The trial of Sharad Ghai, the former chairman of the Kenyan Cricket Association, is due to finally get underway in Nairobi on January 25.Ghai, who was ousted in May, is accused of stealing $3.3 million from the KCA during the LG one-day series played in Kenya in 1999. He denies the charges.
ScorecardFile photo – Bilawal Bhatti’s figures of 8 for 56 were his best in first-class cricket, as were his match figures of 11 for 95•AFP
An eight-wicket haul from Bilawal Bhatti shot out United Bank Limited for 189 in their second innings, leaving Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited chasing a target of 160 to win the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy. SNGPL’s chase got off to a rocky start, however, as they ended the third day 56 for 3, with the experienced pair of Azhar Ali and Misbah-ul-Haq at the crease.The second day had ended with Bhatti dismissing the opener Sharjeel Khan to leave UBL 17 for 1 – effectively minus 13 for 1. The third day began with Bhatti needing to bowl one ball to complete his over. He had Umar Siddiq caught behind off that ball.UBL avoided giving Bhatti the hat-trick, but Azizullah bowled Shan Masood and Sohaib Maqsood in between. The two SNGPL quicks had taken four wickets in the space of seven balls, conceding only two runs in the process.From 19 for 4, UBL recovered thanks to Younis Khan’s 128-ball 98, which contained 16 fours. He dominated a fifth-wicket partnership of 141 with Hammad Azam before Bhatti bowled him. There was little resistance thereafter, as Bhatti swept through the lower order, picking up the remaining wickets as UBL lost their last six wickets for 29 runs. Five of Bhatti’s eight wickets – and seven of ten overall – were either bowled or lbw.Bhatti’s figures of 8 for 56 were his best in first-class cricket, as were his match figures of 11 for 95.
The inquest into the death of former Pakistan coach Bob Woolmer entered its seventh week with coroner Patrick Murphy summarising the statements of five more witnesses on Monday. Murphy had been unwell last week and unable to complete his summary.The inquest in Kingston, Jamaica, heard evidence from 57 witnesses and statements from seven other persons. The 11-member jury is expected to deliver its verdict within this week. In the event of the jury failing to agree, the court would accept a majority verdict.Woolmer died hours after he was found unconscious in his Jamaica hotel room on March 18, a day after Pakistan suffered a humiliating defeat to Ireland at the World Cup. Dr Ere Seshaiah, the government pathologist who conducted the post mortem, declared that Woolmer was murdered but three independent pathologists all concluded later that Woolmer died due to natural causes.
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Inzamam-ul-Haq, former Pakistan captain, wants to play Test matches for some more time before retiring “in an honourable manner.”Inzamam retired from ODIs after a disastrous World Cup and resigned from the Test captaincy. The PCB is expected to leave out Inzamam from its list of centrally-contracted players, on the basis that he is no longer an ODI player. Further, sounds coming out of the board and selection committee suggest that it may be difficult for Inzamam to find a way back into the team.”I am not going to play for long but I do want to play a few more Tests as I think I can still contribute to Pakistan cricket,” Inzamam said at a function where he was feted for his contribution to the game.”I don’t understand why they (selectors) keep on saying things about my form and fitness. Obviously if I am not fit or not in form I myself will not make myself available for selection,” Inzamam said.”But the selectors should not make such a big issue of these things. I want to play Test matches but honourably and I also want to finally retire in an honourable manner,” he added.Tauqir Zia, the former board chairman, at the same function reminded Inzamam that every player had to go someday, mindful perhaps that few Pakistan players have ever left the game graciously.”What I would advise Inzamam is to accept whatever the board and selectors decide for him. What they decide, will be in the national interest and their decision must be accepted sportingly by him,” Tauqir said.Inzamam, who has played 119 Tests and 378 One-day Internationals (ODIs) for Pakistan, ruled out reversing his retirement from ODIs and said once a player retired, he should stay retired.”It is never easy for a professional cricketer, who has represented his country for 17 years, to forget the past and adopt a new lifestyle. But I have taken my decision on one-dayers,” he said.
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Andre Adams, the New Zealand allrounder, has been suspended for one domestic match after assaulting a player in a match this week.Adams was charged with physical assault after grabbing the helmet of Bevan Griggs, the Central Districts batsman, and shaking the grill which in turn cut Griggs’s lip.He was suspended by a code of conduct commissioner in Auckland and will miss their last round match of the State Championship next week.He has until tomorrow afternoon to appeal against the decision.
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New South Wales Breakers will aim for back-to-back National Women’s Cricket League titles after they sealed second place with a double success against South Australia at the weekend. The Breakers earned two bonus-point victories in Adelaide to set up an appointment with Victoria Spirit in the best-of-three finals series at Glen Waverley from January 26.Queensland Fire entered the last weekend of preliminary matches in second spot, but their 57-run loss to Victoria in Melbourne on Saturday dropped them to third and despite an 80-run thrashing of Spirit on Sunday, they could not hold off the charge of New South Wales. Cathryn Fitzpatrick’s return of 3 for 23 was crucial in the first match and she picked up another two victims on Sunday to equal the haul of fellow Australia bowler Kirsten Pike, who performed strongly for Queensland.Half-centuries to Alex and Kate Blackwell set up the Breakers’ opening win and their 101-run partnership pushed the total towards 9 for 234. South Australia fell for 184 and they managed only 181 the next day as Charlotte Anneveld picked up 3 for 25. Lisa Sthalekar made sure of her side’s progress into the final with her unbeaten 92 securing the eight-wicket success.Victoria, who finished three points ahead, and New South Wales will contest the finals series for the seventh time in the 11-year history of the league and the Breakers hold a 4-2 advantage. They defeated Queensland over three matches last year to avenge the loss to Victoria in 2004-05.Queensland’s Melissa Bulow finished the series as the leading run-scorer with 336 at 42.00, ahead of South Australia’s Kris Britt, who collected 279 at 55.80. Clea Smith, from Victoria, was the most successful bowler with 15 wickets at 14.53 while Pike finished with 14 victims at the impressive average of 11.85.
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Listen to Rahul Dravid’s press conferenceSoon after the presentation ceremony, Rahul Dravid walked towards theboundary rope and gestured towards the crowd. His wife made her way throughthe throng and handed over little Samit, who was then carried across tothe dressing room. Perhaps the celebrations were a little too much for atoddler to take and, by the time his father arrived for the press conferences,shirt soaked in spirits, Samit had gone back to a more child-friendlyenvironment.Sporting the biggest smile that he has in a long while, Dravid spokein animated tones about the celebrations following a historic 123-run victory.”Everyone’s going berserk and really enjoying it,” he said”. “It’s aspecial moment for this group and we are celebrating appropriately.”In the build-up to the game, Dravid had emphasised that it would bedangerous to write India off, though he admitted that the no-hopers taghadn’t been entirely undeserved. “I don’t blame the people for criticisingus,” he said. “South Africa were always going to be favourites headinginto this Test, but I knew there was a lot of quality in this team. Weshowed that in the last few days. We had players who stood up and werecounted.”Having been an integral part of epochal successes at Adelaide, Headingleyand Multan, Dravid was cautious when asked where this triumph rated in thegrand scheme of things. “This victory is great because this is the firsttime we have done it in South Africa in four visits over the past 14 years. Asa cricketer, your special moments are the ones that you share with theteam; the celebrations, the joy you get from winning and just being a partof the group that has stood by you for three-and-a-half days and put ineverything they’ve got to come out victorious.”The morale appeared to be too low for zero after the capitulation in theone-day series but, by the time the players returned to Johannesburg forthe Test, the spring was back in several steps. “It’s not that we haven’tdone this before,” said Dravid, when asked what had changed. “We lost theone-day series in West Indies but came back to win the Test series. Ithink it was nice to get away in Potchefstroom and hang in together.”The team was pretty hurt with the one-day defeat and we just got togetherand said whatever happens, we’ll try and put in a better performance. Wecame here with a bit of confidence having won the warm up-game. I’mglad the boys displayed a lot of fighting spirit and character.”Sreesanth’s brilliance with the ball broke the game open for India, butDravid preferred to focus on the team effort when asked to pick out thepivotal moments in the game. “The way Sourav Ganguly batted with the lowerorder to get us to 250,” he said. “His partnership with VRV Singh wascrucial too. Sreesanth and Zaheer coming out and bowling out theopposition for 84. Laxman did a great job with the tail in the secondinnings and his stand with Zaheer. Sreesanth picking up three wickets in thesecond innings, including the important wicket of Kallis. These were thecrucial moments that eventually helped us win.”The return of Ganguly added experience to the middle order, and both heand Laxman played hugely important knocks in the context of a low-scoringmatch. “It’s nice to have boys who have performed well in situations likethis before,” said Dravid. “To be honest, this Test team has been the samefor some time now, except for one or two players here and there. We hadthe same group in Pakistan, [against] England and West Indies.”When asked whether he’d discerned any change in Ganguly’s attitude andapproach to the game, Dravid said: “He’s really playing well. There’s nodoubt about that. His performances in Potchefstroom and in this Test havebeen really good. It’s great to see him batting well. He’s a proven andexperienced performer and when he bats well, it’s going to make a bigdifference to the side. I hope he keeps continuing because we’ll need goodperformances from people like him, Sachin, Laxman and myself to have theright results.”There was praise too for the coaching staff, who have copped considerablecriticism in recent months after indifferent results in the one-day game.”Unfortunately, we tend to focus a lot on individuals in success anddefeat,” said Dravid. “But at the end of the day, victories and defeatsare not about the captain or the coaches or one or two individuals. It’salways about the team. I’ve always believed that it’s the performancesthat you put in as a team that helps you win matches.”
| The team was pretty hurt with the one-day defeat and we just got togetherand said whatever happens, we’ll try and put in a better performance. Wecame here with a bit of confidence having won the warm up-game. I’mglad the boys displayed a lot of fighting spirit and character |
With India needing just five more wickets at the start of day four, theintensity was a little less than what it had been on the first three days.Dravid said, however, that there had been no hint of complacency. “Thesenior guys in the side were pretty keen to remind me and everyone else,saying: ‘Let’s get this done. They are a very good side, we need to beprofessional and get the job done’. It’s a good group of senior boys inthe team and the support they’ve given me is fantastic. A lot of things Idon’t even need to say, it just comes from the group and they handle a lotof things themselves.”In the past, great highs such as this have been followed by crashing lows,and Dravid said that his team needed to be wary of a South Africanbacklash. “South Africa will come back hard at us,” he said. “We have tosoak up a lot of pressure and respond adequately.”The pressure was certainly on when he walked out for the toss at theWanderers, and he asserted that the decision to bat had been his alone.”Whether we bat or bowl first, or who plays in the XI, is going to be mycall,” he said. “I do discuss things in our team meetings and with some ofmy senior players but at the end of the day, it always starts and endswith me. I felt that batting first was the way to go on this pitch.”Getting 249 on the board was quite an achievement, but what followed wasjust sensational, with the bowlers dismantling a powerful batting line-upin just 25.1 overs. “He bowled brilliantly for us,” said Dravid, whenasked specifically about Sreesanth’s man-of-the-match display. “Obviously,he’s a character, but he needs to be a bit careful. We wouldn’t want himto miss a game.”He chuckled when asked about Sreesanth’s impromptu celebrations afterwhacking Andre Nel for a straight six. “I’d rather have him do what he didwith the bat than what he did later. But I enjoyed his six. I enjoyeverything when Sreesanth bowls well. He’s a great character. A playerlike him, a character like him, needs to be celebrated and enjoyed.”And, as the storm clouds gathered over the stadium, he admitted that thehigh jinks weren’t about to end just yet. “It’s a good moment to betogether as a group and celebrate,” he said, with a big grin. “We played alittle bit of ‘Holi’. The boys need to learn to drink too, and not justspray it!”After what they have just accomplished, most Indians would forgive them that.
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The England captaincy is a hot potato at present, with the selectors frantically juggling their options until such time as Michael Vaughan’s knee comes back to life. Away from the spotlight at Canterbury, however, Robert Key was demonstrating that leadership doesn’t have to be a burden. He led from the front for England A, compiling a beautiful unbeaten 128 to give Pakistan’s bowlers a tough workout ahead of next week’s first Test.After the battering that the senior side has received in recent weeks, this fixture comes as a welcome opportunity for the England camp to regroup. Consequently the side has been packed with men with several points to prove – not least among them Key himself. As Kent’s captain, he is in familiar surroundings, but today’s news that Vaughan has officially been ruled out of this winter’s Ashes added an extra frisson to his innings.Key made a favourable impression on the previous trip to Australia four years ago, but hasn’t played for the Test side since the tour to South Africa in January 2005. While England’s batsmen were dropping like flies in India this winter, he was recuperating from shoulder surgery and so was overtaken in the pecking order by men such as Alastair Cook and Owais Shah.”It’s been a slow start for me in four-day cricket,” Key admitted afterwards, having not yet registered a century this season. He began his innings bullishly with four fours and a six before lunch, and later clouted Danish Kaneria straight down the ground for another maximum to bring up his 150 partnership with another recent England discard, Ian Bell.The conditions were very much in favour of the batsmen, as Key was quick to acknowledge. “We played Notts on a wicket like that,” he said. “We got 600 and couldn’t bowl them out.” But with the likes of Mohammad Asif and Umar Gul obtaining some reverse swing from as early as the 20th over, it was never entirely plain sailing. “They showed some class,” he added, “on a wicket where there was no conventional swing and no seam movement.”England suffered an early setback when Cook was caught behind for 3 off Mohammad Sami, a neat low catch in front of first slip by Kamran Akmal, but Akmal was soon forced to leave the field after damaging his left index finger. On the stroke of lunch, clearly discomforted, he dropped Key off Asif for 30 and did not return.It was an alarm for Pakistan, who have no reserve keeper in their squad and instead handed the gloves to Faisal Iqbal. The uncapped 20-year-old, Zulqarnain Haider, would have been flown in from Lahore in the event of a break, but Pakistan’s coach, Bob Woolmer, later confirmed Akmal had suffered nothing more than bruising around the top joint.Faisal did at least manage to hang onto the one catch that came his way. Bell is becoming a familiar face to this Pakistani attack, having top-scored for the Test team in last winter’s tour, a performance that included a century in the second Test at Faisalabad. But this time he was unable to make the most of similarly flat conditions, and was second man out for 74 (187 for 2).Shah came in at No. 4, as if to showcase the strength of England’s middle-order reserves, although judging by the current medical bulletins, they are going to be needed in the weeks and months to come. He made another start, 23 from 97 balls, but was unable to pick up his momentum and eventually edged a low catch to Imran Farhat at slip off Danish Kaneria.There were four changes for Pakistan, after their eight-wicket win over Leicestershire, with their captain Inzamam-ul-Haq returning in place of vice-captain Younis Khan. Mohammad Yousuf came in for the big-hitting Shahid Afridi, Abdul Razzaq replaced Shoaib Malik in the allrounder’s spot, while Asif was given a chance ahead of seamer Shahid Nazir.Though Pakistan were not fielding their full Test XI, it was nonetheless an important first century of the season for Key, whose recuperation from surgery has been hampered by some “interesting” wickets at the Rose Bowl and Stockton, among others. “Before you know it, you’ve been nicked off a couple of times,” he explained, “and you’re staring down the barrel of an ordinary start to the season. But the last two have been perfect for batting, so it’s nice to cash in.”Key won’t be in contention for the Lord’s Test, because his shoulder is still not back to full strength. “I was starting to think I’d never throw again a few weeks ago,” he admitted, “but all of a sudden I’ve starting rocketing them in from about ten yards! But it was a big operation. They reckoned it would take 12 months before I was throwing properly. It’s seven or eight now, so give it a couple of months, and it shouldn’t be a problem.”That would coincide nicely with the Ashes considerations, and in Vaughan’s absence, there is a definite prospect of a tour place for Key. “Any runs are valuable, but this is probably slightly more in the spotlight. This is definitely a set up from county cricket when you come up against an attack like that. You feel more a part of the England set-up, with a different group of people and an England shirt of some means. I think it’s a great format.”
Kenya’s ambitions to bridge the gap between themselves and the Full Member countries have been dealt a blow by the news that Roger Harper will not be renewing his contract as coach after the ICC World Twenty20.Harper took charge in January 2006 and has had considerable success in rebuilding a side that hardly played in the previous three years. In February this year Kenya won the World League Division One, a success which earned them a place in the ICC World Twenty20. The Kenyan side has also become far more disciplined in his time at the helm.Harper turned down an invitation to continue because of family commitments in the Caribbean.”Roger has been a truly marvellous ambassador for the game of cricket,” Samir Inamdar, Cricket Kenya’s chairman, told Cricinfo. “His steadying influence at a time when our cricket was in pieces has been an outstanding feature of his stay here. It has, I believe, succeeded in bringing our national team together into a cohesive and disciplined unit.”Kenya will look to fill the vacancy immediately after the tournament. Harper’s successor will be appointed for the period ending June 2009.
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Lloyd Mash, the opener who made his first-class debut against West Indies on Friday, has replaced Brad Hodge and will play his first Pura Cup match against Queensland starting on Friday. Mash collected 44 against West Indies, hit four sixes in an over during a hastily-arranged Twenty20 match with the tourists, and is the only change to the side that sits on top of the table with New South Wales.Greg Shipperd, the Victoria coach, expected the Bulls to provide a stern test for his side after their perfect start to the domestic interstate summer. “We have had two very good away wins in Perth and Hobart and we’re confident that if we can execute our game plan we can come away from Brisbane with another good result,” he said.The fast man Shane Harwood missed the tour match with a back injury but returns to the squad and the bowling attack will be chosen from Mick Lewis, Gerard Denton and Allan Wise. Hodge is tipped to make his Test debut against West Indies in Hobart on Thursday.New South Wales will consider a Pura Cup debut for Stephen O’Keefe after he was named in the 12-man squad to play Tasmania at the SCG beginning on Friday. O’Keefe, a 20-year-old allrounder, has taken 12 wickets at 17.25 with his left-arm orthodox spin in Sydney grade games this season.Brad Haddin, who is recovering from a finger injury, faces a fitness test later this week but has also been picked in the initial squad. Simon Katich will lead the team after he was dropped from the Test side last week.Victoria squad Jason Arnberger, Michael Klinger, Nick Jewell, Lloyd Mash, David Hussey, Cameron White (capt), Jon Moss, Adam Crosthwaite (wk), Shane Harwood, Mick Lewis, Gerard Denton, Allan Wise.New South Wales squad Phil Jaques, Greg Mail, Simon Katich (capt), Matthew Phelps, Dominic Thornely, Aaron O’Brien, Brad Haddin (wk), Grant Lambert, Stephen O’Keefe, Matthew Nicholson, Stuart Clark, Doug Bollinger.