ESPNcricinfo picks the highlights of the third round of the Ranji Trophy 2010-11

Abhishek Purohit22-Nov-2010The collapse
Eighty-seven runs needed with eight wickets in hand, Yusuf Pathan at the crease and Ambati Rayudu to follow. Baroda were overwhelming favourites to win at home against Uttar Pradesh, and were looking to consolidate their pole position in Group B of the Super League. Four Sudeep Tyagi deliveries later, half the Baroda side was back in the pavilion, including Rayudu for a first-ball duck. Yusuf gritted his teeth, but continued to play in the only gear he possesses, the top one. Tyagi removed Baroda captain Pinal Shah. Yusuf blazed away to 49 off 39 deliveries, slamming four sixes along the way. Thirty-three needed with four wickets standing. Bhuvneshwar Kumar took over from Tyagi, and got the big fish, Yusuf. Now Baroda were rudderless, and two more batsmen fell in the same over. Tyagi was not to be outdone, though, and got the last man with the first ball of the next over. Baroda had lost four wickets in six balls with no addition to the total. Uttar Pradesh had won by 32 runs, after conceding a 119-run first-innings lead.The near collapse
Forty-eight runs needed with eight wickets in hand. With Wasim Jaffer and Ajinkya Rahane at the crease, Mumbai were all set for their first outright win of this season, against Railways. The veteran Railway bowlers, Murali Kartik and JP Yadav, combined to dismantle the line-up. Jaffer sent in left-hand batsman Iqbal Abdulla to counter Kartik’s left-arm spin. Abdulla lasted ten balls before Kartik got him. Kartik struck again in his next over. Yadav compounded Mumbai’s woes by getting two more wickets in successive overs, and suddenly Mumbai were thinking about a draw, with only 15 runs to get. That man Rohit Sharma, who usually squanders away starts, batted doggedly for once, to ensure Mumbai wouldn’t meet Baroda’s fate. His unbeaten 31 took the defending champions home in the penultimate over.The marathon
When Laxmi Shukla and Wriddhiman Saha hit personal-best scores in a 417-run stand – the third-highest for the sixth-wicket in first-class cricket – at Eden Gardens, Bengal felt confident enough to declare on 562 against Assam late on the second day. The visitors’ openers responded with a 150-run stand, and former India batsman S Sriram took Assam to 293 for 3 on the third evening. After Sriram fell with the score on 386, Tarjinder Singh and Gokul Sharma added 176 to take Assam past Bengal late on the second evening. 1150 runs scored and 13 bowlers used to take 12 wickets in four days. Did anyone say it’s a batsman’s game? Anyone was right.The defiance
You don’t concede a 368-run lead in a four-day game and escape with a draw, unless maybe you have conspired with the weather Gods. But Gujarat managed it all on their own at the Feroz Shah Kotla, against Delhi. After having lasted 23.4 overs on the first morning to make 71, they defended for 774 deliveries in the second innings, down to the last man. Opener Priyank Panchal led the way with his maiden first-class hundred, and No. 8 Rohit Dahiya, the debutant medium-pacer, defied Gujarat for 135 minutes to make 2 runs in 109 balls, with a strike rate lower than Chris Martin’s Test batting average. To round off the defiance, No. 11 Ishwar Choudhary survived the last five deliveries of the match, as Delhi got three points while chasing six for the innings win.The milestone
That man Sunil Joshi refuses to fade away. He completed the Ranji double of 4000 runs and 400 wickets – and also the first-class double of 5000 runs and 500 wickets – against Haryana. At 40 and in his 19th first-class season, he still remains a force in the Karnataka side. “One fine day I’ll have to go,” he told the . “I’m not going to be playing forever. The day I’m convinced that someone has come to the fore, I will step away.” What did he think of the double? “We don’t play to have these records, they are just incidental. But in saying that, it does give you some satisfaction at the end of the day.”The queer selection
Vikrant Yeligati, the offspinner, had played his first and only first-class game in September 2007. Last season, he was in the list of domestic bowlers with suspect actions, and had to spend time at the National Cricket Academy. Mumbai included him as the third spinner against Railways along with Ramesh Powar, another offspinner, and left-arm spinner Iqbal Abdulla. He bowled only four overs in the match, all in the first innings, going for 26 runs in Railways’ 201. According to a report in the , Mumbai were warned by match officials to avoid bowling him in the second innings because of his action. On a pitch where seamers took 19 wickets, the selection of the almost-absent third spinner was queer, to say the least.

As a versatile, thinking bowler who doesn’t rely on pace for his wickets, and, more importantly, as the fast bowling captain and coach of the team, Zaheer Khan transforms India’s attack from average to potent

Sidharth Monga at Kingsmead27-Dec-2010How much of a difference can Zaheer Khan make? Bowling off 13 paces, not much faster than 130kph, he was joining a pack of bowlers who’d lacked purpose and direction in Centurion, conceding five an over, taking four wickets in 130.1 overs, bowling India out of the game. Zaheer is a good bowler all right, they said, including the former South Africa greats. But how much of a difference can he make to this seemingly hopeless attack?Perhaps they have not seen Zaheer operate in far less helpful conditions, using the rare combination of skill and that shrewd bowling brain. Perhaps they don’t realise that along with Dale Steyn, he is the only current Test bowler to have mastered all three balls – Kookaburra, SG and Duke. Perhaps, most importantly, they haven’t noticed how Zaheer is much more to this team than just a bowler; he is the bowling captain and coach too.The other Indian fast bowlers shine here and there, but they are more like the bully kids in the neighbourhood who come out of their house only when they know daddy is watching over them. Daddy wasn’t watching over them in Centurion. Zaheer might have taken only three wickets today, one of them bowled off the edge of the thigh pad, but he was the captain in the field. When Sreesanth was struggling in his first spell, Zaheer was making gestures all the way from fine leg. And Zaheer’s gestures are the ones that work with Sreesanth and Ishant Sharma. He understands their bowling, and they respect him.By the time Sreesanth came back for his second spell, from Zaheer’s end, the bowling captain was at mid-off, putting an arm around Sreesanth as he painstakingly – after many rituals – marked his run. Zaheer was trying to coax a better delivery out of him, a better delivery he knows Sreesanth is capable of. Sure enough it arrived, a peach to take out AB de Villiers at the stroke of lunch.However, those gestures did not work on Sreesanth in the first spell. He made it as difficult as he could for Zaheer to create breakthroughs, giving away 16 runs in his first two overs, releasing any pressure that the senior partner was creating. Alviro Petersen too did his bit, playing five and four deliveries each in Zaheer’s first two overs, and keeping Graeme Smith away from him,.Turned out they were just taking their time to authenticate the travellers’ cheque that Smith seems to have become for Zaheer. The cheque was duly encashed. Of the five balls that he bowled to Smith, two swung away and one seamed in towards him. He has now taken out Smith 10 times in 21 international innings. In the battle between opening bowler and opening batsman, that is a huge edge. That is the hallmark of a special bowler; once he sees a batsman’s weakness, he preys on it, technically and psychologically. Ask his former India captain Sourav Ganguly, whom he removed four times in two domestic finals in 20005-06 and 2006-07, for three ducks and a 90.Zaheer also showed that the general criticism leveled against the Indian attack – the lack of pace – isn’t really significant. He barely ambled in, and bowled in the early 130s. Everything he did was part of a plan. Most instructive was the over to Hashim Amla, after the latter had got off to a good start. Zaheer bowled two deliveries wide of off, angling away, and then came the inswinger. It missed the edge, but created doubt.Yes, there was some luck involved in how he bowled Petersen, but he had troubled the batsman before too, getting a thick edge with the second ball of the innings, and then beating him more than once with the inswing. That, and the Jacques Kallis run-out, was just the stroke of luck India needed on what has largely been a luckless tour. And then Zaheer owned Ashwell Prince, both with the swing away from him and the seam in.Ishant and Harbhajan Singh, for a change, had circumspect batsmen to bowl at. Harbhajan responded exceptionally on a fast bowler’s pitch, in addition to holding a difficult catch at fine leg. He loved the bounce, and the unsure batsmen, and out came the long-shelved doosra too. Amla’s was the big wicket, and three other quick ones followed. However, Harbhajan, who took one more wicket than Zaheer did, gave the returning seamer his due.”In the last press conference I had mentioned that other people can definitely do the job, and I will stick to those words,” he said. “But obviously Zaheer is an experienced guy, and whenever he plays, he plays a major role in the bowling department. It’s great to see how he approaches each game and takes crucial wickets. He has been outstanding. Not just taking wickets, he helps other bowlers also to take wickets. He is the man.”The opposition felt the same way too. When asked what difference he saw in the side that could manage just four wickets in the first Test, de Villiers’ immediate response was: “They got Zaheer back into the attack. He’s a world-class bowler, and put us under pressure from the word go.”Again, how much of a difference can Zaheer make?

MS Dhoni showed his penchant for a run-chase yet again, while the middle order soaked up pressure quite superbly with two decisive stands

S Rajesh02-Apr-2011At two wickets down for 31, chasing a target of 275 in a World Cup final, it all seemed to be headed in Sri Lanka’s direction. In all ODIs since 2000, a first-innings total of 270 or more had been a winning score 394 times, while only 100 times had it been chased down. Add to that the pressures of the occasion – only twice in nine previous finals had the team batting second won a World Cup final, plus no side had ever lost their first wicket without a run on the board – and there was no doubt about which team held the whip at that stage.That’s when India’s middle order stepped up, with a couple of stunning partnerships that completely turned the run-chase around. Virat Kohli and Gautam Gambhir’s 83-run partnership consumed only 15.3 overs and resurrected India’s innings, while the Gambhir-MS Dhoni stand more or less sealed the deal, adding an outstanding 109 off 19.4 overs to ensure the highest sucessful run-chase in a World Cup final.The highlight of both those partnerships was the manner in which the batsmen soaked up the pressure, kept the risks to a minimum, and yet scored their runs at an excellent rate. In the third-wicket stand, Gambhir and Kohli scored only 32 out of 83 runs in fours and yet scored at 5.35 runs per over. Gambhir and Dhoni were even better, scoring 32 out of 109 in fours, yet achieving a run-rate of 5.54.Going into this innings, Dhoni’s performances with the bat had been disappointing, but there were no half-measures about the way he batted today. He showed, once again, his ability to excel in a run-chase: in 81 innings when he has batted second, Dhoni averaged 50.92, with 19 fifties and two hundreds. Among batsmen who’ve scored at least 2500 runs batting second, only Michael Bevan has a higher average.Of the 91 runs he scored, more than half – 48 – came in the region between point and mid-off, several of them through back-foot punches off the spinners. Muttiah Muralitharan went for 22 off 22 balls, while Suraj Randiv conceded 14 off 15, as Dhoni repeatedly made room and played against the spin, carving the ball through cover and extra cover.The other key contribution came from Gambhir, who clearly relishes playing Sri Lanka. Four of his nine ODI hundreds have come against them, and he almost made it a fifth with a superbly paced 97. One of the key tasks he accomplished was playing out Muralitharan and Lasith Malinga: 42 out of the 122 balls he faced were from them, and though he scored only 28 from those deliveries, he did his job by playing out a fair number.

Overall, there was little to choose between the Sri Lankan and Indian innings. India played seven fewer dots, but one of the impressive aspects of the Indian chase was the fact that they ran 24 twos, which shows the intent and aggression in the team during the chase.

The win meant that, for the first time in a World Cup final, a centurion ended up in the losing team. Clive Lloyd, Viv Richards, Aravinda de Silva, Ricky Ponting and Adam Gilchrist had all scored hundreds in winning causes, but Mahela Jayawardene’s sublime 103 not out wasn’t enough to seal the win for Sri Lanka. None of that was Jayawardene’s fault, though, as he crafted a magnificent knock, scoring at at least a run a ball against each of the Indian bowlers. Zaheer Khan, so incisive in his opening spell, was taken apart by Jayawardene, who scored 23 from 14 balls off Zaheer.The flawless manner in which Jayawardene batted made it look as if he was batting on another pitch. A comparison of his innings’ stats with those of the other Sri Lankan batsmen illustrate the gulf: Jayawardene didn’t score off less than 32% of the deliveries he faced; for the rest of his team, that percentage was more than 56.This was also the first of Jayawardene’s 14 ODI hundreds which ended in defeat. Considering how classy the knock was, it probably deserved a better result.

By turning to other sports for inspiration and ideas, the board may be diluting cricket rather than enriching it. Why not get help from other cricketing nations?

Daniel Brettig04-Apr-2011As Michael Clarke marked his first day after his appointment as Australian Test captain with an appeal to reapply cricket’s fundamentals, his board’s national talent manager, Greg Chappell, and a quartet of minions were returning home from a trip to Boston and Texas to watch baseball and American football.This unfortunately timed mission was not billed as a holiday or an exercise in wish fulfillment. Instead it was trumpeted by Cricket Australia as a “reconnaissance exercise” designed to “explore best practice being used by two world-leading organisations, covering areas such as recruitment strategies, list management, player preparation, opposition analysis and team culture”. The exhaustive-sounding brief seemed to address areas that must be fine-tuned by administrators if they wish to hurry on the next generation, and at a time when cricket is bleeding talent to football, Australian Rules and general apathy at an alarming rate.Yet the fact that five senior officials would find the time to disappear to the United States before the season had actually ended said rather too much about the thinking of an organisation that still believes it does cricket coaching and management better than anywhere else in the world. It is a notion that has persisted despite a pronounced slide down the rankings at international level, and a noticeable drop in the standards of domestic cricket.Internal appointments are common – national coach Tim Nielsen, talent manager Chappell and new Centre of Excellence coach Troy Cooley have played their own version of musical chairs with management positions in recent years – and it would not surprise to see another promotion from within the ranks to replace Cooley as Australia’s pace bowling coach.Whoever is chosen, they are likely to be taken in by fashionable thinking about the value of other sports as a source of knowledge and ideas for the greater development of cricket. The American trip is of a kind commonly made by many sporting coaches in the early 21st century, as AFL mentors venture to London for primers on the ways of the English Premier League and rugby league bosses check in with the NFL for tips on kicking and injury treatment. A culture of cross pollination extends to the poaching of staff from one sport to another – fitness manager Darren Burgess jumped from Port Adelaide to Liverpool FC via the Socceroos.While this all sounds quite enlightened, it is arguable cricket in Australia is being diluted, rather than enriched, by ideas from outside the game. Clarke certainly would appear to think so, having this to say when asked on a national current affairs program what needed fixing in the Australian team: “To start, it’s about me being able to do things my way. The advantage is, after these three one-dayers in Bangladesh we have a couple of months at home where we can, as a group, Cricket Australia, selectors, board members, Shane Watson and myself, sit down and make a plan to build to the future. But the things that come to mind straight away are, I love the Australian cricket team playing that entertaining brand of cricket. I think it’s really important that we go back to some of the old-fashioned style basics of cricket, where we get better at our basic batting, bowling and fielding, which is going to mean doing more of it at training. These days in cricket there’s a lot of technology, there’s a lot of sports science, which I think is a big part of our game, but I think with a young group we need to get better at the basics.”

“I love the Australian cricket team playing that entertaining brand of cricket. I think it’s really important that we go back to some of the old-fashioned style basics of cricket, where we get better at our basic batting, bowling and fielding”Michael’s Clarke’s view of the way forward for Australia

Twenty20’s emergence is the highest-profile departure from said basics, but there are others ranging from the variance of opinions on how to manage the bodies of young fast bowlers to the fact that three of Cricket Australia’s highest office bearers – chief executive James Sutherland, head of cricket operations Michael Brown and head of marketing Mike McKenna – each cut their administrative teeth, with decidedly mixed results, in the AFL. Sutherland, Brown and McKenna are all commonly heard to spout the buzzwords about “world’s best practice”, “the pathway” and “development”, while advocating a wide search across all sports for the best of everything. Their apparently high-minded intentions, however, are clearly being lost when it comes to the results of the Australian team, and this is where pride in the country’s coaching system has become dangerous.Help is more readily sought from other sports than it is from other nations playing the same game. The only foreign-born mentor with the Australian team is the fielding coach, Mike Young, who has parlayed his long and decorated baseball career into a lengthy cricket tenure. But there is nary an Englishman, Pakistani, Indian, Sri Lankan or Kiwi in sight. Often an Australian coach will try his luck overseas if opportunity is scarce at home, a path trodden by Cooley and more recently David Saker with England. But there are precious few to have been welcomed in Australia from overseas backgrounds in coaching or development – brief stints with New South Wales for Waqar Younis and Graham Thorpe aside. The appointment of former South African coach Mickey Arthur to manage Western Australia was a welcome deviation from the trend.Much can be learned from the ways of other nations, particularly those who bore the brunt of Australia’s dominance between 1995 and 2008. Given their inability to tie down the hyperactive genius of Shane Warne for any protracted period, Cricket Australia’s eyes had to be cast across the seas for a quality spin bowling coach. Bishan Bedi and Saqlain Mushtaq worked wonders for Jason Krejza and Nathan Hauritz at various times, but their roles were confined to those of one-off consultants. On his last visit to India, Hauritz bemoaned his inability to see Erapalli Prasanna. At the same time Mushtaq Ahmed was helping Graeme Swann maintain the form of his breakout summer, something Hauritz was unable to do while taking advice from Ricky Ponting and the Centre of Excellence spin coach John Davison. An attempt to attract Muttiah Muralitharan to Brisbane for this year’s intake was unsuccessful, but would it have been different with the offer of longer-term employment?Spin bowling is just one of many disciplines unique to cricket, and all the research trips in the world to the Boston Red Sox will not improve Australia’s increasingly tenuous understanding of its subtleties.

A few key numbers from the first phase of World Cup 2011

S Rajesh22-Mar-2011An all-time high run-rate
The average runs scored per over so far is 5.07, which is the highest so far among the ten World Cups. The 2007 tournament is next with 4.95, which means this could be the first World Cup with a five-plus run-rate.The weaker nations have obviously been involved in a lot of matches in this tournament due to its format, but while their batting has brought down the overall run-rate, their bowling has boosted it. In the 16 matches in which the nine Test-playing teams have played each other, the average run-rate has been 5.12, which is marginally higher than the overall tournament run-rate.Also, there’ve been 20 centuries scored so far, which equals the 2007 tally, and is only one short of the record total of 21 hundreds which were scored in the 2003 edition.In terms of 300-plus scores, this World Cup has already broken the earlier record: there have been 17 so far, while there were only 16 in 2007. The difference, though, is the lack of the really high scores: in 2007, there were eight scores of more than 340; this time, there have been only three.Of the 17 scores of 300 or more, only six have come against the top teams, and Ireland’s outstanding chase of England’s 327 is the only instance of a lesser team scoring more than 300 against a top side.

Competitive or one-sided?
With so many games involving the weaker teams, it was inevitable that many games would be one-sided, and so it has been in the first phase of the World Cup. Of the 41 games that have produced results, 24 have been decided by a margin of more than 75 runs, or by five or more wickets with 30 or more deliveries to spare. Of those 24 games, 16 have involved the weaker teams.A tale of three countries
The pitch in Chennai hasn’t been batsman-friendly, but most of the other venues in India have seen good batting conditions, with the result that the overall run-rate in matches played in India is 5.22, which is well clear of the rates in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. The rate in Bangladesh suffers also due to the two abject collapses by the home team, who were bowled out for 58 and 78 by West Indies and South Africa. Out of the 20 centuries scored in the World Cup, 14 have been scored in the 26 matches in India – an average of 1.86 matches per hundred. In Sri Lanka the average is 2.50 matches per hundred, while it’s three in Bangladesh.In terms of grounds, the top five run-rates all belong to Indian venues, with Pallekele and Hambantota occupying the next two spots.

The toss factor
Out of the 42 matches so far, 22 have been won by the team batting first and 18 by the side chasing (one match was washed out and one was tied). In 30 day-night games, 15 were won by the team batting first, and 13 by the team chasing. Also, of the 40 games which produced a decisive winner, exactly 20 were won by the team which won the toss. In the 16 matches involving the top nine teams, though, ten were won by the team which won the toss, while only four times did a team win the toss and lose the game. (One match was tied, and one washed out.)The teams batting first also have a much higher run-rate, with 80% of the centuries being scored by them. The four batsmen to score centuries in run-chases so far in the tournament are AB de Villiers, Andrew Strauss, Paul Stirling, and Kevin O’Brien.

The dreaded batting Powerplay
It’s the five-over period that’s come in for the most discussion in this World Cup, so here are the batting Powerplay numbers. The overall run-rate in these Powerplays is 7.89, while the average runs per wicket is almost 22. That converts into a five-over score of almost 40 runs, for the loss of nearly two wickets.

New Zealand have the highest run-rate of all teams, and they also made the most runs in a single batting Powerplay, scoring 74 against Canada. The second-best effort was Pakistan’s 70 against Kenya. England have lost the most wickets, followed by India.

Starting with spin
It’s been done in one-day internationals from time to time, but never as often as in this World Cup. Dipak Patel and New Zealand made the headlines for using that tactic so successfully in 1992, but thereafter it was used sparingly: only once in 1999, three times in 2003, and never in 2007. In this World Cup, though, a spinner has opened the bowling – ie, bowled one of the first two overs – 26 times in 83 innings, which is almost once every three innings.The team which has used this tactic most often is one from whom you’d have never expected it a couple of decades back. West Indies have opened the bowling with Sulieman Benn in each of their six matches, even against India on a bouncy track in Chennai which cried out for two fast bowlers to exploit it. Zimbabwe have started with Ray Price five times – they opened with two fast bowlers against Sri Lanka – but the team which has used this tactic most successfully is South Africa. Johan Botha got rid of Chris Gayle in their first match of the tournament, and Robin Peterson went one better, dismissing both Andrew Strauss and Kevin Pietersen in his first over.Out of 14 teams, nine have used a spinner to open the bowling at least once. The ones who haven’t are Australia, Sri Lanka, Ireland, Canada, and Kenya.The DRS results
In all, 162 decisions have been reviewed so far, of which 35 have been upheld (ie, the original decision has been changed), while 127 have been struck down. That means 21.60%, or about one in five appeals, have been successful. Of these, the success rate for batsmen has been 23.19% (16 out of 69), while for the fielding team it’s 20.43% (19 out of 93).South Africa have used the DRS better than any other side with a success rate of more than 38%. Zimbabwe and Canada, while not matching South Africa for results, have done almost as well in terms of reviews.

Ireland impressed everyone with their skills with bat, ball, and in the field, but they’ll need to do some work on the DRS – they didn’t get a single review correct in 11 attempts, making them the only team with a 0% record. Bangladesh, Netherlands and New Zealand weren’t much better.

Among umpires, Aleem Dar, Ian Gould and Billy Bowden haven’t had a single decision overturned through the DRS. At the other end of the scale are Asoka de Silva and Daryl Harper, with 50% or more of their decisions being overturned.Kumar Dharmasena’s decisions have been challenged more than that of any other umpire, but most of his calls – 14 out of 16 – have withstood the test of technology.

As with almost every selection meeting here, the focus will be on the batsmen though the bowling line-up looks increasingly like a one-man show in captain Shakib Al Hasan

Mohammad Isam11-Jul-2011When Bangladesh’s selectors meet, sometime over the next day or two, to select the squad for the Test and ODI tour of Zimbabwe, they will be staring past the safety net of the 15-man touring party and at a playing XI that to most other observers has seven empty spots. Those blank spaces are symbols of poor form and insecurity among the players, a cricket board unable to cope with its various issues and, above all, a talent pool that is rapidly drying up.Last year’s stunning ODI series win over New Zealand was due in large part to rigorous preparation but that example hasn’t been followed this year. In fact any unsatisfactory outcome in Zimbabwe will probably be traceable to what has been happening in Bangladesh since the Australia series in April.While the players took a well-deserved break, the cricket board triggered a media free-for-all with their hunt for the new coach by the serial leaking of names – even the final announcement of Stuart Law’s name was no surprise to the media. The BCB spent too much energy playing hide-and-seek when all it had to do was get its head down and structure a whole team of coaches.Law’s arrival, on July 18, will be followed in no urgent manner by that of his support staff and it is likely he will have a makeshift team under him in a series fairly crucial to Bangladesh’s reputation.This confusion lends greater importance to the selection by Akram Khan and his team. As with almost every selection meeting here, the focus will be on the batsmen – the squad will have more batsmen than is required so that the new team management can take a good look at all their options – though the bowling line-up looks increasingly like a one-man show with the captain Shakib Al Hasan having virtually marked out his run-up at one end at the Harare Sports Club.The last committee – headed by Rafiqul Alam – kept a settled opening pair in Tamim Iqbal and Imrul Kayes, and gave Junaid Siddique a fair go at No 3 but the team’s problems began with their poor handling of the next spot, leaving a terminal hole in a crucial position.That the inconsistent Mohammad Ashraful has survived, and remains on the selectors’ radar, is only due to a lack of options. He is expected to be named in the 15-man Test squad and stay back for the five ODIs.Raqibul Hasan, the man tried in place of Ashraful, has flattered to deceive and his tendency to slow up the game doesn’t sit well with the new selection committee, yet he remains one of the main contenders.Akram is also said to be less inclined to promote Mahmudullah, who struck an unbeaten 68 against Australia in April at No 4, given his limitations against the fast bowlers, though the allrounder has a Test hundred in New Zealand batting at No 8.The solution could be a toss-up between Raqibul and Shahriar Nafees at No 4 – with Nafees having made a first-class hundred in his previous game to add to his two half-centuries against Australia. Including both in the playing XI, however, is probably how the selectors could go given the recent tendency to bloat the batting line-up and leave Shakib at his favoured position.It is on the bowling front that Akram’s ever-present smile could turn into a scowl. The real lack of bowling options could force the selectors into picking a three-man seam attack led by Shafiul Islam and Rubel Hossain with the third spot a fight between Syed Rasel, Nazmul Hossain and Robiul Islam. The left-armer Rasel, who recently had a stint in the Essex league, is probably the best option on the soft surface of Harare. A crucial performer in the 2007 World Cup, Rasel fell away during Jamie Siddons’ time as coach.With Shahadat Hossain having suffered a broken toe while playing beach football in Cox’s Bazar and Mashrafe Mortaza undergoing rehabilitation after his knee surgery in Australia, Rasel’s experience could work in his favour. Robiul, after one wicketless Test at Lord’s, has received good reviews for his performance with Bangladesh A in South Africa while Nazmul is a certainty for the ODI side.If Bangladesh do go with three seamers, Mahmudullah could claim the second spinner’s slot over Abdur Razzak. It won’t be much of a surprise – Razzak has played only eight Tests in four years and has never been a frontline option, spurning the chance offered by Mohammad Rafique’s departure.The squad, once announced, will play two games against the A side.

Plays of the Day from the Champions League T20 match between Somerset and Royal Challengers Bangalore

Siddarth Ravindran at the Chinnaswamy Stadium03-Oct-2011The drop
Jos Buttler had plenty of attention in the run-up to his participation in the Champions League T20 but his first contribution to Somerset’s campaign was reprieving Chris Gayle in the second over. When on 4, Gayle lunged down the track and top-edged a slice over cover. Buttler had to sprint back to get under the skier, and never looked like catching it as he tentatively moved around when the ball hurtled downwards. He got both hands on it but spilled it, and Gayle went on to waylay the Somerset attack.The double-miss
That drop wasn’t the only life Gayle had early on. In the fourth over, he clipped a full ball on leg stump towards square leg and set off for a single. The non-striker, Tillakaratne Dilshan, took his time before deciding he didn’t want one, by which time Gayle was several yards down the pitch and had given up on making it back. Arul Suppiah rifled in the throw, which was wide, but with Gayle only beginning to run back to his crease, there was still time for the fielder backing up, Nick Compton, to have another go from point. Compton also missed. Two overs later, Somerset had two directs hits but Gayle completed the scrambled singles on both occasions.The turner
Roelof van der Merwe isn’t known for getting the ball to spin big. When he came on in the fifth over, Dilshan and Gayle were hammering the bowling. He got his first one to spin a mile outside off, and beat Dilshan with his second. The third was the best of the lot: it was a fullish delivery that pitched on leg, Dilshan moved across the stumps and tried to sweep. He missed and the ball ripped off the turf to take off stump. Hitting off stump while bowling a batsman around his legs? No wonder van der Merwe was thrilled, letting out an impassioned scream and pumping his fists to celebrate the wicket.The straight six
For the third consecutive match in Bangalore, the press box at the Chinnaswamy Stadium was in the line of a massive six. Kieron Pollard’s just missed on Friday, a cameraman deflected Colin Ingram’s on Sunday but there was no stopping a howitzer from Gayle. The brutal hit off George Dockrell comfortably cleared the sightscreen and headed straight for the glass-front of the media enclosure. A journalist in the front row made a panicky dive as the ball approached but the glass proved sturdy enough to withstand the full impact of the powerful shot.The revenge
Peter Trego was clobbered for 50 runs in his three overs – the worst bowling analysis in his Twenty20 career – and Gayle played a big part in it, clouting two sixes and a four. Trego had his revenge later in the match, though, clubbing two sixes and two fours in the one over Gayle bowled. That over went for 24 and Somerset were back in the game as their run-rate rocketed beyond 10.

Graeme Smith made a battling half-century to lift the pressure of expectation from his shoulders

Firdose Moonda in Port Elizabeth23-Oct-2011For Graeme Smith, batting has lately been a little like driving on a road pockmarked with potholes. Every time he has tried to move out of first gear, he has hit a bump and stalled. But in Port Elizabeth he finally found a smooth track on which he could accelerate freely.After three failures, Smith’s broad shoulders would have felt the weight of expectations and they would have stooped a little lower when the innings began, as they have throughout the series. This time though, it was not Smith who departed early, but his partner. Hashim Amla got a leading edge back to Doug Bollinger and trudged to the dressing room without a run on the board.Jacques Kallis came to the crease and eased any jangling nerves Smith might have had by dealing with the next 11 deliveries. By the time Smith had to face a ball, Kallis had already hooked Johnson for six and driven him for four. There was still stress, as Smith had to take guard against a left-arm seamer in Doug Bollinger, who started with a leg-side wide. Instead of following it up with a delivery that would undo Smith, as he did in the T20, Bollinger hurled down a chest-high short delivery that Smith evaded. Then, Smith was off the mark with a prod to point.Kallis’ presence at the other end allowed Smith the luxury of batting himself in. While Smith nudged, Kallis drove, while Smith clipped off the pads, Kallis cut over point, taking the pressure off the former captain. Kallis’ strike-rate was close to 100 in the early stages of the innings, allowing Smith’s to slither down to little more than 50.Smith’s first four, a drive through the covers, was the most fluent shot he played in four innings but he did not get carried away by it and was willing to grind. He started getting bat to ball in a more confident fashion and was not rattled when he had to defend. Even when a Watson delivery kept low and passed the off stump, Smith was unmoved.It was in the 11th over that Smith showed he might be well and truly back. He had survived the left-armers’ assault, been beaten by Cummins’ pace and battled to 13 off 27 balls, with awkward, but at least, apparent foot movement. Cummins bowled a fairly wide delivery outside off, Smith had to reach but he pushed it through the covers with such power that his intent was clear. In the same over, he drove through the offside again, the second time with more conviction and better footwork.The change in Smith after those two shots was evident. He started strutting rather than shuffling at the crease and was confident enough to argue with Mitchell Johnson when the bowler stood in Smith’s way as he tried to complete a run. Words were exchanged and fingers were pointed but Smith was clearly the victor when Johnson missed a simple chance to run him out two balls later. So wayward was Johnson’s hurl that the ball did not land on the pitch.Getting under the skin of the man who had broken his hand twice in the past allowed Smith to grow more confident. All of Smith’s six fours were scored on the off side, a remarkable feat, given his preference for scoring on the leg. He made room for himself, danced down the track and even hustled between the wickets with rare speed.The innings meant a lot to Smith, who looked up to the sky after reaching his half-century. For the first time this season, a home crowd was on its feet for him and there was no jeering. He acknowledged them warmly.The reverse-sweep was the one shot Smith could not pull off. He was beaten when he first tried it against Steve Smith and then caught behind when he attempted it again off the same bowler. The umpire originally gave it not out but the review showed Smith had gloved it. He walked off the field having given away the chance to do something big, but he had done enough for now.

ESPNcricinfo presents Plays of the Day for the second day of the second Test between New Zealand and South Africa in Hamilton

Firdose Moonda in Hamilton16-Mar-2012Third-time-lucky moment of the day
Alviro Petersen broke a 21-ball run-less drought with a beautifully timed pull to square leg only for the ball to get a good wash in overnight dew. New Zealand’s bowlers were unhappy with the conditions of it and before the end of that over asked the umpires to have a look at it. Neither official felt it was serious enough damage for the ball to be changed. Mid-way through the next over, a committee made up of Chris Martin, Ross Taylor and Daniel Vettori all examined the ball for a few moments, hoping to convince the umpires that it was more than just a passing concern. Only two overs later, when Brent Arnel was brought into the attack and Petersen sliced a ball past gully, presumably for it to land in more damp, and the fourth umpire was asked to bring on a different ball this time.Wicket-less over of the day
On most days, such a headline would apply to most of the overs in the day, but in Mark Gillespie’s case it was unusual because his first four overs of the day contained a wicket each. His fifth one would also have yielded a scalp had Ross Taylor put a third slip in place for Gillespie’s movement away from the right-hander. He pitched one on off and got de Villiers to poke at it. The outside edge would have settled into a third slip’s hands but instead raced through the vacant area for four.Leave of the day
Vernon Philander arrived at the crease with something of a reputation for being an allrounder, after Ross Taylor said he is probably a better batsman that his Test average reveals. He showed the technique for it, too. The first ball he faced from Mark Gillespie was one that moved just a fraction away and while, in hindsight, good judgement had resulted in him leaving the ball, at the time it looked a risky thing to do. The ball danced dangerously close to his offstump as Philander shouldered arms to the oohs and aaahs of the fielding side. The next time Philander left it was to Doug Bracewell and it resulted in him losing his offstump.Clash of the day
While the biggest battle of the first half of the day was taking place between New Zealand’s bowlers and South Africa’s batsmen, once the sparring actually took place between members of the same side. Morne Morkel and AB de Villiers had a collision when batting together after Morkel drove the ball passed Doug Bracewell and set off a single. While scurrying through, he mowed into AB de Villiers and fell over on impact. Morkel made it to the other end with few worries but rubbed his knee, where de Villiers’ bat had hit him, with some concern.Misfield of the day
Brent Arnel was not having a good day. He bowled ineffectual, expensive spells and then cost the team even when he slipped to allow a boundary. Bracewell aimed a ball at Morne Morkel’s head but the South African No.10 had a plan. He pulled, although not with much power, to the deep square leg where Arnel was doing the work. He slid through, right arm outstretched and fingers scrambling for something. All they found was air as the ball escaped with Arnel desperately trying to get his body behind it.Misfortune of the day
Rob Nicol has found increasingly interesting ways to get out and his second innings dismissal was quite unfortunate. He tried to play a Vernon Philander short ball off the back foot but was hit on the arm and the pad instead. The ball’s subsequent path took it rolling towards the stumps and Nicol had thoughts of kicking it away, but they came too late because by the time he did anything, the offstump bail had been dislodged.

Against Zimbabwe in Napier, New Zealand weren’t content with just winning, but doing it with relentlessness. Under John Wright, the team looks more cohesive

Andrew Alderson29-Jan-2012The New Zealand victory over a rebuilding Zimbabwe was demanded and delivered, but it was the way the team conducted itself that gave cause to think this is more than just a blip on their flatlining Test form of recent years.
The significance of the win is more about the camaraderie steadily building under coach John Wright.Since November the team has three wins from four Tests (albeit two against Zimbabwe) but it was the character the side showed in the seven-run win over Australia in Hobart which flowed into Saturday’s win. The New Zealanders were uncompromising in their efforts to concertina a result into three days, one of which was affected by weather.Firstly, it showed in the field. New Zealand’s performance was comprehensive, with few errors. The Zimbabwe batting was weak but a similar looking outfit (minus captain Brendan Taylor) made 329 against the NZ XI the previous week in the Gisborne warm-up match. Why should they suddenly capitulate for 51 (their lowest Test score) and 143 on a decent batting pitch?The main reason was New Zealand’s relentlessness. Thirteen of the 20 wickets were caught behind the wicket by a largely three slip, two gully cordon endowed with Alcatraz hands. Nothing was escaping. Dean Brownlie spilt the only catch at 4.21pm off the bat of Graeme Cremer. In Brownlie’s defence, he picked up four at third slip in the first innings and another in the second. Among New Zealand fieldsmen (not keepers) that first-innings effort is only bettered by Stephen Fleming (with five against Zimbabwe in 1997).Ground fielding glitches were also rare. Replacement fielder Sam Wells bobbled a ball and threw inaccurately at 5.40pm to concede an overthrow. BJ Watling could be proud of his wicketkeeping debut under intense public scrutiny. Making a maiden Test century, taking four catches in the second innings – including the one to win the Test in the extra half hour’s play – and conceding just four byes to a loose Trent Boult delivery down the leg side meant he more than held his own.Secondly, the New Zealand bowlers, led by Man-of-the-Match Chris Martin, sustained the pressure, delivering in tight channels with just a gentle sea breeze for assistance. Revolving the spells of the four pacemen proved as successful as when employed in the second Test against Australia. Martin took career-best figures of 6 for 26 runs in the second innings. The return took him to 218 Test wickets, third-equal with Chris Cairns on the all-time New Zealand list. More importantly, the 37-year-old is showing the next generation of Doug Bracewell, Tim Southee and Boult how to apply themselves in the game’s longest form.In addition to Martin’s leadership with the ball, Brendon McCullum’s tactical nous was evident in Ross Taylor’s injured absence. His gambler instincts were to the fore. It was rare if five men were not in the slip cordon, often with a leg slip and short leg attacking too.Finally, the New Zealand dressing room is breeding a more inclusive culture. It was reflected in their post-match celebration. The team ventured to the wicket to have a drink and a chant once the crowds had gone. Bonds are being cemented. Returning to the shed, Martin (the oldest player) joked with Watling (the man with the newest role); McCullum spoke at length with former Test opening batsman Robert “Jumbo” Anderson; a calf-strapped Taylor hobbled along, soaking it up on crutches – rehabilitation can wait when you have just won a Test. Riffs from tunes like New Zealand band The Exponents’ “Why does love do this to me?” floated up to the press box from the dressing-room bunker. Such unadulterated camaraderie is not only uplifting but vital if they are to progress from eighth in the Test rankings during a busy year playing in the West Indies, India, Sri Lanka and South Africa.The New Zealanders are approaching the looming South Africa tour in the best possible frame of mind.