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Geoff Lawson, the former Australia bowler, has confirmed he will succeed Bob Woolmer as Pakistan’s coach. Lawson told Sydney radio 2KY on Monday morning the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) had called him on Sunday to tell him he had beaten Dav Whatmore and Richard Done for the post. The PCB’s official announcement is expected to be made later today.”It’s such a talented squad they have over there. When you look at the class of players they have, you just have to be excited about being involved with them,” said Lawson after hearing of his appointment.Whatmore was the early favourite on the three-man shortlist, but it is understood a number of players, as well as key members of team management, were more keen on Lawson and passed on their preference to the board. Whatmore’s cause was not helped by the former Sri Lanka captain, Arjuna Ranataunga, who was alleged to have advised Pakistan against Whatmore during a chance meeting with a top PCB official in Glasgow.Pakistan have had 11 different coaches in the past 10 years, with three stints eachfor former great Javed Miandad and Richard Pybus, Pakistan’s first foreign coach, with Woolmer taking over from from Miandad in June 2004.Lawson said he expected to head over to Lahore within a month to prepare for theTwenty20 World Championship. When asked of what changes he is hoping to bring to the team, he said: “Well, there’ll probably be quite a few. I’m hoping to take a few more Australian personnel with me as well.”Lawson played 46 Tests for Australia and, though he has no international coaching experience, he has been in charge of New South Wales. The PCB’s ad-hoc committee is in Karachi for a two-day meeting that started on Sunday and it is also expected to announce new central contracts for the players.

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James Kirtley, who was not a fixture in the Sussex team at the start of the season after remodelling his action, took 5 for 27 as Sussex pulled off a thrilling 15-run win in a low-scoring C&G final at Lord’s. All five of his wickets were leg-before, as he knocked the top off the Lancashire run chase and returned to mop up the tail as Dominic Cork was threatening to carry his team over the line.The highest score of the match was the 37 made by Michael Yardy and Yasir Arafat as Sussex struggled during their turn to bat. Lancashire bowled and fielded outstandingly, with Sajid Mahmood claiming an impressive three-wicket haul, but Sussex weren’t going to roll over and let Lancashire claim the trophy. When Kirtley snared the final wicket, trapping Murali Kartik in front, he fell to his knees and was swamped by his team-mates while the balcony erupted. This may not have been classic one-day cricket in favour of the batsman, but it was still a classic one-day match.Mal Loye went first in the chase, plumb lbw to a ball that nipped back, and four runs later Nathan Astle went in very similar style as he planted his front foot and the ball angled back and would have hit middle and leg. While Lancashire could have little complaint about the first two dismissals, the third will have left them stewing. Stuart Law went to defend his first ball, getting a thick inside-edge onto his pads but Jeremy Lloyds’s finger went up for a third time.With each wicket Kirtley’s celebrations became more flamboyant as he sprinted towards his team-mates, but Law was mortified, waving his bat at the umpire as he turned and trudged off. Luke Sutton survived the hat-trick ball, but Kirtley continued to extract surprising pace and carry.

In a week where most stories about cricket have not been the most pleasing for the game, Kirtley’s tale is one of a player battling back from adversity. He was forced to remodel his action over the winter after he was reported and was carefully handled by Sussex at the start of the season. There was some talk that he may even struggle to resume a full career – but he couldn’t have picked a better stage to banish those memories.With Kirtley’s burst leaving Lancashire 27 for 3, Mark Chilton and Sutton were forced to consolidate and boundaries were few and far between despite the fielding restrictions. When Kirtley was rested following a fine seven-over burst, Lancashire passed 50 but Luke Wright removed Sutton to swing the match again.This left Chilton as the last recognised batsman – but not for long. He charged early at Mushtaq Ahmed, who fired the ball down the leg side, and Matt Prior pulled off a fine stumping. Mushtaq was at his probing best, giving the batsmen virtually nothing to hit, and he removed Glen Chapple, who had the ability to blast Lancashire close to their target, via a wonderfully taken catch at silly point by Richard Montgomerie. Mushtaq’s spell meant that as well as losing wickets, Sussex were also stifling the batsmen and the required rate was rising.However, Cork and Kyle Hogg played sensibly to form a stand of 58 and when Hogg was dropped by Montgomerie at mid-on, on 24, it appeared Sussex’s earlier under-par showing with the bat would eventually cost them. But Montgomerie made amends an over later and Lancashire needed 43 off eight with three wickets left.

Chris Adams captained his team with courage, retaining men round the bat for Mushtaq and hold Kirtley’s remaining three overs back for the very end – knowing his skiddy trajectory would cause the lower order problems. The plan worked like a dream as Tom Smith was trapped lbw, then Yasir Arafat bowled Mahmood, who wasted a chance to show calmness under pressure with an ugly heave. No one, though, was going to deny Kirtley his moment and he became only the third bowler (after Mark Ealham against Zimbabwe and Ian Harvey against Somerset) to claim five lbws in a limited-overs match.Lancashire stood forlornly at the presentation with the realisation that the match was there for the taking as Sussex crashed to 78 for 6. The openers had gone early and Mahmood claimed the vital wicket of Adams, who had been so wound up for the match he was unable to play his natural game. Some of Sussex’s running was suicidal and Carl Hopkinson was the second run out, after trying a quick single to Cork at mid-off.However, Sussex are fighters and Yardy showed the qualities that have attracted him to the England selectors with a battling 37. His crab-like style is not pretty to watch, and this innings was certainly on the stodgy side, but it did a job for his side as Yasir Arafat used the aggressive approach in a stand of 56 for the seventh wicket. That partnership gave Sussex an outside chance. They took it.

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Wisdom Siziba, Matabeleland’s opener, scored an unbeaten 40 to guide his side to a nine-wicket victory over Manicaland on the third day of their Logan Cup match at the Bulawayo Athletic Club.Siziba struck seven fours as Matabeleland reached their target of 70 in only 56 minutes. With nothing to lose, Siziba was not his usual cautious self and from the outset had a go at the bowling. Matabeleland lost their only wicket in the run chase when offspinner Stuart Matsikenyeri had Duffin taken at first slip by Steven Wright for 17.Afterwards, the two provinces played in a limited-overs match, an idea mooted by Phil Simmons, Zimbabwe’s coach, who was watching.

Warwickshire 495 for 9 (Wagh 167) v Lancashire at Stratford-upon-Avon
ScorecardA century from Mark Wagh put Warwickshire in a dominant position on the first day against Lancashire at Stratford-upon-Avon. After Nick Knight won the toss and opted to bat, Wagh cashed in on an excellent batting track, sharing in partnerships of 141 with Knight (53), and 154 with Ian Bell (49), as Warwickshire closed on 495 for 9.Lancashire came into the match with a number of players missing due to injury. Glen Chapple is still recovering from a blow to the head he received against Sussex last week, Carl Hooper is nursing a fractured thumb, and Ian Sutcliffe is still absent with a hamstring problem. To add to that, Andrew Flintoff, James Anderson and Sajid Mahmood are all away on England duty.Wagh began aggressively, hitting five fours before picking up his first single with a push into the covers. After the positive start, John Wood came back well, and beat Knight’s bat no less than four times with balls angled across him. Two maidens on the trot slowed the run-rate, until Knight broke the shackles with a savage cut past point off Wood. On 44, Wagh edged a regulation catch to Stuart Law at second slip, but he failed to hold onto the ball, and Lancashire’s first real chance to break the partnership went begging.Steve Crook replaced Wood in the 18th over, and in his first over produced a quicker ball that nipped in off the seam and beat Wagh’s bat, inducing a half-hearted appeal, perhaps only to celebrate the quality of the delivery. Crook then proved his first ball wasn’t a fluke, completely squaring Wagh up next ball and inducing another play-and-miss. However, the luck stayed with Warwickshire, and in just the 19th over Lancashire already had a sweeper on the cover boundary, testament to the quality of the pitch and the batting. There was some life in the pitch for the slower bowlers though, and in his four overs before lunch Gary Keedy found appreciable turn. He trapped Knight lbw for 53, signalling the lunch interval, with the score at 141 for 1.Wagh proved particularly strong on the leg side, clipping Keedy through midwicket for four to take his score to 99, and bringing up his 18th first-class hundred in the next over, bowled by Martin, with a pull to the square-leg boundary. Martin claimed some retribution though, when Wagh played a ball onto his left knee, leaving him in great pain. He declined the services of a runner, and though the injury seemed to affect his concentration for a while, his shot-making remained fluent.At the other end Ian Bell’s innings went almost unnoticed, but he brought up the hundred partnership with a crunching drive through the covers off Wood. The Lancashire bowlers were beginning to tire, with Wood bowling several no-balls, as well as slipping in an unintentional beamer. With the score on 248, Bell gave Lancashire a half-chance, slicing a ball from Dinesh Mongia just short of Keedy at gully.Wagh brought up his 150 with yet another trademark whip off his legs for four, and Bell had moved untroubled to 49 before he sliced a slower ball from Crook to Law at gully, who this time held onto the catch (295 for 2). Crook struck again in his next over, getting the vital breakthrough for Lancashire by dismissing Wagh, again caught by Law at gully off a slower ball, for 167 (304 for 3).Troughton got off the mark with a well-timed push off the back foot for four, and followed that with a flick through square leg as the runs continued to flow for Warwickshire. Lancashire struck back though, with Law taking another catch, this time at silly mid-off, to remove Troughton for 8 on the stroke of tea (313 for 4).After the interval, Mongia, brought into this match as an emergency replacement for Hooper, trapped Dougie Brown lbw for 16 (356 for 5), but Jonathan Trott and Brad Hogg continued the onslaught, adding 63 in quick time before Martin, who had bowled economically without ever looking dangerous, bowled Trott for 54, before trapping Jonathan Frost lbw for a third-ball duck (419 for 7). Following on from his unbeaten 94 off 61 balls against Northants on Wednesday, Brad Hogg this time raced to 56 from 44, before Martin struck for the third time in the session.Neil Carter and Naqqash Tahir followed Hogg’s lead with some long-handled thumping late to compound a difficult day for Lancashire. They will have to work hard tomorrow if they are to remain competitive in this match and keep alive any hopes of reversing their losing streak.

Lord MacLaurin, the past chairman of the England & Wales Cricket Board, will open the Isle of Wight’s state-of-the-art indoor cricket academy overlooking Ventnor’s unique "superbowl" at Steephill on Friday July 25 2003.The £1.1m project, financed from the Sport England Lottery Fund, IW Partnership, IW Council and many local supporters, has provided the Island with a three-lane Academy, incorporating video playback facilities for coaching, changing and social facilities. One lane has a spin surface, with two for seam bowling.The indoor academy will be available to visiting SPL3 club for pre-match practice from 12 noon on match days, without charge. Visiting clubs with an ECB qualified, and insured, coach are welcome to use the bowling machine, and video cameras. But indoor sports shoes must be used in the academy.The entrance to Steephill is still via the Ventnor Botanic Garden, with the Academy and changing rooms at car park level. There is a spectacular view of the pitch from the changing rooms and players’ balcony, with external stairs from the balcony down to pitch level.Separate changing facilities are available for umpires and the whole facility has been designed to give access for cricketers with disabilities.Ventnor wish to thank all visiting teams for their patience and forbearance last season. They look forward to being able to offer hospitality this season to players and supporters in their ‘state of the art’ licensed bar.

It is touch and go whether Michael Vaughan will be available for the Fifth Test against Australia at The Oval next week.Vaughan has not played in the Ashes series following a knee operation earlier this summer and has reported that it is sore following his return to first-class cricket with Yorkshire.He has been playing in the CricInfo Championship game against Leicestershire, in which he has scored 82 and 47. But in Yorkshire’s second innings he was hit on the knee which was operated on.He will not play in tomorrow’s Norwich Union League match at Grace Road and will rest for a couple of days before telling the England management of his prospects for the final Test.Vaughan said: “I’m very sore from the first two days of Championship cricket.I’m struggling to sprint between the wickets. This might be a natural reactionto first-class cricket.”I will decide shortly what I will do about the England situation. I’ll waitto see how it responds to treatment.”Vaughan has not played for England since making his maiden Test hundred against Pakistan at Old Trafford at the start of June.

Bowlers to have five-over quotas

Warne said the Cricket All-Stars matches will follow all normal ICC regulations, with one tweak: “Sachin and I got together and we thought, ‘What could we change to make it better in Twenty20?’ The only thing we thought of is that sometimes that fifth or sixth bowler just gets smashed. If the best bowlers can bowl an extra over… so we came up with four bowlers can bowl five overs.”

Former Australia legspinner Shane Warne has said he is excited to “create history” by bringing his Cricket All-Stars joint venture with Sachin Tendulkar to the USA next month, while also hitting out at criticisms regarding the pricing of tickets and age of players involved in the event.Earlier this week former Australia captain Ian Chappell had been critical of the plans for the event on , a video series on ESPNcricinfo. The tournament will feature two teams of retired players, some as old as 52, playing three exhibition Twenty20s in New York, Los Angeles and Houston. “I’ve always thought that the reason for retiring is that you wanted to stop playing,” Chappell had said. “The other thing I don’t understand is why people want to watch older cricketers.”At the end of his time with the Melbourne Stars, Shane Warne was struggling in the field as you would expect with someone in their 40s. Your back gives you trouble, you can’t bend over as easily, catches that you used to take very easily you can’t get down very far to take them. You start to look like what you are, an old cricketer.”Warne said he was disappointed with Chappell’s comments. “I think it’s a bit harsh for Chaps to say that,” he said. “I would have thought he would have seen the bigger picture about spreading the game of cricket globally, and that actually we’re doing a good thing if we make sure these games are fun and entertaining.””There are a lot of people in America that have never seen some of their idols play. They’ve got their chance for the first time to come to the stadiums and actually see some of their heroes play. I think that’s a very exciting thing. We’re going to be putting on free coaching clinics for schools, all sorts of stuff. I think it’s disappointing that Ian has that view.”When asked about the pricing of tickets – $50-$175 in New York and Houston, with the majority of tickets at $175, and $325 in Los Angeles – Warne said: “They’re [Major League Baseball Divisional Series playoff tickets] $30-$150, we’re $50-$175, so that’s pretty similar there. There’s lots of entertainment at the grounds too. We’ve got some pretty big name DJs coming, got cheerleaders and all sorts of action-packed stuff. I think the ticket prices are reasonable.”Ticketmaster’s online booking system in Houston, though, reveals that less than 1,500 tickets were sold at the 41,574 capacity Minute Maid Stadium in the 36 hours since tickets first went on sale. The majority of those tickets sold were in the $50 and $75 price brackets. Also, there were concerns about fans attending a mid-week event in the daytime in Houston, resulting in the start time changing from 2 pm to 7 pm.The other major concern for organisers in New York City is the weather. Warne acknowledged that is an issue. “The last two years in New York, November the seventh, it was 20C two years ago and there was some snow last year,” he said. “So we’re hoping and keeping our fingers crossed that the long-range forecast looks pretty good.”When asked why the Central Broward Regional Park in Florida, USA’s only ICC-certified cricket-specific stadium, was bypassed, Warne said: “We’ve got iconic players, we’ve got iconic baseball stadiums, we thought it was a fantastic fit. We thought a drop-in pitch in a baseball stadium is a pretty unique thing to do and that’s why we’re sort of making history.”Warne said Simon Taufel and Marais Erasmus will be the standing umpires at the event, and the match referee will be Ranjan Madugalle.

Andhra skipper Amit Pathak won the toss and elected to bat in their lastSouth Zone Ranji Trophy match of the season against Hyderabad, at Kurnool.Andhra pounded the Hyderabad attack amassing 285 for three in 90 overs, onthe first day. Openers Amit Pathak (64) and LNP Reddy (37) shared a 102 runpartnership for the first wicket. Pathak played an aggressive inningsblasting eleven boundaries in his 98 ball innings. Former India spinnerVenkatpathy Raju broke their partnership when he removed Pathak. Four runslater, Raju dismissed Reddy with the score board reading 106 for two.With both openers back in the pavilion in quick succession, GN Srinivas (76not out) and Y Venugopal Rao (59) set out to build the innings. They shareda 102 run partnership for the third wicket. GN Srinavas displayed a perfectblend of calculated attack and defence in his unbeaten innings. He hitseven boundaries in his 187 ball innings.Andhra ended the day with GN Srinivas and I Srinivas (34) at the crease.Hyderabad have 22 points and are leading the points table from their fourmatches so far. Andhra are fifth with 14 points.

Send us your feedback … what do you think?”Samir Inamdar, Cricket Kenya’s chairman, has dismissed suggestions that his board should have acted to suspend the Centrals province much earlier than they did.As revealed by Cricinfo earlier this week, Centrals were suspended after they failed to promote the game, so much so there were doubts if there was any active cricket being played in the area. Their officials had also failed to attend meetings or respond to queries from Cricket Kenya.”We have tried our utmost to sort out affairs in Central,” Inamdar told Cricinfo. “We did make attempts to get cricket in Central kick-started in the interests of promoting the game there. Senior members of the CK board, including myself, had agreed to travel to Thika in November last year in an effort to get as many clubs and schools together and to create a body capable of running the game there. Joshua Kiragu [the Centrals chairman] said, after being pressed to organise this, that it was inconvenient.”This meeting was rescheduled to December and again at the last minute we had to cancel because we did not receive any confirmation that he had convened a meeting.””We did the same thing in Rift and this was highly successful. It can only work this way if there is someone in a province able to mobilise people to come to a meeting to discuss cricket. Not having seen Kiragu at board meetings after that, we had to refer the matter to the executive committee. This was left to after the World Cup since preceding that we had the Mombasa tri-series in January, the World Cricket League in January/February and preparations and departures for the World Cup in March/April.”The executive tackled the matter in its meeting on May 13 and resolved to remove Kiragu from the board for failure to attend board meetings, and to call a Special General Meeting to discuss the matter with the governing council about Central’s position. The executive had recommended the Council to suspend Central from its membership and the Council approved this at its meeting on June 3.”Let me make it clear that this decision to suspend Central was taken aftersome long hard thinking,” Inamdar continued. “It was never our intention to deprive a province of its status if there was anything that could be done to keep it (and cricket) going.”Some critics had accused CK of taking the decision too close to the elections. “The other three provinces were unhappy that Central, having done nothing for the last two years, would be able to have a say in national cricket affairs and perhaps even influence the outcome of any election,” Inamdar explained. “I cannot question this as it is an entirely reasonable stand to take in my view.”This has come about at a time when all provinces are being asked to overhaul their constitutions to ensure that they comply with the CK constitution in the interests of uniformity. Central does not have a constitution nor any capacity to make one now. This is fundamental if it is to select anyone to be a delegate at the AGM. It cannot have a delegate because it has no registered clubs affiliated to it. Faced with this situation I do not know what else we could be expected to do in the run-up to elections.”

Marvan Atapattu, the injured Sri Lankan captain, has put his health and family ahead of his career in order to live a pain-free life after years of cricket. The rigours of international cricket have taken its toll on his 35-year-old frame, with his spinal cord being especially badly affected.”The back injury was there since I was young. It came and went and wasn’t a major concern,” Atapattu confirmed. “What I used to do was to take a couple of injections and carry on since I was 20. It wasn’t a real problem. It triggered in a bad way in India and that was very bad.”In Australia during the VB Series I had to take an injection in almost every state and had to go for MRI scans. It didn’t look like working and there was no progress,” he added. “It came to a stage where I had to decide whether I am going for surgery. The doctors diagnosed a disc pro lapse, that means the disc is jumping out from the spinal cord and touching the sciatic nerve that runs down my leg. I had to make a decision whether to do surgery and I knew surgery meant that I would be out for a couple of months.”It was at this point that Atapattu turned his thoughts away from cricket and underwent a micro-disc hectomy. “I thought of putting my health in front more than anything else. I thought this is enough as it was a vital time of my life,” he said. “I had to give everything back to the family. It was about living a comfortable, pain-free life after the years of cricket. I had to take that decision along with the family.”Atapattu went under the knife and surgeons removed disc material that was touching the troubled nerve. “The doctor said that three months after surgery I will have a chance of playing again. Now it is almost three months. When I saw him last on June 19, he said I was six months away from playing cricket. It’s a gradual process. You’ve got to do things slowly. If you go fast, you will fall back to zero again and all the symptoms come back.”Atapattu admitted that he was feeling much better now than when he last played for Sri Lanka in March. “If it gets to me again I know how tough it is,” he said. “We are doing all things possible to strengthen the muscle. I would like to try something away from the international level in a warm-up game perhaps to test my fitness level. It’s not like fielding ten balls which we do at practice. It’s going to be for three-and-a-half hours and you’ve got to be 100%. There are no half measures.”All these years you have been wanted by the public, team-mates and the selectors. I don’t want to create a situation where people don’t want you, but you just want to hang on. I guarantee I won’t do that.”