Odhiambo, Mishra lead Kenya to victory

Hiral Patel heroics with the bat and ball couldn’t save Canada from a four-wicket defeat against Kenya in the Intercontinental Cup

ESPNcricinfo staff21-Mar-2013
Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsHiral Patel’s heroics with the bat and ball couldn’t save Canada from a four-wicket defeat against Kenya in the Intercontinental Cup. Patel struck a doughty 93 on the fourth day, scoring more than half of his side’s second innings total, as the other batsmen fell to Nehemiah Odhiambo’s pace. Canada folded for 175, leaving Kenya a target of 128 for victory.Kenya’s chase was hardly confident; they lost Irfan Karim in the first over and then Patel made inroads with his left-arm spin. It was left to Tanmay Mishra, who followed his first-innings half-century with a calm, unbeaten 38, to steady the Kenya innings and then guide the side to a win.

Lancashire fight for survival to frustrate title-chasing Somerset

Shuffled into middle order, Luke Wells finishes day on 78 not out as Lancashire take control

ECB Reporters Network18-Sep-2024Lancashire’s batters made title-chasing Somerset work for every wicket on the second day of the Vitality County Championship match at Old Trafford and had built a formidable 292-run lead at close of play.Josh Bohannon’s 60 and Luke Wells’ unbeaten 78 enabled the home side to finish on 298 for 7 in their second innings of a match both sides desperately need to win, Lancashire to preserve their hopes of avoiding relegation, Surrey to stay in touch with Surrey at the top of the table.The difference between the first day’s play and the second was immediately apparent during a morning session in which Lancashire scored 90 runs in 27 overs for the loss of only two wickets.On a pitch that had dried out and lost much of the greenness, bowlers had to work harder for their successes and the only batsman dismissed in the first hour was the nightwatchman, Will Williams, who was leg-before wicket to Craig Overton for 7 in the third over of the morning.Harry Singh then added 85 for the third wicket with Bohannon, who batted beautifully to make 60 off 76 balls. However, it was indicative of the problems Bohannon has encountered this season that his half-century was only his fourth innings over fifty in 22 Championship innings.None of which diminished Somerset’s joy in the penultimate over before lunch when Bohannon tried to pull a ball from Kasey Aldridge but only succeeded in diverting it via the toe of the bat to Tom Abell in the gully.On the resumption, Singh and Rocky Flintoff defied Lewis Gregory’s bowlers for 50 minutes until Singh thin-edged a catch to James Rew off Brett Randell to give the New Zealander his first wicket for Somerset.Singh had faced 142 balls during his 260-minute innings of 30 but his patient resistance was not copied by Matty Hurst, who hit three breezy fours in 19 runs before attempting to drive Randell and nicking a catch to Overton at second slip.In the next over, Flintoff was bowled by Jack Leach’s arm-ball for 27 but Well and George Bell saw their side through to 214 for 6 at tea, when Lancashire’s lead was 208. And on the resumption, Wells and Bell extended their seventh-wicket stand to 83 before Bell was bowled for 23 when trying to pull a ball from Gregory that kept low.Wells shifted down into the middle order for this match, having struggled in his usual opening role in recent weeks. Batting as low as No. 7 on account of Williams’ deployment as a nightwatchman, he went on to emulate Bohannon’s feat in passing fifty for only the fourth time this season but his strokeplay was impressive, most noticeably when he hit three off-side boundaries in one over from Gregory.And the day ended with Lancashire in the ascendant. Wells was unbeaten on 78 and Somerset’s fielders appeared aggrieved that George Balderson had not been adjudged run out on 5 when apparently run out by Overton’s throw from slip. The visitors had earlier been penalised five runs for fake fielding.

Lanning on women's Tests: Either play more or don't play at all

“It’s really difficult to prepare for a Test match. In my career, we were playing once every two years,” she says

AAP01-Feb-2024Former Australia captain Meg Lanning would prefer to see women’s Test matches scrapped altogether than continue to have them scheduled sporadically.The longest format of the game is much rarer in the women’s international arena than in the men’s; only 12 Tests have been played worldwide across the last decade.Each featured combinations of Australia, England, India and South Africa, with other nations reluctant to prioritise Tests over white-ball matches given the financial challenges of the former and rising popularity of the latter.New Zealand, West Indies and Pakistan have all been absent from the Test arena since 2004 but even the sides that have participated more recently have only done so in one-off matches.”It’s really difficult to prepare for a Test match,” Lanning said. “In my career, we were playing once every two years. It takes us two days to work out how to play it again, and then the Test is over.”If you really want the games to be a good contest and more nations to play and players to understand the game a little bit more, I think we probably need to play more. Or you go the other way and you don’t play any at all and you focus on the short-format stuff.”In December, the unfamiliarity of the format was laid bare for the all-conquering Australian women’s team, which was thrashed by eight wickets in a standalone match against India in Mumbai. Australia will host South Africa for a Test at the WACA Ground in mid-February to round out the multi-format tour.It will be Australia’s third Test in the past 12 months but Lanning still feels the product will suffer if Tests are only scheduled as an afterthought to white-ball series.Lanning retired from international cricket in November having made 241 appearances for her country but only six of those came in Test matches.Lanning’s comments came after new Australia captain Alyssa Healy called for three-match Test series to be introduced into the women’s game after the loss to India.Cricket Australia chief executive Nick Hockley later said he was a “strong advocate” for more women’s Tests to be played. The last time any sides met for a Test series was when England hosted India for two matches in 2006, but not since 1998 has a three-Test series been played.All but one of Lanning’s Test matches were played against England but the 31-year-old has been heartened to see South Africa and India keener to participate in recent years.”That’s great if that means there can be more Tests in the calendar, I think that’ll happen over time,” she said. “But that’s where I sit on it. It’s either more or you sort of don’t go there at all because I think once every so often is pretty difficult as a player.”Cricket Australia will officially pay tribute to Lanning’s career during the ODI series opener against South Africa at the Adelaide Oval, where former vice-captain Rachael Haynes will also be honoured.Lanning continues to play cricket domestically and will line up for Delhi Capitals in the Women’s Premier League that begins later this month. She said her international retirement had not yet hit home.”Until I probably stop completely, it probably won’t sink in,” she said. “It’s obviously been a different last couple of months, a little bit more time and little bit more quiet to spend with friends and family and sort of take stock a little bit. I’ve enjoyed that.”

Fleming to coach Texas Super Kings in USA's Major League Cricket

Fleming is now the head coach at all three CSK teams, in the IPL, at the SA20, and at the MLC

ESPNcricinfo staff and PTI22-Mar-2023Stephen Fleming will be the head coach of Dallas-based Major League Cricket (MLC) team Texas Super Kings (TSK), who have a partnership with IPL side Chennai Super Kings.Fleming has been the long-serving head coach at CSK, and has guided the team to four IPL titles. He was also the head coach at Joburg Super Kings, a team owned by the same owners as CSK, for the inaugural season of the SA20 league in South Africa.Super Kings joined Kolkata Knight Riders, Delhi Capitals and Mumbai Indians to make it four out of six MLC teams to have owners connected with the IPL – the tournament is scheduled to begin on July 13.Related

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The six MLC teams are San Francisco Unicorns, Los Angeles Knight Riders, MI New York, Seattle Orcas, Texas Super Kings and Washington DC. Capitals, co-owned by GMR Group, are partnering with Seattle Orcas.All six MLC teams completed the domestic player draft at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, where they selected nine players each from more than 100 eligible to represent the “US cricket community”. The rest of the players are going to be filled later.”Cricket is the second-most popular sport in the world with a global fan base of around 2.5 billion followers, but there has not been an opportunity for the sport to grow in the US,” Anurag Jain, co-owner of TSK, said. “We look forward to having a professional team in Texas for the passionate local cricket community to root for and to introduce the sport to new fans across the country.”

Gunathilaka charged for alleged sexual assault, arrested in Sydney

Sri Lanka batter was picked up by the police from the team hotel in Sydney on Sunday morning

ESPNcricinfo staff06-Nov-2022Sri Lanka batter Danushka Gunathilaka has been charged by police after an alleged sexual assault in Sydney’s east. He was arrested in the early hours of Sunday morning from the team hotel in Sydney’s central business district after a police investigation into reports that a 29-year-old woman had been sexually assaulted at a residence in Rose Bay earlier in the week.”The woman met with the man after communicating with him for a number of days via an online dating application; it’s alleged he then sexually assaulted her on the evening of Wednesday 2 November 2022,” a New South Wales police statement said. “As part of ongoing investigations, a crime scene examination was undertaken by specialist police at an address in Rose Bay yesterday.”Following further inquiries, a 31-year-old man was arrested at a hotel on Sussex Street, Sydney, shortly before 1am today (Sunday 6 November 2022).”He was taken to Sydney City Police Station and charged with four counts of sexual intercourse without consent. The Sri Lankan national was refused bail to appear at Parramatta Bail Court via AVL today.”SLC issued a statement on Sunday morning after the news had become public.”Sri Lanka Cricket confirms that it was notified by the ICC that player Danushka Gunathilaka has been arrested on the allegations of sexual assault of a woman in Sydney, and Mr. Gunathilaka is due to appear in court tomorrow (7 November 2022),” the statement said. “SLC will closely monitor the proceedings in court and, in consultation with the ICC, will expeditiously initiate a thorough inquiry into the matter and take stern action against the player if found guilty.”Gunathilaka was ruled out of the T20 World Cup during the first round with a hamstring injury. He was replaced in the squad but remained with the team in Australia. He has played eight Tests, 47 ODIs and 46 T20Is for Sri Lanka since making his international debut in November 2015.Sri Lanka’s tournament ended on Sunday following a defeat in their final group match against England at the SCG.

Raza and Kaia's record-breaking hundreds sink Bangladesh

Zimbabwe chased down a target of 304 with ease and ended a 19-match losing streak in ODIs against this opposition

Mohammad Isam05-Aug-2022Zimbabwe 307 for 5 (Raza 135*, Kaia 110, Mustafizur 1-57) beat Bangladesh 303 for 2 (Litton 81, Anamul 73, Raza 1-48) by five wicketsSikandar Raza and Innocent Kaia struck brilliant centuries to help Zimbabwe beat Bangladesh in an ODI after nine years.The pair added 192 runs for the fourth wicket – breaking a 25-year old partnership record and becoming the new best for Zimbabwe against Bangladesh. Raza and Kaia also became only the second Zimbabwean duo to score centuries in the same ODI innings. To think they actually came together when the score was 62 for 3 and the game was almost slipping away from them.Kaia displayed a refreshing batting approach, concentrating on keeping the ball all along the ground. Still he picked up 11 fours and maintained a strike rate of 90.16 by running himself ragged for those ones and twos. He hit two two sixes over midwicket, but he never tried to out-hit the man of the moment.Raza, recently named Player of the Series at the T20 World Cup qualifier, grabbed the game with both hands and struck 14 boundaries including six sixes, the last of which was the winning hit. He had earlier been their best bowler too, taking 1-48.Bangladesh, who came into this game with a 19-match winning-streak over Zimbabwe, would rue their poor finishing with the bat as they become the fourth team in ODI history to lose a game in which they lost only two wickets.Fifties from Litton Das (81), Anamul Haque (73), Tamim Iqbal (62) and Mushfiqur Rahim (52*) had them sitting pretty, but scoring just 39 runs in the last five overs hurt them. It is only the third time that Bangladesh have lost a game scoring in excess of 300, and the fourth time for Zimbabwe have won one chasing 300-plus.Bangladesh join a forgettable list•ESPNcricinfo Ltd

Things had been so different at the start of the chase. Regis Chakabva barely had any time to soak in the fact that he was the first Zimbabwean to captain, keep wicket and open the batting since Andy Flower in 1996. He chopped a Mustafizur Rahman delivery on to his leg-stump for 2. Tarisai Musakanda skied Shoriful Islam to cover in the next over, and Zimbabwe were suddenly 6 for 2.Wessly Madhevere fended Bangladesh off, with Kaia, adding 56 runs for the third wicket. But the partnership ended disastrously when miscommunication between the two, having seen a fumble out in the deep, resulted in an entirely avoidable run-out.That brought Zimbabwe’s match-winners together and though there were a few iffy moments – substitute Taijul Islam dropped Raza on 43, a simple chance at cover. Kaia was dropped twice in the same Shoriful over on 68 and 74 respectively – they soon settled into rhythm.And when they brought up their 162nd run in tandem, they broke the record for Zimbabwe’s biggest ODI partnership against Bangladesh, eclipsing the Flower brothers, Andy and Grant, effort from October 1997.Raza was the dominant one in the partnership, starting his six-hitting in the 21st over when he hammered Shoriful down the ground. He pulled Taskin over midwicket, took a five-over break between the 25th and the 30th, then smashed Mustafizur straight back over his head to reach his fifty. He thrashed his next six off Mehidy Hasan Miraz, pulled Shoriful over midwicket for good measure and finally sealed the match with 10 balls to spare by carting Mosaddek Hossain over the ropes as well.Luke Jongwe played an important hand (24 off 19) after Kaia got out for 110 in the 42nd over.Tamim couldn’t find a wicket-taker among his bowlers. To make matters worse, Shoriful looked to have hurt his knee. Their gamble to go without a left-arm spinner for the first time against Zimbabwe also hurt them.Bangladesh’s score of 303 for 2 was built around four half-centuries but it was the big partnerships that really helped them. Tamim and Litton added 119 runs, their fourth 100-plus stand as an opening pair. Tamim was the first to fifty, and shortly afterwards when he reached 57 runs, he became the first from Bangladesh to reach 8,000 ODI runs.After Tamim’s departure, Litton got to his seventh fifty, and suddenly got into a groove to hit a cluster of fours and a six to get to 81. But while taking a quick first run, he pulled his hamstring, and had to stretchered off after the second drinks break.Anamul followed the openers with his first fifty for Bangladesh in almost eight years. This was also the innings in which he struck the ball the sweetest since making his comeback this year. Anamul got into the Bangladesh side with a world record 1,138 runs in the domestic List-A tournament, the Dhaka Premier League. He continued on the same vein against Zimbabwe, hitting his tenth one-day fifty in 2022, and this was his sixth in a row in this format.Anamul added 96 runs for the second wicket with Mushfiqur, as the pair got into the last ten overs with a gung-ho approach. But after taking 51 runs between the 41st and 45th, they got only 39 runs in the last five. The Zimbabwe bowlers pulling back the scoring rate was their only success in an innings in which they took just two wickets.

Cricket Australia chief won't back down on drastic staff cuts

Kevin Roberts said the board’s finances could be ‘on a path to zero’ if action wasn’t taken

Daniel Brettig21-Apr-2020Kevin Roberts, the Cricket Australia chief executive, has faced questions from staff about the decisions to stand down all but a handful of employees on 80% wage cuts until July for a saving of only A$3 million in an organisation that has so far faced minimal disruption from the coronavirus pandemic.In an effort to defend CA’s recent decisions and the ways in which they have been communicated amidst waves of dismay from staff, the state associations, the Australian Cricketers Association (ACA) and the game’s broadcast and corporate partners, Roberts spoke to staff and media in quick succession on Tuesday afternoon. He faced similar questions from each group, and in addition to defending the staff stand downs, Roberts is believed to have also conceded to staff that redundancies were a possibility after June 30.At the same time, it is understood there have been significant discussions around Australian cricket about whether to convene state association chief executives, chairs and the ACA under the umbrella of the Australian Cricket Council for alternative approaches to current and future issues. Such a move would serve effectively as a vote of no confidence in the way that Roberts has managed the past few weeks.ALSO READ: Hazlewood calls for Cricket Australia transparency but players prepared to ‘ride the lows’Insisting that the wage cuts were necessary as part of an estimated A$20 million in savings that the governing body had already made, Roberts showed no inclination to revisit a decision that is understood to have been first drafted in March as part of a range of measures to sustain the business. Roberts confirmed, too, that CA is paying its stood down staff the equivalent of JobKeeper (A$1500 per fortnight) because it is not eligible for the government payment as a result of not having actually lost any significant revenue since the pandemic hit towards the very end of the season.”It wasn’t an overreaction because we’re dealing with a situation that’s hitting us unfortunately at the low point of our cash cycle over four years,” Roberts said. “We reach a point in early September where if there’s more shocks as we’ve had over the last month or more, where our reserves are very thin and in fact effectively we’d chart a path to zero if we didn’t take drastic action.”Then you layer on top of that the possibility that the international season doesn’t go ahead, and that’s an issue of hundreds of millions of dollars. Albeit the timing is a little bit different in our season relative to the football codes, we’ve seen across the two major football codes they’ve done four things: one is to secure debt facilities, one is reduce their own costs as leagues, the next is to reduce their funding of clubs and the next is to negotiate a sensible resetting of player payments for the season.”So it’s no surprise to see that blue print rolling out across all sports and that we’re pursuing that as well. If we weren’t doing that, we would be managing this situation by looking in the rear vision mirror and that’s not what we’re charged to do. We’re charged to manage the situation that we’re presented with, and that which we see in the future, so we’re looking forward and taking those actions as we’re required to.”The financial situation at Cricket Australia has escalated in recent days•Getty Images

Roberts also insisted he still had the support of the CA board, the states and his own staff to continue to prepare for a wide range of possible scenarios for the game. The state associations debated and won a backdown from CA on the depth of cuts to their annual grants, from 45% to 25%, a back and forth that strongly suggests major reservations among CA’s owners about the way its management has handled events of recent weeks.”We are all across Australian cricket acknowledging that reductions might need to go to that level but that’s preemptive planning,” Roberts said of states. “What we need is a plan to take 25% of cricket Australia’s operating expenses out next financial year with a further plan to go deeper if need be and something similar with the states and territories. It follows the work around player payments where naturally you have a smaller reduction in player payments if the season goes ahead without crowds and a larger reduction in player payments if the season in part or in full were not to go ahead.”Speaking about his staff, Roberts maintained that the stand downs – while executives and a skeleton staff are retained on 80% of their usual salaries – needed to take place as part of the range of measures the board has taken in preparation for the possibility of losing revenue ahead of next summer.”I feel desperately for our people who have been stood down through this period and emphasised that to them. The pain our people are enduring who are being stood down from next week onwards is part of the motivation for us to navigate this situation as best we can,” Roberts said. “We didn’t start with the stand downs, what we started with was acknowledgement that most activities in cricket needed to pause as a result of the emerging situation, and when you pause those activities you have a lot of people who were previously working on those activities who aren’t required to work on them anymore.”I feel desperately for each and every one of them and I hate the fact we had to move to that after all of the fantastic progress we’ve made as an organisation and our culture, and the outstanding people that we’re so grateful to work with, I hate doing that. Unfortunately, it was an unavoidable piece of the puzzle.”

Shankar, Iyer steer India A home in high-scoring slugfest

Ishan Kishan also contributed handily to the victory after fifties from Hamish Rutherford and James Neesham had helped New Zealand A post 308

ESPNcricinfo staff07-Dec-2018In a 619-run slugfest in Mount Maunganui, Vijay Shankar’s unbeaten 87 and his 116-run fifth-wicket stand with Ishan Kishan steered India A to victory with an over to spare. Shankar’s 80-ball innings, coupled with Kishan’s 47 and a half-century from Shreyas Iyer, were the highlights of a chase of 309 under lights, with five of India A’s top six going past 35.India A got off to a solid start, thanks to a 61-run opening partnership between Mayank Agarwal and Shubman Gill, who then fell three overs within each other. Manish Pandey, the captain, then added 85 with Iyer, who made a run-a-ball 54 in his first game on tour. Then, with India A 158 for 2 in the 26th over, the pair fell in the space of three balls to Hamish Bennett’s pace.The onus of rebuilding the innings fell on Kishan and Shankar, who proceeded to make his third 60-plus score on tour, having previously scored 62 and 71 in the two unofficial Tests he got the opportunity to bat in. Shankar hammered 12 fours and a six in his 80-ball innings. Lockie Ferguson removed Kishan in the 43rd over with India A still needing 33. India A lost their No. 7 Krunal Pandya cheaply, but Shankar dug his heels in and ensured the visitors took a 1-0 lead in the three-match series.New Zealand A will, however, take heart from the fact that three of their batsmen notched up fifties after India A put them in. Openers Hamish Rutherford and George Worker added 83, before wicketkeeper Tim Seifert and James Neesham put on 82 for the fifth wicket. Rutherford’s 70 and Neesham’s 79 blunted an Indian attack in which only Shankar (4-0-12-0) conceded less than five an over. The most expensive of the bowlers was Siddarth Kaul, whose two wickets came at the cost of 74 runs off 10 overs as New Zealand A finished with 308 for 6.

PCB agrees to issue NOCs for T10 League after 'due diligence'

Seventeen Pakistan players were selected in the draft, but it’s unlikely that all of them will get clearance since the T10 league clashes with Pakistan’s Tests against New Zealand

Umar Farooq25-Oct-2018The PCB has agreed to issue NOCs (No-Objection Certificates) to its players for the second edition of the T10 League following “extensive diligence” in coordination with the Emirates Cricket Board and the ICC. Ehsan Mani, the new PCB chairman, had earlier raised concerns over the league’s ownership patterns and sponsorship.The organisers will, however, have to shell out a flat fee of US$ 600,000 to the PCB for the NOCs, which will be dealt with on a “case-to-case basis”. In addition, the PCB will also deploy their own integrity officers to monitor the tournament.As many as 17 Pakistani players had been selected in the draft held in Dubai in September, although it’s unlikely all of them will be granted permission because the league clashes with Pakistan’s Test series against New Zealand in the UAE. In any case, with the PCB having capped the number of franchise leagues their contracted players can participate in to just two, several might not be eligible.Mani’s apprehension may have stemmed from former T10 League president Salman Iqbal pulling out citing a lack of “transparency and proper systems and monitoring”. Mani had subsequently written to the ICC in September seeking reassurances about the league.Meanwhile, the T10 League has also signed four former India players, including World Cup winner Zaheer Khan, alongside the recently-retired Praveen Kumar, S Badrinath and Reetinder Sodhi, now a BCCI match referee. The other overseas players include Chris Gayle, Shane Watson, Rashid Khan, Shahid Afridi, Andre Russell and England’s limited-overs captain Eoin Morgan.Morgan, currently in Sri Lanka with England’s limited-overs squad, will return to lead defending champions Kerala Kings. Kieron Pollard, not part of the West Indies ODI squad that is on tour in India, is also set to feature in the league.The T10 League will feature eight teams this year, as compared to six last year. The tournament will be held over 12 days and feature 28 matches, more than double from the 13 matches over four days last year.

Knight Riders replace Russell with de Grandhomme

Kolkata Knight Riders have taken on New Zealand allrounder Colin de Grandhomme, who has a strike-rate of 171 from 91 innings in all T20 cricket

ESPNcricinfo staff03-Apr-20174:33

‘Very happy with the players we’ve got’ – Gambhir

Kolkata Knight Riders have bought New Zealand allrounder Colin de Grandhomme as a replacement for Andre Russell, who is currently serving out a one-year ban for a doping-code violation.De Grandhomme, a medium-pace bowler and a lower-order batsman, made his debut for New Zealand in February 2012. In seamer-friendly conditions, he is capable of generating enough lateral movement to trouble the batsman despite his leisurely pace of 120 kph. He took 6 for 41 in his first Test against Pakistan in November last year. Making him a value addition is his batting strike-rate in all T20 cricket – a whopping 171 after 91 innings.Considering a relaid Eden Gardens pitch afforded surprising assistance to the fast bowlers in its first international match, Knight Riders appear to be stocking up on pace bowling options. They already have Trent Boult and Nathan Coulter-Nile, both known for generating swing and seam.Despite the reinforcement, Knight Riders would feel Russell’s absence. He was an important part of their title-winning run in 2014 and was Man of the Tournament in 2015.”We are not on the back foot,” the allrounder Yusuf Pathan said. “Russell was an important cog in our wheel not only on-field, but in the dressing room also. He is a great character to have. There are situations when players miss out. He will be missed in the dressing room. But we have to look ahead and work with what we have.”Captain Gautam Gambhir echoed similar sentiments. “Either we can see Russell’s absence as a challenge or look at it as an opportunity in bold letters,” he told . “I as an individual, and KKR as a group, are looking it as an opportunity.”Knight Riders begin their IPL campaign on April 7 against Gujarat Lions in Rajkot