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On the same day that Sri Lanka fast bowler Shaminda Eranga was hospitalised in Ireland, he was also suspended from bowing in international cricket

ESPNcricinfo staff19-Jun-20160:59

Eranga’s bowling action ruled illegal

On the same day that Sri Lanka fast bowler Shaminda Eranga was hospitalised for experiencing an elevated heartbeat, he was also suspended from bowling in international cricket for an illegal action.Eranga had been reported for a suspect action after the second Test against England at Chester-le-Street in May. He was evaluated at Loughborough on June 6 and results showed his elbow exceeded the permitted 15 degrees of flex in all of his deliveries.The ICC allows a bowler suspected of an illegal action to continue playing international cricket until the results of biomechanical testing on his bowling action are released. Hence, Eranga was able to take part in the third Test against England at Lord’s. He opened the bowling in both innings and picked up a match haul of 4 for 152.Now, however, Eranga cannot bowl for his country until he gets his action approved by an ICC-accredited testing centre. This comes as a blow to Sri Lanka, who have already lost Dhammika Prasad and Dushmantha Chameera to injury. With Eranga unavailable, Sri Lanka have three specialist seam bowlers, to go with two seam-bowling allrounders, to play England in the ODI series due to begin in Nottingham on Tuesday.Eranga can continue playing domestic cricket in his home country, with the permission of Sri Lanka Cricket.

Jack Taylor, the Gloucestershire allrounder, has been passed to resume bowling his offspin by the ECB

ESPNcricinfo staff03-Aug-2016Jack Taylor, the Gloucestershire allrounder, has been passed to resume bowling his offspin by the ECB. Taylor was suspended in June after being found to have an illegal action for the second time in his career.Taylor underwent remedial work after his bowling action was found to exceed 15 degrees. He was re-tested on July 28 and the ban has now been lifted with immediate effect.Even without his bowling, Taylor has continued to feature in Gloucestershire’s middle order. The 24-year-old has scored 602 runs at 43.00 in the Championship this season – behind only Chris Dent – and made his highest T20 score of 44 not out last week to help Gloucestershire top the NatWest Blast South Group table.He was previously called in 2013, missing the rest of the season to remodel his action with the help of Gloucestershire and the ECB’s national academy in Loughborough, before being cleared to resume bowling in February 2014.

Brothers Union players met BCB chief executive Nizamuddin Chowdhury on Tuesday to inform the board they were not yet paid their dues for playing in the 2016 Dhaka Premier League

Mohammad Isam02-Aug-2016Brothers Union players met BCB chief executive Nizamuddin Chowdhury on Tuesday to inform the board they were not yet paid their dues for playing in the 2016 Dhaka Premier League.Brothers Union are the second club after Victoria Sporting Club to meet the CEO for not being paid in time. The Victoria players still remain unpaid despite their complaint on June 23. Six days later, the BCB paid the players from Kalabagan Cricket Academy and Cricket Coaching School a partial amount after the teams received little from their respective clubs.The DPL players were supposed to be paid 30% of the full amount before the tournament started on April 22, the next 30% by the end of the first phase and the last 40% by August 3, six weeks following the end of the Super League. However, according to the Brothers Union players, most of them weren’t paid after the first instalment.
Nafees Iqbal, Shahriar Nafees, Nabil Samad were among the players who met Chowdhury.”Most of the players have been paid 30%,” Nafees said. “While we should have received our full amount by now, we haven’t even been paid our second instalment till now. We have informed the BCB’s chief executive about this. The board have been strict in this matter, and have paid two clubs before Eid.”The Premier League is the source of income for most of the professional players in the country. So if we are not paid properly, it would make our livelihood difficult.”Chowdhury said the board will tackle the discrepancy this week, and would strive to settle the issue “amicably”.”Players from Brothers Union club met me today. We contacted the club recently. We had given the players an assurance when they came under the players-by-choice process of transfer. We are trying to amicably settle the situation with the club, which means that we want them to pay the players. We are hoping this will be settled soon otherwise the board will take its own action.”We told the players that we will speak to the club this week. If we don’t get anything satisfactory out of it, we will take the action as per the BCB president’s earlier statement,” he said.Nafees said the Brothers Union officials haven’t lived up to their assurance of clearing some payment before Eid last month. “We haven’t really heard from them at this moment. They had told us that we will get some payment before Eid but that was a long time ago. We haven’t had any discussions with the club since then,” he said.Nafees, though, said the clubs were limited by irregular earnings and having to rely on donations.”The clubs said that they wanted player-by-choice to reduce the high player payment in the DPL, because it was becoming hard for them to pay players. We have usually sacrificed 10-15 per cent of our payment almost every year. We know that clubs don’t have a permanent source of income, and they have made a lot of sacrifices for the players. They run on donations.”But if they still can’t pay the players after going by the new system, it becomes very hard for the players. We became hopeful after the board president said that they will take responsibility if the clubs are lazy in payment, and this is why we came to the board,” Nafees said.

Kent kept up the pressure on second division leaders Essex after wrapping up a convincing victory by an innings and 127 runs over Sussex

ECB Reporters Network02-Sep-2016
ScorecardHardus Viljoen picked up six wickets in the match as Kent rolled on (file photo)•Getty Images

Kent kept up the pressure on second division leaders Essex after wrapping up a convincing victory by an innings and 127 runs over Sussex in the Specsavers County Championship. Their first Championship win at Hove since 1992 moved Kent on to 195 points, the same number as Essex – who are pushing for victory themselves against Worcestershire at Chelmsford – had at the start of the round.Kent will be hoping that Worcestershire’s batsmen show more application than Sussex’s managed on the third morning as they tamely surrendered eight wickets in 27.5 overs, several of them to questionable shots. Kent seamers Mitch Claydon, Hardus Viljoen and Matt Coles took three wickets each as Sussex suffered their first Championship defeat of the season to end their own slim chance of making a late charge for promotion.Their hopes of making Kent work for victory depended largely on the experienced Chris Nash and Luke Wells but both fell within 30 minutes of the resumption. Nash got a beauty from Viljoen which pitched and left him off the seam but Wells tried to cut a ball that he should have left alone and gave second slip Coles a head-high catch. He wasn’t the only Sussex batsman with poor judgement outside off stump.None suggested they were in the mood to get their head down thereafter. Coles found some extra bounce to have Fynn Hudson-Prentice caught off the glove and Craig Cachopa gave a catch to wicketkeeper Sam Billings, moving in front of first slip.Skipper Ben Brown could consider himself unfortunate when he played on to a ball from Darren Stevens that hardly bounced and by then it was only a case of whether Sussex might hold on until rain arrived at lunch time. But their tail offered little resistance. Ollie Robinson guided a ball at least a yard outside off stump from Coles to third man, Danny Briggs was pinned by Claydon’s nip-backer and with lunch delayed after the ninth wicket fell Claydon wrapped things up when last man Steve Magoffin was caught behind. Only Nash batted for longer than an hour.Kent head to Beckenham next week where victory over Northamptonshire could set up a potential winner-takes-all promotion decider against Essex at Canterbury on September 20.

Persistent rain and a wet outfield resulted in an early call-off without a ball bowled on the final day of India A’s tour to Australia as the second unofficial Test in Brisbane ended in a draw

ESPNcricinfo staff18-Sep-2016
ScorecardFile photo – Hilton Cartwright was awarded the Man of the Match for his 117 in the first innings•BCCI

Persistent rain and a wet outfield resulted in an early call-off without a ball bowled on the final day of India A’s tour of Australia as the second unofficial Test in Brisbane ended in a draw.India A had ended the third day at 4 for 158, still 108 behind Australia A’s first-innings score of 435. India A had responded strongly with a 82-run opening stand before they lost four wickets for 16 runs.Hilton Cartwright, who struck his second first-class century in the game, was awarded the Man of the Match for his 117.Australia A won the two-match series 1-0 having won the first unofficial Test by three wickets.

A round-up of the final day of Group A matches in the second round of the 2016-17 Ranji Trophy

ESPNcricinfo staff16-Oct-2016Railways collapsed dramatically on the final day in Bilaspur as Tamil Nadu won by 174 runs – their first win of the season. Railways had picked up a 52-run first-innings lead. Tamil Nadu made up for their abject first-innings performance with 452 for 8 declared, courtesy centuries from captain Abhinav Mukund and Dinesh Karthik. Set 401, Railways had ended the third day on 108 for no loss, but crumbled for 226 in 57.2 overs on the final day. Railways lost Shivakant Shukla on his overnight score of 52 off the fourth ball of the day, and from there on, it was a continuous slide. Saurabh Wakaskar, who resumed on 54, struck 120 for his sixth first-class century, but the rest could not deliver and Railways lost their last five wickets for four runs. Offspinner Malolan Rangarajan led the wreckage, finishing with 4 for 37.At the CH Bansi Lal Cricket Stadium in Lahli, Madhya Pradesh folded for 180 in their second innings to give Punjab a 126-run win. Punjab had declared on 175 for 9, having taken a first-innings lead of 131. Set a target of 307, MP had lost Mukul Raghav off the last ball of the previous day. Resuming on 26 for 1, they soon found themselves 74 for 4. Devendra Bundela (32), the captain, and Shubham Sharma, who top-scored with 37, got together for a 50-run stand, but that was about as much resistance as MP could offer. Manpreet Gony (4 for 41) and Siddarth Kaul (3 for 42), Punjab’s new-ball bowlers, did the bulk of the damage.The match between Baroda and Mumbai at the Palam Grounds in New Delhi was a draw. Mumbai had eked out a lead of 18 runs in a thrilling end to their first innings, responding to Baroda’s 305 with 323, thanks to Akhil Herwadkar’s century.The final day began with Baroda on 321 for 5 in their second innings, and Deepak Hooda, batting on 66, and Swapnil Singh, unbeaten on 5, at the crease. Baroda added 62 more and declared on 383 for 5, after Hooda raised his fifth first-class century.Mumbai began strongly through their top three, with Herwadkar and Jay Bista (49) putting on 68 for the opening wicket, and Shreyas Iyer scoring 46 at No. 3. Suryakumar Yadav and Armaan Jaffer fell early, but Aditya Tare, the captain, saw off the remaining overs in the company of Abhishek Nayar. Tare was not out on 63 and Mumbai were 224 for 5 when stumps were drawn.Bengal collected first-innings points against Uttar Pradesh after playing out a draw at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium in Jaipur. Bengal had put up 466 in the first innings, courtesy centuries from Abhimanyu Easwaran and Manoj Tiwary. UP narrowly missed the first-innings lead, getting bowled out for 410, after which Bengal ended the third day on 30 for no loss. Easwaran struck his second century of the match and stayed not out on 110, while Shreevats Goswami also scored a century of his own. After Goswami’s dismissal, for an even 100, Bengal declared on 274 for 6. Chinaman bowler Kuldeep Yadav followed up his five-wicket haul in the first innings with 4 for 107.Tanmay Shrivastava and Almas Saukat, the UP openers, batted out 20 overs before UP went to stumps on 70 for no loss.

In what will be his 20th Test match as captain, Virat Kohli is yet to field the same XI in consecutive games

Alagappan Muthu in Mohali25-Nov-20162:21

Span of eight days too short to analyse DRS – Kohli

Virat Kohli will captain his 20th Test match on Saturday and he is yet to field the same XI in consecutive games. Sometimes that choice has been taken away from him – Mohali being the latest example where India’s first-choice wicketkeeper Wriddhiman Saha will not be available due to injury.Other times the changes were tactical. The inclusion of Bhuvneshwar Kumar in St Lucia and Kolkata earlier this year on pitches that looked like they would seam is one such instance. There was also the Cheteshwar Pujara v Rohit Sharma debate that dominated the 2015-16 season. Both, India’s players and the management appear to be comfortable with such an environment, where a change in conditions could mean someone’s skills become surplus to the team’s cause.

Kohli responds

On ball-tampering allegations: I think it’s just to take the focus away from the series. It happened in Australia when South Africa won the series. I’m surprised the issue came up in Rajkot but there was no mention of it until the Vizag game was over. To me a newspaper article doesn’t matter over the decision of ICC. We as cricketers respect that only. If I was doing something, ICC would have spoken to me.
On umpire’s call in DRS: A lot of people don’t understand it. If the on-field umpire has made the call, then obviously the benefit has to go to him, what his vision of the decision was and then DRS just confirms that particular decision. If it is really, really off, then DRS corrects it but if it is marginal, then you got to respect it.
India’s progress with DRS: We are going to get better with using it. We are going to understand it and actually figure out where the ball has hit the pad and sometimes you feel like you have less time to review, but you do actually have more time. So those are the sort of things we will be more aware of going forward but a span of two games is very little to judge how we have gone so far with DRS.

Kohli explained the horses-for-courses approach was a conscious decision. “This is something that we made pretty clear when we lost the game in Galle [against Sri Lanka in 2015]. After that we had a pretty clear chat that we are going to play people that we think are suitable for different venues.”Even the batting order changes; I have gone up and down the order as well and other batsmen are keen to do it as well. I think it sends the message across, that the eventual motive is for the team to win.”While he has always wanted to bat higher, R Ashwin’s success at No. 6 also falls into the category of India’s players taking up the challenge of unfamiliar batting positions.Pujara made a century as a makeshift opener in seamer-friendly conditions at the SSC in Colombo last year. Ajinkya Rahane made one at No. 3 on a different ground in the same city. Kohli did the same in the Caribbean, moving to one drop after making a double-century at No. 4. Each of them adjusted because India wanted Rohit in their XI.Still, there is an argument that players might prefer a little job security. Kohli appreciated that his men were willing to look past that.”Every player needs to buy into the idea and it makes it easier as captain and the management if players agree to it – and they have,” Kohli said. “They have been pretty good with it and that’s why if you see someone stepping in for a game or two, they take it as an opportunity and have actually given match-winning performances.”It’s not like they are taking the pressure off not knowing whether they will play the next game. It’s all about focussing on that particular game and staying in the present and it has been really wonderful to see it and we just want to carry that forward.”Parthiv Patel is in such a situation. Coming back into Test cricket for the first time in eight years, he may only play for India till Saha recovers from his thigh strain. At the moment, that is only one match.”Parthiv understands the situation he’s in,” Kohli said. “I’m pretty glad he respects that and he’s still looking forward to the opportunity and try to make a mark. He knows when we plan to take two wicketkeepers away. This is the opportunity.”

Sri Lanka fast bowler Nuwan Kulasekara said the step up in class facing the West Indies pace attack provided a stiffer challenge than what his side faced in the tri-series opener against Zimbabwe

Liam Brickhill in Harare16-Nov-2016Sri Lanka barely broke a sweat while easing past Zimbabwe in the Tri-Series opener, but West Indies’ pace and bounce proved a rather more testing assignment in their second match, with Sri Lanka bowled out for 165 in pursuit of West Indies’ 227. Nuwan Kulasekara said that the Sri Lankans will have to adjust as quickly as possible to the varying attacks if they are to bounce back when the series moves to Bulawayo.”Zimbabwe, they have talent, but they tend to bowl 120 to 130 kph,” Kulasekara said. “West Indies’ bowlers have height that gives them bounce, and [Shannon] Gabriel always bowls 140 plus. [Jason] Holder bowled really nicely today too, getting that outswing. You just have to adjust as soon as possible. That’s the main thing. We have to improve for the next few matches in the batting department, because they have height and get bounce on these wickets.”Kulasekara is returning to international duty with Sri Lanka after 10 months on the sidelines, and his own returns from his first two matches have been decent. Displaying good control with the new ball, he picked up two wickets against West Indies to go with his two in the first match against Zimbabwe, and also removed Kraigg Brathwaite and Holder with direct hits in the field.”I’ve been doing even more fielding practices with my fielding coach, and I always try my best,” Kulasekara said. “My last game was against New Zealand in January. It’s nice to come back to the side. I’ve been very happy with my performances in the last two games.”With the experience of 175 ODIs to draw from, Kulasekara has slotted back into this Sri Lankan touring squad as a senior. This is also his fourth tour of Zimbabwe, and he has been very willing to share his knowledge of conditions in the country with the less experienced members of his team.”As seniors, we always discuss [game plans] with the younger players. I played two matches in Bulawayo in 2010, the wickets there are much flatter than Harare. Slow and low bounce. You have to adjust as a batsman, and we’ll have to bowl different lengths in Bulawayo. We’ll make our plans in the next few days for that.At 34, Kulasekara is also philosophical about his own place in the side. “Yeah, there’s always pressure that comes with playing for the national team. So youngsters come in, and they put pressure on the senior players. Senior players go into retirement, and youngsters come and grab their places. That’s the way it goes.”

The India captain wanted at least a month’s time to get used to conditions, but only a short stint might be possible with current schedules

Sidharth Monga in Chennai15-Dec-20163:44

Kohli trying to make county stint happen

Virat Kohli has said he would love to play county cricket in the lead-up to the tour of England in 2018, but only a short stint might be possible with current schedules. Kohli wanted at least a month’s time to get used to conditions, but the IPL ends in the last week of May, and India tours to the UK generally start in the last week of June.”If I have a chance, I would love to do that; love to be there, say a month or a month and a half and get used to playing in those conditions, understand how the wickets behave in that particular phase of the year,” Kohli said. “I think those things matter a lot. Preparation time is something, which is very crucial for any side. So yeah, if I have the opportunity to go there a few days before the start that will be great. I have actually been thinking about it, trying to work out how I can make it happen. Most definitely, if I have the time I’ll go and play there.”This was a great sign from the captain of a side that had become blasé about the lack of preparation time before Test tours in the recent years. If Kohli manages to squeeze in even a couple of county games before the first Test in 2018 – as opposed to nothing – he would be better equipped to handle the swing and seam prevalent in English grounds. In the 2014 tour, Kohli scored 134 runs at 13.4 in India’s 3-1 defeat.India have bounced back from that crisis with five successive series wins, but Kohli knew the regrouping won’t be complete, that his side won’t match his ambition, until it did well in certain conditions.”We still understand we have to play a lot of cricket everywhere in the world,” he said. “It’s not only about this one period we are going through. It looks really good because we have come out of transition and immediately started winning games. But I wouldn’t take it as overconfidence. It’s an on-going process, which needs to be sustained for the next five to seven or eight years for us to become a top-quality side and leave a mark on world cricket; maybe be known as one of the best teams to have assembled on the field.”We want to do it across formats and make that mark for Indian cricket on the world stage. But it requires a lot of persistence and skill, a lot of hard work on your fitness, and those are the key factors that will decide where we go as a unit and as a team. We don’t feel invincible, to be honest. We respect every opposition, we admit it every time we are put under pressure, and we know teams are going to put us under pressure. We appreciate that, we accept that and we try to find a way out of it. I think that’s been key for us, and it’s a process that should go on for another seven or eight years.”Virat Kohli enjoyed the rivalry he has with Joe Root, Steven Smith and Kane Williamson•AFP

Kohli spoke of his own batting with similar modesty. He has scored three double-centuries this year, has 640 runs in this series, has played scarcely believable knocks in limited-overs internationals too, and broke every record in the IPL. But he considered Joe Root, Kane Williamson and Steven Smith as better batsmen in Test cricket. Kohli, who was No. 2 on the ICC Test rankings, felt the four of them raising the bar for each other enriched the sport.”They [the fans] put us in a group of young players coming up in world cricket,” Kohli said. “That healthy competition is great for the game. People like talking about it. It is a great topic of debate. I see people enjoy talking about it a lot and they mention it to me as well. “You four-five players are exciting to watch” and those sort of things. You feel good you are in a bunch of batsmen that is taking world cricket forward, not just having that healthy rivalry between us.”As an individual, I don’t focus on those things. It is a massive distraction. When you are going through a good phase, you want see the rankings, you want to see what people are talking about, ‘am I in the race,’ and stuff like that. But you get so addicted to it that when you are not doing well, and saying things backfires and it can really put you down. To me all these are world-class players, and I have always rated each one of them higher than me, in Test cricket especially, because of the way they have performed in the last two or three years.”I understood my limitations and never tried to outdo them in the longest format of the game. In shorter formats, yes, I have been doing very well. I understood what I needed to do in the longest format for me to be able to contribute the maximum for my team. That’s been my aim. My aim was never to go about Joe or Steve or Kane. I respect them equally and I think there is equal amount of respect between all of us, David [Warner] included. All of us understand and like our games.”Kohli has scored runs in Australia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, and the West Indies. If he doesn’t rate himself as highly as the other three in Tests, his performance in England must be the only reason behind it. County cricket could go a long way in correcting it.

The pair helped their side reach 6 for 251 by stumps on the first day

ESPNcricinfo staff01-Feb-2017
ScorecardFile photo – Joe Burns and Marnus Labuschagne shared a stabilising partnership of 127 for the third wicket•Getty Images

Joe Burns and Marnus Labuschagne underpinned a solid day’s batting by Queensland against Tasmania on day one of the Sheffield Shield match at the Gabba in Brisbane.Having been dropped by the Australian selectors earlier in the season, Burns made a well-composed 83 in partnership with Labuschagne after the Bulls had lost a pair of early wickets to the new Dukes ball in the hands of Sam Rainbird and Cameron Stevenson.Labuschagne’s innings was patient with the odd flourish against the short ball as the pair shared a stand of 127 for the third wicket either side of the lunch break.Once they were parted, Sam Truloff and the wicketkeeper captain Chris Hartley worked hard to build the total in the final session, with the latter hoping to help his side pass 300 on the second morning aided by the bowlers. Andrew Perrin, a former Victoria Futures League player, bowled tidily on his Tasmania debut for three wickets.