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While Bangalore will want to fashion a turnaround in their fortunes, Kolkata will want to prove their loss on Wednesday was just an aberration

The Preview by Sidharth Monga21-Apr-2011Match factsFriday, April 22, Kolkata
Start time 1600 (1030 GMT)Yusuf Pathan has been bowling well. Now for some sixes…•AFPBig pictureThe date is April 22, it is a Friday, and the match is the 24th out of the 74 in this year’s IPL. One team will be wearing purple, the other gold and red. The team from Karnataka has used two Karnataka players so far, the number is same for the team from Bengal. To state the obvious, the teams will want to win to improve their chances of making it to the qualifiers. If the match is one-sided, well, there will always be cheerleaders dancing to Bollywood songs and some Black Eyed Peas being played on the PA system at the Eden Gardens.The people that represented the said teams in previous seasons faced each other six times, and shared the spoils. These, though, are completely different people, and will bring nothing forward from those matches. Kolkata Knight Riders have six points from five matches, and Royal Challengers Bangalore have three from five. So if Bangalore wins, it ought to be considered an upset of sorts.Team talkBangalore have bought the services of Chris Gayle, and will hope to unleash him on his former team at his former home ground. Expect a few other changes from them to keep the balance of the four overseas players intact.
Kolkata wouldn’t want to panic and change a solid combination after their defeat to Kochi Tuskers Kerala.Predict the playing XIs for this match. Play ESPNcricinfo Team selector.
In the spotlightDaniel Vettori will like to bowl at the Eden Gardens if the pitch is anything like it was during the game between Kolkata and Kochi. And as captain and lead spinner, he will want to lead by example and fashion a turnaround for Bangalore.
Yusuf Pathan, a major signing for Kolkata this year, has added superb value with the ball, going at 5.76 an over and leading the wickets chart for Kolkata. But he will want similar impact with bat after having scored just 41 in three innings so far.Prime numbersDaniel Vettori’s 5.43 is the third-best economy-rate this season for bowlers who have bowled at least ten overs. Yusuf’s 5.76 is the fifth-best.Jacques Kallis is in the hunt for the orange cap, placed behind Paul Valthaty, Sachin Tendulkar and Brendon McCullum on the top run-getters table.The chatter”It was just one bad day. We have had three wins in a row. We have a lot of positives to take from them.”

Craig McDermott has pipped his old pace rival Allan Donald and the little-known Allister de Winter to become Australia’s pace bowling coach, replacing Troy Cooley

Daniel Brettig12-May-2011Craig McDermott pipped his old pace rival Allan Donald to be the man charged with shepherding Australia’s pace bowlers after they slipped to innocuous depths during the Ashes. The appointment of Troy Cooley’s replacement was announced in Brisbane on Thursday after Michael Brown, Cricket Australia’s head of cricket operations, had completed his final round of interviews.”It’s great to be back as part of the Australian team set-up again and I can’t wait to get started working with the bowlers and the rest of the team,” McDermott said. “We’ve got some challenging tours ahead in the coming months but I’m excited at the opportunity to be part of the group that helps get Australia back to number one in all forms of cricket.”McDermott wasted little time identifying the potentially explosive but more often wayward Mitchell Johnson as a key to the Australian team’s fortunes. Johnson maintained a very close relationship with Cooley, but the countless hours they spent together did not always result in fruitful spells on the field.”I thought Mitchell had his head in a really good space in Bangladesh,” McDermott said. “If he can get it together he’s like no other bowler we’ve got in the country. His arm speed is phenomenal and when he gets it right, he’s unplayable. He was working on a couple of things in Bangladesh and if he gets it right he will bowl well and he’ll be around for a long time.”In the 15 years since his retirement from international cricket in 1996, McDermott has tried various pursuits, not all of them successful. But in recent times he had worked as a pace bowling coach at the Centre of Excellence in Brisbane, and was taken to Bangladesh as interim pace bowling coach for Australia’s short tour in April, where he gelled successfully with the players.”Not everything is a quick fix. It’s a long-term thing. Certainly I’d like to put an emphasis on that part of our bowling,” McDermott said of encouraging Australia’s bowlers to pursue a fuller length. “If you pitch it up you’re a much better chance of getting lbws, caught behinds and clean bowleds.”We’ve got more than enough (bowling) depth for Australia to be top in all three forms of the game. It’s a challenging time but I enjoy a challenge.”McDermott was chosen out of an initial field that included Jason Gillespie and Andy Bichel in addition to Donald and the little-known Allister de Winter, with his previous involvement in the Australian system a major selling point. A long and successful Test career, in which he took 291 wickets across 71 matches and excelled in a wide variety of conditions, also helped.”His impressive record as an international player, during which he successfully overcame a number of setbacks, combined with his recent record at the Cricket Australia Centre of Excellence and with the Australia team in Bangladesh, all impressed us that he was the outstanding candidate for this role,” said Brown. “He will provide valuable support to the new Test Captain, Michael Clarke, coach Tim Nielsen, and the playing group.”Justin Langer, retained as batting coach the same day McDermott was appointed, quantified the Queenslander’s value.”He had an unbelievable work ethic when he played,” Langer told . “He played in an era with some great players and also a tough era. He went through the AB times and the Bobby Simpson times. That experience will be invaluable.”I think he’ll also bring quite a worldliness to the group, because he obviously went away from the cricket scene for some time and had varying degrees of fortune in his business life. He’ll bring that worldliness to the group, which I think is pretty invaluable in this day and age.”Often young professionals now, they gain this change-room existence where they come in and they become professional cricketers and all they really get to know is the change-room and their team-mates. I think any outside sources or influences who can talk to them about life after cricket and about being a good person off the field, or the different challenges that come with being a professional cricketer and the rewards that come with that, will be valuable.”Donald is now likely to remain with New Zealand where he had begun a fruitful relationship with the national side during the World Cup, while de Winter will go back to preparing the Tasmanian pace attack for their tilt at defending the Sheffield Shield title.

Former Bangladesh captain Akram Khan has been named the chief selector of the national team

ESPNcricinfo staff27-Apr-2011Former Bangladesh captain Akram Khan has been named the chief selector by the board. He will lead a three-man committee that includes Habibul Bashar and Minhajul Abedin, who are also former national captains. The new panel will take charge from June.Akram led Bangladesh to victory in the historical win in the ICC Trophy in 1997, while Bashar led Bangladesh in the 2007 World Cup, where they pulled off surprise wins against South Africa and India. Abedin, who was a part of the playing XI in Bangladesh’s first official ODI in the ’80s, retired after the 1999 World Cup where he averaged 70.00 with two half-centuries – including one against Australia – in four innings.Akram was a member of the outgoing selection committee, whose tenure was not renewed after it ended on April 30. The decision was taken as part of a revamp of the Bangladesh cricket setup, after a disappointing 2011 World Cup performance.Coach Jamie Siddons departed earlier this month, after Bangladesh lost 3-0 to Australia at home, while a host of support staff are either leaving or under review. While bowling coach Ian Pont has already parted ways with Bangladesh cricket, strength and conditioning coach Grant Trafford Luden will stay on for another year. The future prospects of fielding coach Julien Fountain and physio Michael Henry are not yet clear.

25-Jun-2011
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Marcus Trescothick and Kieron Pollard lit up a grey Taunton evening with an exhilarating stand of 68 in 4.5 overs to help Somerset to 177 for 4 off 15 overs in their Friends Life t20 game with Sussex at Taunton.But it proved in vain as a match already reduced to 15 overs a side was abandoned by umpires Nick Cook and Nigel Cowley, who ruled the light too poor to continue with Sussex 40 for 2 off 3.4 overs in reply.Both sides had to settle for a point and a large crowd went away frustrated and disappointed. Eight more balls would have constituted a match and the Duckworth/Lewis method would have decided the outcome, but as it was both sides took one point.Trescothick smashed 87 off 39 balls, with 10 fours and four sixes, after losing the toss, while Pollard marked his first appearance of the season with 40 off 18 deliveries, with three fours and three sixes.Umar Gul was the Sussex bowler to suffer most from Trescothick’s onslaught. His three overs cost 57, while Kirk Wernars’ only over went for 20.Somerset lost Peter Trego and Craig Meschede early on before James Hildreth helped his captain add 62 by scoring 39 off 21 balls. But it was merely an appetiser to the main course which followed when Pollard joined Trescothick to a hero’s welcome from the crowd after Jos Buttler had perished for a first-ball duck.At 109 for 4, the mighty Trinidadian took a few balls to size up the pitch and the opposition then flat-batted Rana Naved for an extraordinary six over long-on.The last 22 balls of the innings saw Pollard and Trescothick plunder 63 runs, sharing five sixes and five fours in that period. After three successive home washouts in the competition it was no more than the Somerset supporters deserved.In reply, Sussex lost Ben Brown to the first ball of their innings, but then kept up with the required Duckworth-Lewis total at the end of each over until Chris Nash was caught at mid-off by Hildreth for 11, miscuing a pull off Steve Kirby.Lou Vincent was unbeaten on 22 and his team required nine off two balls to be ahead on D/L, but before the next batsman could get to the wicket the umpires took the players off. Soon it was raining steadily and there was no chance of a restart.

Somerset extended their lead at the top of the Clydesdale Bank 40 Group C table but they had to settle for a point after no result was possible in their clash with Lancashire Lightning at Old Trafford

18-Jul-2011
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Somerset extended their lead at the top of the Clydesdale Bank 40 Group C table but they had to settle for a point after no result was possible in their clash with Lancashire Lightning at Old Trafford.Rain throughout the day in Manchester prevented play starting until 8.15pm, which meant the clash was reduced to 15 overs per side. But there was more wet weather to come after 7.4 overs of Lancashire’s innings with the hosts struggling at 39 for 3 on a turning track.Somerset, last year’s runners-up, may have moved one point clear of Essex after six matches but this result ended their 100 percent record in this year’s competition. Spinners Murali Kartik, Max Waller and Arul Suppiah bowled 5.4 of the 7.4 overs – with the former two taking the new ball.Indian Kartik, a former Lancashire overseas player, struck with the sixth ball of the match when he had Stephen Moore caught at point by Craig Meschede. Lightning stand-in captain Steven Croft, who had earlier won the toss, hit two boundaries off Waller’s first over but he and his partners failed to find the fence again until the seventh over when he pulled Meschede’s medium pace to the fence twice.During that time opener Karl Brown became the second wicket to go, trapped lbw by Alfonso Thomas for one to leave the score at 15 for 2 in the third over. Paul Horton struggled for any rhythm during his innings of 7 not out off 17 balls and he lost Croft lbw to the legspin of Waller the ball before the rain arrived as Jordan Clark made his way to the crease.Croft, whose side have only won two of their six matches, finished with 26 off 18 balls. Kartik claimed figures of 1 for 6 from two overs, and Thomas 1 for 1 from one over.

If Yorkshire go on to suffer relegation this year, they may well come to rue the opening day of this match

George Dobell at Edgbaston23-Aug-2011
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If Yorkshire go on to suffer relegation this year, they may well come to rue the opening day of this match.This was a day of missed opportunities for the hosts. Despite winning first use of a blameless pitch and despite facing an attack decimated by injury and international calls, Yorkshire squandered their opportunity to set-up a match-defining position. It sums up their performance that they were dismissed just three runs short of gaining a third batting bonus point. Such profligacy may come back to haunt them.The frustration, from a Yorkshire perspective, was that they did the hard work. Several of their batsmen made decent starts, but none of them could provide the imposing total their side required and nearly all of them played a role in their own dismissal. From a platform of 120 for1, it was a disappointing effort.By contrast, Warwickshire could feel well satisfied with their day’s work. The visitors were missing their three leading Championship wicket-takers – Chris Woakes and Boyd Rankin are absent on international duty and Rikki Clarke has a back injury – convincing them to take-on Essex’s Chris Wright, who has signed until the end on season on loan, and utilise their director of cricket, Ashley Giles, as 12th man until reinforcements arrived from Birmingham.Yet, somehow, the makeshift side combined the dismiss Yorkshire for a score that may well turn out to be at least 100 under par. Defying their lack of experience, they turned in a professional performance that did much to explain the differing positions of these two sides in the Championship table. In terms of talent, Yorkshire surely have the edge. In terms of application, they could learn much from Warwickshire.As Giles put it: “We’re four down from the side that played last week – six if you include Trott and Bell – but we found different guys to get the job done today. That’s what good squads do.”While Andrew Miller was not selected as Warwickshire felt he’d had insufficient bowling after coming back from a recent knee injury, Giles’ decision to select Wright surely bodes ill for Naqaash Tahir. Naqaash, a highly skilled swing bowler, is out of contract in a month and has already made his last appearance for Warwickshire. The 27-year-old played a valuable role in the 2004 Championship success and remains a dangerous bowler when the conditions – or perhaps more pertinently his mood – allow. But the suspicion remains that he has promised a little more than he has delivered and that he has not always embrace the training regime that Giles requires. He may yet forge a decent career elsewhere.If Naqaash is Warwickshire’s past, Keith Barker may well play a significant part in the future. It was 24-year-old Barker who produced the key performance of the day, claiming 4 for 73 from 23 impressive overs.Barker is an interesting cricketer. Having pursued a career in football, he played almost no cricket between the age of 16 and 21. He is fast making up for lost time, however, and with an ability to swing the ball at pace and score Championship centuries, it is far from impossible that he’ll be interesting the England selectors before too long.Perhaps, had fate taken a slightly different course, he might have done so already. Barker, the God son of former West Indies captain Clive Lloyd, was a highly promising young cricketer who some at Lancashire wanted to sign at 14. Alas, officialdom intervened and a decision was made that the club shouldn’t offer him a contract until he was 16. By the time they did make him a firm offer – two years later – it was too late. He had signed for Blackburn Rovers two days earlier.He bowled very well here. Swinging the ball consistently, he also generated more pace than any of his colleagues from this gentle surface. More importantly, he claimed four good wickets. Jacques Rudolph was punished for playing across one which straightened, Joe Sayers was bowled off the inside edge as he pushed at one that left him, Gerard Brophy edged a quicker ball that surprised him for pace and Richard Pyrah was bowled by one that nipped back between bat and pad. On a surface offering little assistance, that represented high quality bowling.Wright also impressed. Maintaining a tight line and length, he bowled at a decent pace and probed around on off-stump waiting for mistakes. There will be days when he has to wait far longer, but against a Yorkshire side who appear to have lost their traditional ability to graft for runs, he was soon rewarded when Joe Root, who clearly oozes ability, spoiled his pleasing innings by playing horribly across a straight one and Anthony McGrath felt for one outside off stump and edged to slip. It will have done Wright’s claim for a longer-term contract no harm at all.Chris Metters, the left-arm spinner who was playing for Devon this time last year, also claimed three wickets, though he would probably accept he was a little flattered by that haul. Adil Rashid cut a long-hop to point, Gary Ballance turned an innocuous delivery straight into the hands of short-leg before David Wainwright, out of contract in a few weeks and keen to secure more first team cricket, ended his impressive innings by missing a horrid swing to leg. All three batsmen had played very nicely up to that point, but all three would have been immensely disappointed at the soft nature of their dismissals.And that was the story of the day. Yorkshire surrendered their opportunities a bit too easily and Warwickshire accepted them with delight. The hosts’ batting – weakened as it is – suggests this game is far from over, but Yorkshire will have to toughen up substantially if they are to avoid relegation.

The large gathering of former Sussex players at Hove on Friday would not have been impressed by the efforts of the current crop to stave off defeat by County Championship title hopefuls Durham

02-Sep-2011
Scorecard
The large gathering of former Sussex players at Hove on Friday would not have been impressed by the efforts of the current crop to stave off defeat by County Championship title hopefuls Durham.The visitors batted on until tea before declaring on 366 for seven with a lead of 520, and at the close Sussex were 119 for 4. The old boys were present for a lunchtime ceremony which involved re-naming the pavilion and most of them stayed for a surreal evening session played mostly in a swirling mist.Durham could have been made to look foolish for batting on so long, but although the umpires consulted once they decided to stay on and the last few overs were played in sunshine. Chris Nash fell lbw to Callum Thorp for four in the second over after tea.In the fifth over Graham Onions pinned Luke Wells in front to make it 25 for two, but Ed Joyce and Murray Goodwin put on 46 with relative comfort before both surrendered to Ian Blackwell. Blackwell came on when the mist was at its worst and struck in his fourth over when he defeated Goodwin’s attempted sweep to gain the third lbw verdict.Six overs from the close Blackwell was handed a second wicket when Joyce pulled him to Scott Borthwick at deep square leg to depart for 57. Nightwatchman James Anyon kept Matt Prior company to the close, although the latter was lucky to survive an airy drive at Borthwick in the final over when on 21.All Durham’s top six, other than the injured Michael Di Venuto, earlier helped themselves to relatively easy runs. Resuming on 93 without loss, they added 107 in the morning and 166 in the afternoon. Although he was on the field throughout both sessions, South African Wayne Parnell was kept out of the Sussex attack as they looked ahead to Sunday’s Clydesdale Bank 40 semi-final at The Oval.Durham face a four-hour trip to Taunton for their semi-final and will hope to wrap things up swiftly tomorrow. Occasional off-spinner Nash got through 27 overs to take four for 103 and Monty Panesar picked up his first two wickets of the match.Opener Will Smith, on 54 overnight, went on to complete his third century of the season off 192 balls. As soon as he reached his hundred he looked to accelerate and in trying to paddle Panesar to fine leg he fell lbw.Paul Collingwood drove Panesar for a big six over long-on, but in going for a repeat he fell slightly short and was caught by Amjad Khan for 51. Blackwell made 61 off 68 balls before he was stumped by Ben Brown off the bowling of Nash.

Virat Kohli played his finest Twenty20 innings but it was the little-known Arun Karthik who delivered the knockout blow

Siddarth Ravindran at the Chinnaswamy Stadium05-Oct-2011One of the allures of the Champions League Twenty20 is the chance it gives for the little guy on the big stage. None of the obscure domestic cricketers grabbed the opportunity as dramatically as 25-year-old Arun Karthik. He thwacked the final ball of the match over midwicket to conjure a preposterous win, which took Royal Challengers Bangalore through to the semi-finals, and set off on a memorable chest-thumping celebration. That will be the abiding image of Royal Challengers’ victory over South Australia, and perhaps of the league phase of the CLT20.There was another moment to define the game though. It was in the 13th over of the chase, in the middle of an audacious counterattack by Virat Kohli and Tillakaratne Dilshan. Kohli punched the air angrily after drilling a full toss to long-off for a single. After completing the run, he chastised himself and practised the off-drive again. Annoyance at missing out on a hit-me ball is one thing, but Kohli had missed out on the fourth ball of the over after striking the first three for six, six and four. It was that sort of a match, where no amount of runs seemed enough.Kohli had played a couple of blinders for the Royal Challengers in the CLT20 last year, and was second only to Chris Gayle in amassing runs in the IPL this season, but this 36-ball 70 ranks as his finest Twenty20 innings. There were several challenges to deal with in this high-pressure must-win game: no IPL team had ever beaten an Australian side in the CLT20, only a handful of times had a target in excess of 200 been successfully hunted down, and finally Gayle, the man whose form has closely mirrored that of the Royal Challengers this year, had been dismissed relatively cheaply.After Gayle and Dilshan had provided the initial thrust, Kohli came out and utterly dominated the high-octane century stand with Dilshan, which kept the chase on course. Of the first 74 runs of the partnership, Kohli’s contribution was 61, a big chunk of which came off his favourite Twenty20 stroke – the inside-out lofted drive in the arc stretching from long-off to deep extra cover. There were dabs past third man for four, hard-run twos after tucking the ball softly towards the deep, and no ugly across-the-line heaves were attempted.Virat Kohli made a vital 70 from 36 balls•Associated PressBy the time Kohli was dismissed, the pair had taken Royal Challengers to 165 for 2, with an eminently gettable 50 needed off the final five overs. “We were pumped up, to want to play like me and Dilshan did, you need some sort of adrenaline,” Kohli at the post-match press conference, with the sound of the Royal Challengers celebrating still being heard. “I was really excited since we were hitting the sixes at the right time and probably the best T20 match of my life.”Still to complete the job after Kohli’s dismissal, Royal Challengers needed some amazing hits and most of their batsmen delivered. Saurabh Tiwary bludgeoned Tait for a 99-metre six over long-on, Mayank Agarwal pummelled his first ball over the extra-cover boundary, Daniel Vettori flicked one way beyond midwicket, and S Aravind played an immensely courageous scoop in the final over for four. Despite all that, it came down to nine off three balls, at which stage Kohli says he lost hope.”I didn’t (think we could win),” he said. “I was sitting with the coach and we needed seven off two, and I told him, ‘coach if we get four off this ball, and two off the last ball, just run, I think we are going to make it,’ when we got a single, I just closed my eyes, and said coach whatever happens, happens.”Then came Karthik’s moment of magic, and the crowd went berserk. The Royal Challengers were also delirious, mobbing Karthik, who couldn’t stop bouncing up and down after the match-sealing six. Kohli, an animated presence in the dug-out since his dismissal, charged out and was the first to pluck some stumps as souvenirs. “None of us can still believe that, especially since it was a quarter-final for us, to be able to play like that was a team’s delight, a coach’s delight, a player’s delight, all in all a wonderful experience.”Royal Challengers may have emphatically proven they can win without Gayle turning in a headlining performance, but their shoddy fielding and toothless bowling remain a cause for worry. For their fans and the team, those concerns can wait for another day as they savoured a famous win.

Chris Doig, the former New Zealand Cricket CEO, has died in Christchurch

ESPNcricinfo staff13-Oct-2011Chris Doig, the former New Zealand Cricket CEO, has died in Christchurch at the age of 62. Doig had struggled with cancer for some time before his death. He had headed the New Zealand board for six years, before Martin Snedden took over in 2001.Doig had also previously worked on the New Zealand Rugby Union board, was active with New Zealand Rowing and was a prominent opera singer who founded Southern Opera. He was made a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit in June.Paying tribute to Doig, New Zealand prime minister John Key said this was a loss to the country’s sports and art fields. “Chris has had a remarkable career in the arts and in sport,” Key said. “His commitment to cricket and to rugby, and to the city of Christchurch, has been truly breathtaking.”NZC’s current chief executive Justin Vaughan praised Doig’s contribution to cricket in New Zealand. “It was an honour and a privilege to have known Chris, ” he said . “He was a great servant of New Zealand Cricket and an insightful and astute administrator. He will be fondly remembered for his contributions not only to cricket but his service to other sports, the arts and the community.”

A series of lower order partnerships allowed Victoria to set Western Australia 362 to win the Sheffield Shield match at the MCG

ESPNcricinfo staff13-Nov-2011Western Australia 218 and 1 for 22 trail
ScorecardA series of lower order partnerships allowed Victoria to set Western Australia 362 to win the Sheffield Shield match at the MCG. The Warriors lost Marcus Harris to Jayde Herrick before the close, which arrived at 1 for 22.WA had hoped for early breakthroughs and a slimmer chase when day three began, and the Bushrangers slipped to 5 for 80 then 6 for 145 after the loss of Rob Quiney, to keep the window open.However the wicketkeeper Matthew Wade maintained his outstanding run with the bat to carve out 60, and the allrounder Glenn Maxwell made a fighting 72 to frustrate the visitors.