist and many of his offerings reduced the sub-editors at This Day to either fits of laughter or tears of sorrow. He loved his job and his passion for writing was evident in the many excellent articles he produced.”

India’s busy season after the World Cup kicks off with a short tour of Bangladesh as the Bangladesh Cricket Board released the itinerary, comprising two Tests and three one-dayers.Should India qualify for the World Cup final on April 28, they have a breather for just eight days before the the scheduled departure for Dhaka on May 7. The one-day series commences on May 10 at the Sher-e-Bangla Stadium in Dhaka, followed by the second match, at the same venue on May 12. Chittagong will host the third one-dayer three days later.India will stay back in Chittaong for the first Test from May 18 and will head back to Dhaka for the final Test, starting May 25. India last toured Bangladesh in 2004, winning the Test series 2-0 and the one-dayers 2-1. The reciprocal tour, however, is yet to happen.ItineraryMay 7 Arrival in Dhaka
May 10 1st ODI, Dhaka
May 12 2nd ODI, Dhaka
May 15 3rd ODI, Chittagong
May 18-22 1st Test, Chittagong
May 25-29 2nd Test, Dhaka

Deb K Das with his report on the USACA’s EGM and what it achieved – or didn’t achieveOf the two season-ending events in US cricket from which a great deal had been expected, the Interstate Tournament at Brian Piccolo Park in Florida ended with a decided bang, and the Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) called by the USA Cricket Association (USACA) the following week hardly rated a whimper.Much had been expected from the EGM on December 10 in Dallas. For one thing, it was supposed to formalize the end of the protracted conflict between the USACA and the Council of League Presidents that had brought US cricket to a standstill for nearly a year. A final agreement on holding a new USACA election was to have been achieved, and a complete redraft of the much-criticized constitution was to have been set in motion. The gag orders on all parties were to be lifted, and the websites of the USACA and CLP were to be free to operate and were to resume the communications that had been rudely interrupted by the legal disputes. In other words, this was to be new beginning for the USACA, and a chance to convince a sceptical ICC that the USACA was on a new and constructive course.US cricketers, too, had been making clear that there were questions it wanted answered, and issues they wanted USACA to address. What was the present status of the USA within the ICC; was it an Associate Member, an Affiliate Member or neither? If the USA was an Associate Member, why had the ICC failed to schedule the USA in any events for the next two years? What plans did the USACA have to be re-instated into ICC’s good graces? With no ICC money coming into the US, would the USACA now raise the dues of individuals or clubs in order to stay solvent? US cricketers wanted straight answers to these questions, and hoped these would be addressed at the EGM.There were also questions on other matters, which had been raised directly with USACA leadership. What action would the USACA take on two proposals: one concerning mainstreaming of US cricket and the other on changing dues payments from a per-club to a per-member basis, which had been formally prepared and presented to USACA leadership? Also, how and when would USACA initiate exploratory discussions with Major League Cricket (MLC) for cooperation in the interests of US cricket, and would it also actively disavow all efforts to sabotage, undermine or otherwise denigrate MLC’s policies and programs? Clearly US cricketers had been looking for specific answers to all these questions, and the EGM looked like a likely place to find them.The first warning signs that all was not well with the EGM came with the fact that there was no mention of such a meeting on the USACA’s own website, and only a brief reference on the CLP’s. Only Cricinfo carried a story on the EGM, and that too over a month after it was supposed to have been decided upon.As just about everyone in US cricket knew, a USACA EGM is not easy to hold; it requires that at least 15% of the membership from across the USA be represented in person at the meeting, which would mean that given the USACA’s registered membership, 30 to 40 representatives of member clubs would have to be present in Dallas to secure a quorum. In the only two previous EGMs held in the past five years, there had been concerted efforts to get clubs to send representatives, and three to four times the numbers needed had shown up at the meeting. This time, there seems to have been no such effort; USACA leadership simply sat back and waited to see who would show up in Dallas.The full extent of the shortfall was not known until Vinod Shankar, an observer who had produced the first independent review of the MLC Interstate tournament, produced a similar one for the EGM. Until then, neither the USACA nor the CLP had seen fit to issue any kind of report. According to Shankar’s tally, there were 17 persons (including him) at the EGM in Dallas. Three were USACA officers; six were Board members (one short of the number needed to have a board quorum); five were present and former officers, and current members, of the North Texas Cricket Association that was hosting the conference; one and possibly two were from the neighboring cricket league at Houston. There was not a single other USACA member club representative from anywhere else in the USA. Far from not being able to achieve a quorum, the EGM had scored a big fat zero. And though some USACA supporters were bitter in blaming member clubs for their absolute apathy, the blame really needs to be placed squarely on USACA leadership for totally failing to persuade their members of the importance of the Dallas meeting.Under the circumstances, those present in Dallas decided to make the best of it, and conducted an open-ended discussion. Gladstone Dainty talked about focusing USACA’s energies on youth (non immigrant) cricket development, put the past behind, and work towards the development of cricket in the United States. The meeting minutes of the previous AGM were unavailable, as the secretary was not in attendance. Caesar explained that the chanelling of Project USA funds to Gary Hopkins through a separate USACA account had led to some problems that the auditors were currently working with USACA to sort out. Dainty said that all tournament dates would be announced by Jan 15 for the 2006 calendar year, so that different leagues could prepare accordingly.Lu Rehman, a vice-president, said there were no funds to host all these youth tournaments that were being proposed. Laks Sampath, a North West Regional Director, challenged Rehman to come up with some accomplishments in the next two months towards cricket development. There was talk about forming a constitution committee. A deadline for completing the task of having a new website in place was set by Dainty as January 31, 2006. Dainty also declared that any player could play in any tournament (MLC, ProCricket etc) in the United States and that would not harm that player’s chances of playing in Regional Championships or to represent USACA in ICC events.An interesting point did emerge during the discussions. It seems that even though both the CLP and USACA execs had reached an amicable agreement and had sorted out their differences, no statements were issued to the press or the ICC because they were still waiting for people to sign off on the lawsuit before they could issue that statement. It was decided to get this signed off as soon as possible so that “the curtain could be closed on USACA’s darkest hour”Some USACA supporters take a Pollyanna-ish attitude towards these deliberations, and declare that this was proof that USACA was at last beginning to move in the right direction. I find it difficult to share that optimism. For one thing, none of the issues raised by US cricketers appears to have been addressed, let alone resolved. Even the Under-19 team preparations were not brought up. And the revelation that even the agreement between CLP and USACA on ending their disputes has not been acted upon because it is waiting on the disputants to sign off on it is somewhere between outrageous and unbelievable. If this is the way that the USACA is going to run its own business, it is no wonder that people are losing any hope that the USACA will ever be able to get its house in order — now, or at any other time.

Pakistan have begun a race against time to set up a world-class cricket stadium in Islamabad by 2008, when the country is due to host the ICC Champions Trophy for the first time.A PCB official told `The News’ that a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) would soon be signed with the Capital Development Authority (CDA) for the allocation of land to build the proposed stadium.”We have a couple of major tournaments to host in the coming years and would like to add to the existing cricket facilities,” said Saleem Altaf, Director of Cricket Operations, PCB.Pakistan are due to stage the biennial Champions Trophy in 2008 and will be the co-hosts for the 2011 World Cup with India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.Altaf conceded it will be a race against time if Pakistan want to have the facility in Islamabad ready ahead of the Champions Trophy. “But it is a possibility,” he said, adding the PCB would make efforts to hasten the process.The PCB is presently waiting for a physical possession of a piece of land which it is to get from the CDA. “Once we get the physical possession then the actual work can begin,” he said.Altaf said the PCB would start issuing tenders for the construction of the stadium once it gets possession of the land in Islamabad. “We hope if everything goes according to the schedule, the stadium would be ready by the end of next year.”Pakistan might extract some aspects from the design of a cricket stadium being built in the Dubai Sports City while finalising its own blueprint for the proposed stadium in Islamabad. The stadium in Dubai, once completed, is expected to be counted among the best cricket facilities in the world.Islamabad does not have a cricket stadium of international standard. Test and ODIs are, however, regularly played in its twin city Rawalpindi. But the Rawalpindi stadium is not controlled by the PCB, as it has to hire the facility from the local authorities.The PCB, in fact, has the administrative control of just two Test venues — the Gaddafi Stadium (Lahore) and the National Stadium (Karachi).Cricinfo adds:The PCB, as part of their preparations, are planning to bring the administration of stadiums in Faisalabad, Multan and Rawalpindi – all venues for 2011 – under their control. In addition, as reported recently, the Niaz Stadium in Hyderabad – once an venue of Tests and ODIs – is also coming under the supervision of the PCB.At a recent press conference. Shaharyar Khan, chairman PCB, said, “Our preparations for the World Cup have to begin in earnest from now and one of the first things we must accomplish is gaining control of stadiums in Faisalabad, Multan and Rawalpindi. We need to bring these stadiums up to international standards and at the moment they aren’t. But I will impress upon the government that these stadiums need to be in our control for them to be upgraded to the requisite standard.”