All posts by h716a5.icu

Breakthrough never came on fourth morning as old ball refused to move in overcast conditions

Valkerie Baynes05-Jun-2022″I’d sell my soul for total control…” so sang The Motels circa 1979 and this was a match where neither side could claim to have held full sway until what turned out to be the final morning, when Joe Root and Ben Foakes guided England to a rather anticlimactic five-wicket victory over New Zealand just over an hour into the fourth day.Talk to any seasoned England fan with their side needing just 61 runs with five wickets still in hand and one of their greatest ever battters unbeaten on 77, and still they more than half-expected a calamitous collapse to inject some unwelcome excitement, or the imposing gloom overhead to erupt and elongate the day. But neither eventuated.New Zealand needed to seize the initiative with an ageing ball they had managed to swap out the previous evening, arguably to their peril when it failed to give them any assistance, and they repeatedly tried – unsuccessfully – to change it again on Sunday morning.Related

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“The game ebbed and flowed throughout the whole three-and-a-half days and there were some very similar traits,” Kane Williamson, the New Zealand captain, said. “We were trying to take advantage of those, whether that was overheads or the slightly harder ball.”Credit to England, it was a game that was on a bit of a knife-edge, it was finely balanced and we knew coming into this morning that if we could pick up a wicket early then we know things can happen quickly here in England. It wasn’t to be. We struggled to get the assistance that we hoped for and an exceptional knock from Joe there, that he’s done so often and he does it again.”Indeed, it was Root and Foakes who finally took control over an arm-wrestle of a match with a glorious century and mature 32 not out respectively as part of an unbroken 120-run stand.But before that, it was some of the more out-of-control moments that had the potential to define this match. There was Colin de Grandhomme’s bizarre run-out as he appeared to bask a little too long in surviving an lbw appeal from Stuart Broad in the middle of three New Zealand wickets falling in as many balls, then de Grandhomme’s no-ball which gave Ben Stokes a second life on 1 (he went on to score a valuable 54).There was Stokes taking to spinner Ajaz Patel, launching him for three sixes and effectively shutting him out of the attack on the third day and Stokes’ eventual dismissal flailing his hands at a Kyle Jamieson steepler. All were moments within moments that could have turned the match.Jamieson could hold his head high after bowling superbly on the third day for his four wickets. Williamson said it had been his intention to use Patel more but, after he conceded 22 off his two overs in England’s second innings and with cold, overcast conditions not conducive to spin on the last day, he looked again to his seamers.”Both teams played frontline spinners, looking at the surface and expecting them to come into play,” Williamson said. “We’ve seen that a little bit more throughout the whole season over here in county cricket as well and, as we saw, it took a slightly different turn and things started happening quite quickly, where the threat with the seam bowlers appeared to be more significant and so we were trying to utilise that.”Naturally as the game starts coming to a close and time’s not on your side you’re trying to make the decisions that might give you the best chance and we felt that the seamers out there were the ones to try and do the job, as they did in the first innings.”He was also left to rue Broad’s explosive spell with the second new ball which removed Daryl Mitchell shortly after he reached his century on the third morning, while James Anderson removed Tom Blundell four runs shy of his ton, which served to highlight the New Zealand bowlers’ inability put a lid on Root and Foakes until the second new ball was due for them.New Zealand were frustrated on the fourth morning•Getty Images”It was a game that was so finely balanced throughout all the days that it was played and so it was trying to stay in it and stay patient and know if you could bring quality for long periods, then then it can change so quickly and we certainly had that hope coming into to the last day today,” Williamson said.”We were sort of hopeful perhaps of some assistance and a lot of the guys have played in England before and talk about overheads and today you couldn’t have hoped for much better. But it wasn’t to be and it was met with real quality in the batting and in the chase that England provided. So unfortunately for us that it wasn’t our day, but credit to England and the way they played and stayed in the fight as well.”Stokes, who celebrated his 31st birthday on Saturday, recalled his thoughts as he turned back, three-quarters of the way back to the pavilion thinking he was out to de Grandhomme: “No matter what my wife gets me for my birthday, it probably won’t be as good as that.””It was a huge bit of luck, but sometimes you need it,” he added, “just very, very fortunate because I don’t think Dutchy really over-steps the mark that often. Lord’s and drama and me – it just seems to follow me around, doesn’t it?”Stokes too, remarked on how the momentum could have gone either way throughout in a match that kept raising reminders of their 2019 World Cup final battle.”We didn’t take control, New Zealand didn’t take control,” he said. “Maybe they did at one point when Mitchell and Blundell were playing but I just don’t know what it is about Lord’s, England-New Zealand, there’s just always drama, always very good games and we’re very even sides, especially in these English conditions.”Sixty needed, five wickets down, it sounds like we should cruise to victory, but the way this wicket’s played and the conditions that always seemed to be in the bowlers’ favour, but the way that Joe and Ben went out and played this morning, you know, almost put the nail in the coffin straight away.”So finally someone found it. That precious moment of control.

They have moved on where others have appeared to stand still. Their split-coach method is something sides will want to look at imitating

Mark Nicholas15-Nov-2022The best team won. It came easier than it might have done, with the sight of Shaheen Shah Afridi limping from the field of play after just one ball of his third over, but no one could reasonably argue against the fact that England have the most bases covered. Indeed, a surprise of the tournament was how few bases have been covered by some of the pretenders.Only a year has passed since the last T20 World Cup but England have moved on, while most others appear to have stood still. The buy-in to this fearless style of cricket is the thing, along with the lack of judgement from those at the helm when events occasionally go pear-shaped. It is driven by free spirit and a form of unbridled expression that is filtering through the English system. When England lost the Lord’s Test to South Africa last summer, the general opinion was that the batters should have reined themselves in against a fast and accurate attack. When asked about this in the post-mortem, Brendon McCullum went all counterintuitive with his belief that in such conditions and against that opponent, England should have gone harder. The consequent trickle-down was even seen in county cricket, where big scores were chased with relish. In the Hundred, some of the batting was outrageous.Having said that, brains matter. For all his buccaneering, Ben Stokes applies the most forensic of minds to the white-ball chase. He knows when to soak it up, like a boxer on the ropes for a while, wearing down his opponent, and he knows when to strike back. In the 2019 one-day final at Lord’s, he played a truly great innings – one of the best three I can think of in World Cup cricket – while at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Sunday, his batting was a little less tidy, as if he were in a street fight. At times the angled bat, over-complicated footwork and penchant for looking to run fast legcutters for a single to third man appeared to have cost him, but they did not, however animated the appealing of the Pakistanis. In fact, the more those bowlers beat his bat, the more he smiled at the absurdity of it all.Related

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When Afridi left the field for the second and last time, Stokes pounced on Babar Azam’s decision to finish the five remaining balls of the over with Iftikar Ahmed’s offies. By heaven, what a gamble! Immediately the move seemed like it had worked as England’s talismanic allrounder threw all he had at a nothing ball a tad outside off stump and mishit it so badly that it fell agonisingly shot of Babar at deep mid-off: Stokes was so sure he was out, he barely ran. After that, they had to stop the fight. Ten off the last two balls of that over were complemented by three Moeen Ali boundaries in the next over and that was that. T20 games disappear from your grasp quicker than a magician’s hand.A full set from Afridi – the Wasim Akram of the day – would have made it tighter, but with the batting to come and Stokes’ extraordinary temperament and talent to guide it through, an England win remained the more likely outcome.It was a rum business for Pakistan – a thrilling team in so many ways – but as Babar admitted, they were 20 short with the bat. In part, this was of their own doing, especially in the final stanza of the innings, but England were impressive with the ball. Well, Adil Rashid and Sam Curran were hugely impressive and the others stacked up solidly enough alongside them. Fact: the combined figures for Rashid and Curran were 5 for 34 off eight. That’s ridiculous. Three of those wickets and only 12 of those runs were down to Curran. His father was Kevin, the bruising Zimbabwe allrounder who died young from a heart issue while out on a run ten years ago. One can only begin to imagine the pride he must have had looking down from somewhere above the Spidercam.If Shaheen Afridi hadn’t limped off the field in his third over, England would probably still have won, but the match might have been tighter•Getty ImagesWatching these two at work in the shadow of the Shane Warne Stand was a particular joy, for they were about skill and deception. Rashid started the rot, beating Mohammad Haris in the flight and fooling Babar with the googly. It wasn’t just that he dismissed Babar, it was that he made the world’s most elegant batter look clueless, and you don’t see that often, if at all. At the ground Warne loved more than any other, Rashid spun it and swerved it, floated it and dipped it just like the master we all so miss would have done to the delight of those Melbourne crowds that adored him.Curran seamed it, swung it, wobbled it, cut it, slowed it down, sped it up, bounced it, looped it and generally ran amok. His confidence is high, his heart big, his mind ahead of most of the blokes taking guard; and he can bat and field too. A word for his Mum, Sarah, his brothers, Tom and Ben, and for Allan Lamb too: they all played their part in Sam’s fulfillment and this terrific day for English cricket. In addition to Alec Stewart’s fatherly hand at Surrey, a key aspect of the Curran education has been the IPL, where time spent with MS Dhoni and Stephen Fleming – as well as playing a run of high-standard T20 cricket – has been invaluable.I say this because, from afar (which is not the best informed place for comment), it appears that the IPL is not the go-to reference for selection it might be. Perhaps the same can be said of the Big Bash. The obvious signs are ignored in favour of existing perceptions, which can lead to blind faith. To those of us on the outside, it seems the strangest thing to omit Rishabh Pant from any T20 team. If you were selecting on the principle of whom the opposition least want to play against, Pant might be first choice.Both India and Australia need a T20 reset, which almost certainly means the purging of a few popular faces, but if not, a rapid change in agenda. Pant’s devil-may-care approach is the zeitgeist and there are new kids ready to step on the block within both of these great cricketing traditions.England’s Player of the Series, Sam Curran (right) took 13 wickets in the tournament, and Adil Rashid finished with an economy rate of 6.12, the best among those who bowled at least as many overs as he did•Getty ImagesSomething that requires urgent attention for all teams around the world is the splitting of coaches. Initially this sort of thing was thought to create confusion, but England have proved that the move actually provides greater stability, with the head coach and support staff focused and energised by the project for which they have sole responsibility. This allows a more objective look at players, and the possibility of regenerating those who have lost their mojo in one format by relocating them to another. Matthew Mott came with high praise and has not disappointed. In a burst of McCullum-esque conviction he suggested England were timid in defeat against Ireland and asked for a more attacking mindset from the batters.Each batter has to work out exactly what this means. The bigger playing areas in Australia lead to fewer sixes and more hard running between the wickets. Spinners can therefore give the ball more air, rather than get away with simply bowling a hard length into the pitch. Equally, at the MCG for example, the quicks can bowl back of a length and even short, knowing that the boundary riders provide serious wicket-taking options. Liam Livingstone’s third catch, deep in the leg side in the final, was taken with a kind of “Really, again… so you think I ever drop these?” inevitability. In Adelaide the quicks pitch up and place the Livingstones at deep mid-off and deep mid-on. It’s not rocket science but it is the kind of detail that is as important to a batter’s response as to a bowler’s planning.A word for the upsetters – Namibia, Scotland, Ireland, Zimbabwe and Netherlands all put some big names to shame. The biggest shock – tinged with more than a hint of irony – came when the Dutch, with a few South Africans of their own in their ranks, blew South Africa out of the tournament. This allowed Pakistan a second chance at the semi-final place all South Africans assumed was theirs, a chance that was gobbled up. No doubt, the smaller teams have improved and will continue to do so; professionalism and wider opportunity ensure as much. It is a truism that the lowest common denominator evens things up. T20 is, therefore, the most likely of the international formats to create an upset. Even so, South Africa’s defeat further fuelled the mickey-taking that has haunted their players and supporters since the 1990s.Sure, it rained a bit around the Great Southern Land but it was fun otherwise, primarily because the pitches in Australia gave more to the bowler. This balance between bat and ball is all that really matters for cricket to thrive. The tournament finished with the most attacking batting side playing the most attacking bowling side in a match that, but for an injury, might have gone to the wire.Naturally, if the home team fails to reach the knockout stage a bit of momentum is lost but India filled a semi-final ground and Pakistan all but filled the MCG for the final. There wasn’t much not to like. Cricket is in a good place but the message should remain that, wherever possible, less is more. That way we will continue to marvel at the incredible cricketers of the age.

The England phenom has had a tough time dealing with slow and low pitches

Alagappan Muthu28-Apr-2023Harry Brook has a highest score of 13 at his IPL home ground.At his best, he is a batter who forces a rethink about what cricket even is because he has this habit of hitting good balls for boundaries. More to the point, he has been able to do so with ease away from home. Test hundreds in Rawalpindi, Multan, Karachi and Wellington proved that England had unearthed a gem.The IPL obviously took notice. He went for INR 13.25 crore at the auction. Sunrisers Hyderabad, who went in with the biggest purse, were fairly happy with their purchase. They have a history of underwhelming middle orders. So to pick up the next big thing in the sport, a man who weaves most of his magic from No. 5, constituted a big win.Related

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Only nobody thought it would go like this. Or maybe they should have.Those runs in Pakistan came on flat tracks. The ones in New Zealand had pace and bounce. This is India, and six out of seven times, he’s found himself dealing with conditions that are slow and low.Brook began IPL 2023 in the middle order, where he had a tendency to commit too early and lose his shape. He’s built a whole lot of muscle memory playing cricket in places where the ball comes on to the bat. So as soon as he sees one on a length, he’s into the drive on the up. He hasn’t always accounted for how, over here, the ball stops on the pitch.Sunrisers tried to mitigate this by pushing Brook up to open where he had a better chance of having the ball come on to his bat, and for one glorious night at Eden Gardens, it worked.

SRH bought Brook for a lot of money. That automatically brings scrutiny. They made some of his team-mates bat out of position to give him the best chance of success. That brings a whole different kind of pressure

Outside of that innings, though, Brook has made 63 runs in 73 balls with seven fours and no sixes. This is not uncommon for an overseas player dealing with their first IPL. Especially because a lot of them, like Brook, grow up in conditions that are the polar opposite of what they face here, of what they are asked to immediately overcome. Eoin Morgan and Aaron Finch, two World Cup-winning captains, know exactly what Brook’s going through right now.It is totally on him to do better but also, should his team have put so much on his plate? They bought Brook for a lot of money. That automatically brings scrutiny. They made some of his team-mates bat out of position to give him the best chance of success. That brings a whole different kind of pressure.Abhishek Sharma was acquired for INR 6.5 crore at the mega auction ahead of IPL 2022. That was huge for someone who had played only 22 matches in the tournament, and was yet to hit a fifty. But he repaid their faith immediately, finishing the season as their highest scorer. And here’s the rub – Abhishek opened in every single one of those 14 innings. Now, one year later, he doesn’t have a fixed position. He’s batted at the top twice. One innings at No. 4 and one at No. 5.For what it’s worth, Brian Lara, the Sunrisers coach, likes it this way. He sees Abhishek’s left-handedness as an advantage in the middle order.1:27

Should Brook continue to open for SRH?

And as for Brook, well, a former Sunrisers coach, the one who took them to the title in 2016, believes he will provide a handsome return on the investment.”This is a long-term play,” Tom Moody said at the start of April on ESPNcricinfo’s T20 Time:Out. “I feel that Sunrisers have identified a very, very exciting young player. He’s only 24 years old. And they see him as a ten-year-plus project. So a lot of people will look back in time and think, ‘gosh, they got him at a steal’. You know, he’s now part of that franchise. A bit like an AB de Villiers was for RCB.”Moody has since pointed out that Brook isn’t playing on instinct like he used to, which makes sense. He is with a new team, in a new country, answering to the largest cricket-watching audience in the world. Some of them had already got to him. “I went on to social media, people were calling me rubbish, and you start to doubt yourself a little bit.” It almost feels like he’s given a little too much thought to proving he belongs in the IPL.This is the part where a senior player should have stepped in and picked up the slack. Like, maybe, Sunrisers’ other big buy at the 2023 auction. Mayank Agarwal was supposed to be the experienced Indian batter they could rely on. Instead, he’s averaging 23, striking at 111 and contributing roughly 25% of the wickets they have lost to spin (five of 22).All of this combined has left Sunrisers with a huge problem, and because it’s at the top, it’s trickling down into everything they are trying to do.

RCB batter abandons his safety-first approach to instead go hell for leather, resulting in a “quite special knock”

Shashank Kishore19-May-20231:48

Moody: ‘The way Kohli batted, he reminded me of the 2016 season’

The discourse around Virat Kohli the T20 batter for much of IPL 2023, or perhaps a little longer, has been about his intent in the powerplay or the lack of it. Much of this has stemmed from poor returns of the Royal Challengers Bangalore batters apart from himself, Faf du Plessis and Glenn Maxwell.This safety-first approach has worked wonders as much as it has also backfired. But it is one that Kohli has backed himself to execute successfully more often than not.Against Sunrisers Hyderabad on Thursday evening, Kohli decided he’d had enough; he wasn’t going to bat the way he’d been batting all along. There was a purpose that perhaps stemmed from RCB having one eye on net run rate and a mindset of outright domination from get-go. Of the kind that made you wonder whether Kohli had been angered by something or someone; and there have been a few occasions this IPL where he has been testy.Related

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The first ball of the innings laid down the marker. Bhuvneshwer Kumar’s late swing was met with one of the most purposeful forward strides and head right over the ball as he creamed one through the covers. Kohli was up and running.It was a tall chase, even if not one that needed him to go all out. Kohli, though, did just that. Off the second ball, he anticipated Bhuvneshwar shortening his length and stood tall to slap it over backward point. He was one up on Bhuvneshwar, whom he has played with for over a decade. He knew what was coming and reacted instinctively. No holds barred.It was Abhishek Sharma’s turn next. Kohli vs spin in the powerplay has rarely set pulses racing: his strike rate against left-arm orthodox was 116. Abhishek has several variations – a traditional off break, a back-of-the-hand delivery, and a seam-up that swerves in. Here, he fired one down leg, perhaps anticipating Kohli would give him the charge. But Kohli went outside leg to get underneath the length and shovelled it back over the top. Two balls later, he backed away again to slap a length ball back past the bowler.It wasn’t until his stand-and-deliver boundary through extra cover off Kartik Tyagi – one that made such sweet connection that you wondered if he’d hit one that clean this season – that Kohli got into top gear. Batters often tell you there’s one particular stroke that helps them flick a switch. This, seemingly, was that stroke that pumped Kohli up. The 17 runs he made off his first 10 balls were the second most he’s hit in this phase this season.But it wasn’t just about the big hits. The moment Mayank Dagar came on and slowed it down nicely to extract square turn, Kohli switched gears and treaded with caution. The powerplay – RCB were 64 for 0 after six – gave him leeway to do so, too. With Dagar exercising control, you wondered if Sunrisers had erred by not picking another frontline spinner in Mayank Markande. They had handed a debut to seamer Nitish Reddy, and he was under the pump straightaway.One moment, Kohli was batting calmly, andthe next he was allowing adrenaline to kick in and his wrists and forearm power to take over. Kohli simply short-arm jabbed a perfectly acceptable length delivery into the body for a 103-metre six and stood there following the trajectory of the ball, holding the pose for the camera. That was just one of several eye-catching shots he played. The no-look sweep to a full, in-drifter from Dagar was full swag. It left du Plessis astounded.Virat Kohli started RCB’s chase with two boundaries, and did not stop there•BCCIKohli said later that batting with du Plessis brought him as much pleasure as batting with AB de Villiers. Kohli and du Plessis are different in the shots they play or areas they can access. Du Plessis is bottom-handed, while Kohli is the epitome of elegance that he mixes with a more-than-capable power game.”I think it’s the tattoos,” Kohli said with a laugh when asked about his success with du Plessis. The two have racked up the most runs by an opening pair in a single IPL season. “We call each other the ink boys. We almost have 900 runs together this season. It’s been amazing to bat with him. Another guy, very similar to how I used to feel when AB and me batted together.”There was just an understanding of where the game is going and what needs to be done. We pump each other, we read the conditions, we give each other feedback for how we can play certain bowlers. Having an experienced guy who’s captained at the international level, he’s handled troops as well, it’s just been a beautiful transition for us coming together for RCB at the top and making an impact, which is so important.”For much of the innings, Kohli and du Plessis were neck-and-neck with their score. And then suddenly Kohli gave himself a power boost against Bhuvneshwar. If you thought he couldn’t have topped the first two shots to open the innings, you were wrong.Kohli on his ton – “It was a quite special knock considering where we’re placed in the points table and the magnitude of the game”•BCCIA regal drive on the up, a chip over cover and mid-off that nearly carried all the way, a one-handed hit over his head off a low full-toss and a ferocious cut – all in Bhuvneshwar’s third over – shaved nearly 10% off their target. From 55 off 36, it was down to 37 off 30. Bhuvneshwar’s final over, the 18th, was the one in which Kohli reached his hundred, off 62 balls.”Yeah, quite special knock considering where we’re placed in the points table and the magnitude of the game,” Kohli said. “I thought Hyderabad got a really good score. If you saw, the ball was gripping in between overs as well, so it’s quite special, knowing that we wanted a good start, solid start.”We didn’t expect to be 172 without loss, but that’s how well Faf and me have played this season. Faf’s been on a different level, but, you know, I’ve had a quiet couple of games in the last few games. I just felt like the way I was hitting the ball in the nets, it wasn’t quite transitioning into the game in the last two or three games, so I wanted to make an impact, and my intent from ball one was to go after the bowlers. It’s something that I’ve done through the season – there was a little bit of a dip, but I wanted to pick my game up at the right time, so considering all those factors I’m just happy that it all came together nicely.”

Invincibles’ sixth-wicket pair shared record unbeaten 127-run stand from only 64 balls

Sampath Bandarupalli27-Aug-2023127 Partnership runs between Tom Curran and Jimmy Neesham, the highest for any wicket in the Hundred Men’s competition. The previous highest was the unbeaten 124 between Dawid Malan and D’Arcy Short for Trent Rockets’ second wicket against Southern Brave in 2021.34 Oval Invincibles’ total at the fall of the fifth wicket. Only one team has won a men’s T20 final after losing their fifth wicket at a lower total – 32 by Uganda in the Africa Continental Cup final earlier this year against Kenya, where they finished on 125 and won by one run.1 Number of teams to have won a game in the Hundred Men’s competition, despite losing their first five wickets for less than 50 runs, before the Invincibles on Sunday. Trent Rockets defeated the Northern Superchargers in 2021 by two wickets in the pursuit of a 133-run target, from five down for 41 runs.29 Runs aggregated by Invincibles’ top five on Sunday. It is the lowest contribution by the top five batters of a team to win a men’s T20 final. The previous lowest was 42 runs by Westerns against the Northerns in the 2009 Zimbabwe domestic T20 final. It is also the lowest contribution by the top five batters of a winning team in the Hundred Men’s competition.3 Number of sixth-wicket partnerships in men’s T20s that have been higher than the unbroken 127 between Curran and Neesham. The highest is 161 by Andre Russell and Kennar Lewis for the Jamaica Tallawahs against Trinbago Knight Riders in 2018. The Curran-Neesham partnership was also the first century stand for the sixth wicket or lower in a men’s T20 final.67* Curran’s score against the Originals is now the highest individual score in a final of the Hundred. Paul Stirling’s 61 against Birmingham Phoenix in the 2021 edition was the only fifty scored in the final during the first two editions of the Hundred across the men’s and women’s competitions.7 Curran’s 67 not out is also the highest score while batting at No.7 or lower in a men’s T20 final, surpassing MS Dhoni’s 63 not out against Mumbai Indians in the 2013 IPL final.5 Curran and Neesham are only the fifth pair of No.6 and No.7 with fifty-plus scores in the same innings in men’s T20s. Oval Invincibles’ innings was only the tenth in men’s T20s where two players batting at No.6 and lower had fifty-plus scores in the same innings. Never, in the Hundred, before this game, had two players batting outside the top three scored fifties in the same innings.4 out of 5 T20 fifties by Curran have come while batting at No.7 or lower. Russell (9), Kieron Pollard (7), David Wiese (5) and James Foster (4) are the other players with four or more fifty-plus scores while batting at No.7 or lower in the men’s T20s.

One thing that lasts longer than Australian heartbreak is Pakistani belief. And day four captured that perfectly

Danyal Rasool30-Dec-20235:10

‘A classic at the MCG’

“Pakistan! ZINDABAD!!!”

The chant goes up, loud and proud, in the Shane Warne Stand, where a group of Pakistan fans have congregated. It’s a relatively small crowd – fewer than 20,000 come through the turnstiles all day – but here in this little corner, the flags you see do not bear the Blue Ensign, but the green and white of the star and crescent.Asif leads the chants, his three-year-old son clinging to his leg. His father, Asif says, was at the SCG in 1995 when Pakistan last beat Australia in a Test match in this country, and while he won’t have the chance to be in Sydney next week, this might just be his – and Pakistan’s – moment.It’s early evening, shortly after the tea break, and it’s not the most optimistic time to have this chat. Josh Hazlewood has just bowled what appears to be a match-turning spell, sending down 24 successive dots before rattling Babar’s off stump. Saud Shakeel fell to Mitchell Starc shortly after, and it’s suddenly all down to Mohammad Rizwan and Salman Ali Agha, with 155 runs standing between them and the summit.But Asif hopes. Hope is the last thing you lose. “Pakistan!,” he yells again. “ZINDABAD!!!,” they cry back.

****

It’s impossible to describe what a historic Test match smells like, but anyone who has woken up on that decisive morning will know. It’s that final morning in Karachi in March 2022, that day in Brisbane in 2021 or 2016. As the train pulls up at Jolimont Station, the walk across the bridge and through Yarra Park is sensory overload. The MCG, visible in all its glory, may just be about to see another strand of history woven through it. There are few more intoxicating feelings than a simmering Test match that has come to a boil.Pakistan already have regrets because Australia are 241 ahead, perhaps too far in front already. That, certainly, was Mitchell Marsh’s view, whose 96 put them in that imperious position, after he was put down by Abdullah Shafique in a slip cordon he didn’t belong in 76 runs earlier. But Pakistan believe they have found a way to survive, in the cricketing wasteland that Australia is to visiting sides, Pakistan have stayed in the bunker just long enough; willing to wound, and yet, until now, afraid to strike.Pakistan do strike in the morning, but perhaps not quite soon enough. The final few partnerships added 22, 28, 12, and 13. Shaheen Afridi is the first to strike, drawing an edge from Mitchell Starc. This time, the man who should have been there all along dives low to take an excellent catch. Babar has given Pakistan the breakthrough. How, you feel, they’ll need him today.Meanwhile, Shahid Afridi has rocked up to the MCG, declaring he believes the target is chaseable. He can’t know what that target is, because Australia are still batting, but it would be unlike Shahid to consider that. He is flanked by Pakistan squash legend Jahangir Khan, who knows a thing or two about winning streaks.

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Shan Masood and Babar are out there together. Six weeks ago, they were both in Lahore on a very different kind of day. Babar had just been told he was being done away with as white-ball captain and could see where he wasn’t wanted, resigning from the Test captaincy, too. Masood was there to be anointed his successor, and while the pair have never exactly been best of friends, what they’re doing right now is too important to let anything as trivial as that get in their way.Imam-ul-Haq looked like a dead man walking from the moment he stepped out, but it was Shafique who fell first, perhaps fittingly, by edging to the slips. It was a sharp catch at third slip, but, unlike Pakistan, Australia have their cordon worked out to a tee, and Usman Khawaja did not err. Pat Cummins worked Imam over before trapping him in front shortly after.Related

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But, while any mention of Masood and Babar in the same sentence only highlighted the dysfunctional nature of Pakistan cricket until a little while ago, the captain and his predecessor are ticking together like clockwork. Shan takes the lead, as he needs to, building on his first innings-half-century with a knock that carries the promise of something even more substantial. He lifts the scoring rate, moving onto the front foot early and anticipating the short ball, too. The bounce doesn’t appear to trouble him, and he manages to steer Hazlewood and Starc into gaps. Babar, meanwhile, hangs back, more cautious but equally assured, aware that if Pakistan are to make a fist of it, they are unlikely to do it without him.The partnership crosses 50, the total passes 100, and the belief rises once more.

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Then, the dagger. Anytime Australia’s bowlers have come up short, Cummins has limbered up to the mark. He comes around the wicket to Masood, and it takes him just three balls to find the perfect delivery. It’s on off stump, wobbling away, and Masood defends with hard hands. On the second day, a similar nick dropped an inch short of Khawaja, but Steve Smith takes a sharp catch. Hazlewood’s spell has seen Babar off, and though Babar’s not in the best form, that doesn’t tell the story of how metronomically accurate Australia have been to him. He protected the inside edge twice in Perth, only to nick off. Here, he covers the outside edge, and Hazlewood, like Cummins before him, manages to sneak past his defences on the inside.Captain gets captain: Pat Cummins celebrates the scalp of Shan Masood•Getty Images and Cricket AustraliaBut while Australia sniff a four-day victory, Rizwan and Agha seem to be up to something. Rizwan is doing that jittery thing where he never looks settled while playing the most confident, low-percentage shots on both sides. That swivel-pull off the ribs to Cummins is a sign of the kind of mood he’s in, while Agha won’t be left behind. The ball after he’s pelted on the helmet and a lengthy concussion protocol follows, he whips his liquid wrists to dispatch him to third man. An edge off Hazlewood flies away for four more, while a wristy offside flick from Rizwan clears the slips and dashes down.It is that stage of a Test match where all roads lead to an epic finish. The Australian fans still outnumber the Pakistanis, but it is the support for the visiting side that truly appreciates the magnitude of what they might be witnessing. Pakistan’s target is now below a hundred, and they have half the side still to come in. This is a generational opportunity – like Hobart 1999, Sydney 2010, and Brisbane 2016. But this is happening now, and in the moment, it feels different.The MCG scorecard flashes up the ‘top five chases at this ground.’ The only one above 300 came 95 years ago, and just one of the top five features a game that took place after Pakistan became a country – a South African chase of 297 in 1953. But while history says don’t hope on this side of the grave, Pakistan prefer the concluding line of that famous Seamus Heaney stanza. They believe hope and history are about to rhyme.Rizwan glances up at the scoreboard before he takes guard for the next ball. Cummins has once more brought himself on to squash this last rebellion from Pakistan and to that end, he bowls the cricketing equivalent of a body serve, one that’s lined up on middle and continues to rise while still being low enough to make ducking impossible.Mohammad Rizwan makes his point to Joel Wilson•Getty Images and Cricket AustraliaRizwan gets out of the way, arching his body back and keeping his bat out of the way. But that’s not what Australia see, and when Michael Gough doesn’t agree with them, up it goes to the TV screen. Rizwan points repeatedly at a mark on his forearm to indicate where the impact was made, but the technology shows a spike, as well as a mark on his wristband. 24 years ago, the lack of similar technology denied Pakistan a certain win against Australia. It was a clicky bat handle then, a kissed wristband now, and it’s all the same to Pakistan.As Rizwan walks off, still gesticulating furiously, Pakistan’s fighting spirit goes up in smoke too. The next 39 balls are a blur from the same repetition, the one of crushed dreams and the sickening knowledge that it ends the same. It will always end the same way.By the time the final wicket has fallen, the bright sunshine of the early evening gives way to the evening clouds. But few of those supporters in that Warne stand are there to see it. There seems little point when they’ve seen it all before. The Southern Cross is everywhere once more, the star and crescent folded away.Asif’s father never saw another Pakistan win in Australia, and for him and his young son, the wait continues. They, along with the millions back in Pakistan, may insist they will never be back, that there is no point. Perhaps even that they do not care.But of course they do. It is what prompted team director Mohammad Hafeez to lambast the technology, and induced someone as mild-mannered as Rizwan to protest so furiously. And when Sydney rolls around next week, the fire will continue to burn for a side that knows it stared at history but blinked first.It is why those early alarms will go off all over Pakistan again next week, and hundreds of people with stories like Asif’s will descend upon the SCG. The wait will continue, for one more Test, perhaps for one more series, maybe for one more generation. But the one thing that lasts longer than Australian heartbreak is Pakistani belief. And days like this at the MCG – the smell of hope and the lure of nostalgia – are exactly why.

In his comeback from a life-threatening car crash in December 2022, Rishabh Pant made 18 off 13 balls and passed the wicketkeeping test too

Nagraj Gollapudi23-Mar-2024

Rishabh Pant at the toss of his comeback match in Mullanpur•BCCI

The moment Rishabh Pant has longed for since December 30, 2022 arrived at 4.06 pm on March 23, 2024, in little-known Mullanpur. David Warner had gloved an attempted hook off a slower bouncer from Harshal Patel and was walking back, but the ongoing review process extended the wait. Yards away from Warner on the other side of the boundary, was Pant, ready to take his first steps on a cricket field in a competitive match since surviving a car crash 15 months ago.As Pant started his walk to the middle, he was introduced as the new batter over the public address system. The whole crowd – the ground was more than half full, with thousands still outside because of the security process – stood up to celebrate Pant’s return. It wasn’t a visceral roar but it was wholesome. The non-striker Shai Hope also punched his bat with a gloved hand a few times to welcome his captain.A large number of fans had travelled from neighbouring towns and cities in Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and, of course, Delhi. A few wearing navy blue ‘Pant 777’ t-shirts braved the harsh afternoon sun in anticipation of a Pant special, which the Delhi Capitals head coach Ricky Ponting had predicted, having observed how zealously his captain had been training in the week leading up to today.Pant took guard on leg stump. The Punjab Kings left-arm spinner Harpreet Brar angled the ball away from his reach, forcing Pant to stretch and reach to connect. Having had his knee ligaments reconstructed, it’s an area he’s going to be tested, in addition to throws coming to his end while running between the wickets. Pant refused to run a double twice in his first six deliveries.Related

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Such caution is understandable as he is taking small steps back after a severe injury. On 4, Pant pulled a long hop from legspinner Rahul Chahar straight to deep midwicket, where Harshal Patel was blinded by the sun and couldn’t catch it. His second boundary was a cover drive, off Harshal, but Pant’s innings ended soon after.A slower offcutter from Harshal climbed towards Pant’s head and his predetermined ramp ended up in backward point’s hands. He rapped his pads, berating himself. His first innings in his second innings as a cricketer lasted 23 minutes and ended on 18 off 13 balls, but it had its moments.The Capitals finished with 174 and then came Pant’s bigger challenge: keeping wickets and making decisions as captain in the fast and furious pace of T20 cricket. He was up for it, even after losing one of his four specialist bowlers Ishant Sharma to an ankle injury.Ask batters to pick the chirpiest wicketkeeper around and Pant is likely to be high on their list. Part of his talkativeness may be to wind up the batters, but he also does it to motivate and guide his bowlers.Rishabh Pant made 18 off 13 balls in his comeback match•BCCIPant has kept wicket to Kuldeep Yadav at both India and DC, and shares a rapport with the left-arm wristspinner. Throughout Kuldeep’s four-over spell against Punjab, Pant rarely kept silent, and some of that chat came through on the stump microphones. (let him hit long), (you are bowling well. Relax and bowl freely),” Pant said in Kuldeep’s first two overs as Prabhsimran Singh and Sam Curran were batting.Prabhsimran’s aggressive intent was evident, and Pant wanted Kuldeep to relax. (You are our only hope. It [the wicket] will come),” were Pant’s words the ball before Kuldeep had Prabhsimran caught in the deep. Not just to Kuldeep, Pant’s message to his team was to keep believing, even as Punjab took control of the chase. You could hear him saying “put in the energy”.Pant’s biggest strength was his fearlessness, and the question was whether he would still be fearless. He did not hesitate to stretch or dive behind the stumps, and attempted two stumpings, successfully dismissing Jitesh Sharma with the second attempt.On the eve of the Capitals’ season opener against Punjab, Ponting had described Pant as the “heartbeat” of the team. While the result did not go his way, Pant was pulsing with energy, and achieved what many feared he may never do again. Play cricket.

With Washington Sundar also contributing consistently through the Zimbabwe tour, India’s T20I future seems to brim with options

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Batters who can bowl have been on India’s T20I wishlist for a long time.While Hardik Pandya continues to be the only man in India who can do Hardik Pandya things, a new crop of batters who can bowl is emerging. In the fifth T20I against Zimbabwe in Harare, India’s top eight contained four players who could perform dual roles. Among the lot, Shivam Dube came away with the Player-of-the-Match award and Washington Sundar with the Player-of-the-Series award.With Ravindra Jadeja retiring from T20Is, Washington has now staked his claim for a full-time role in India’s side in the format. Dube, who bowled just one over each in IPL 2024 and the T20 World Cup that followed in the USA and the Caribbean, ended up bowling eight overs across three T20Is in Zimbabwe, and completed his full allotment of overs on Sunday.Related

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Dube claimed the wickets of Dion Myers and Johnathan Campbell to kill of Zimbabwe’s chase of 168. He kept digging the ball into a used Harare surface, and kept taking pace off to deny batters easy access to the boundaries. This after he had crashed 26 off 12 balls to help drag India towards 167.”It’s always a special thing for me as an allrounder to contribute in both the departments – bat and ball,” Dube said after the game. “So, it felt really good today to take some wickets.”India’s team management might have been even more pleased with Abhishek Sharma’s spell: 3-0-20-1. With the series already in the bag and with Abhishek extracting turn, bounce and grip, India could afford to give him an extended spell ahead of Washington or Tushar Deshpande. Abhishek had returned identical figures of 3-0-20-1 in the fourth T20I after taking some tap in the first three games. In that fourth T20I, he could have got another wicket had Ruturaj Gaikwad not dropped a fairly straightforward catch in the infield.Prior to his first international series, Abhishek had bowled both in the powerplay and middle overs in IPL 2024. In the second qualifier against Rajasthan Royals on a pitch in Chennai that turned appreciably more in the second innings, Abhishek picked up the wickets of Sanju Samson and Shimron Hetmyer while giving up just 24 runs in his four overs.Shivam Dube only bowled one over through the T20 World Cup but showed in Zimbabwe that he can cope with a bigger workload•Associated PressAbhishek then fine-tuned his bowling in the Sher-e-Punjab T20 league, where he was among the top ten wicket-takers. “A special mention to the coaches and Shubman [Gill] who actually believed [in me] after the first two matches [in Zimbabwe] because I didn’t bowl that much and I didn’t bowl well also,” Abhishek said after India won the series 4-1. “So, I thought that giving me the chance with the ball again… I’m always very grateful for that. I’ve been working really hard on my bowling. I knew if I’m going to get my [India] cap, I have to bowl for my team, so I was working on that.”Once India’s seniors return to the T20I team, there might not be room for Abhishek in the XI, but it’s always a healthy sign to see batters work actively on their secondary skill.Dube is also learning on the job as a T20 bowler and has added the back-of-the-hand slower variation to his standard offcutter. As for Washington, he is predominantly a bowler in white-ball cricket, but has been training behind the scenes to pack more power into his batting. At one point, he even had a stint with Apurva Desai, the former Gujarat batter who has also worked with Dinesh Karthik in the past.T20 cricket moves at a breathless pace. It leaves players behind unless they upgrade themselves. To keep up with that pace, New Zealand’s Glenn Phillips learnt offspin on the job to add to his power-hitting. England’s Liam Livingstone dipped into all-sorts spin to enhance his value as an allrounder. Namibia’s Gerhard Erasmus, who started as a batter, can now turn the ball both ways. His mystery spin helped him break into the ILT20 as an allrounder.It’s now refreshing to see India select and nurture such multi-dimensional players in T20 cricket. Not too long ago, India had five batters, none of whom could bowl, an allrounder, a wicketkeeper, and four specialist bowlers. And when Hardik was unavailable, they were left scrambling for balance. They turned a corner while winning the T20 World Cup, picking a side with three allrounders in Hardik, Jadeja and Axar Patel, apart from Dube who wasn’t called on that much with the ball.Despite the absence of Hardik, Axar and Nitish Kumar Reddy, the IPL’s newest all-round hero, in Zimbabwe, India coped excellently and provided a glimpse into a bright future.

The four teams made it here by topping their respective groups in the ACC Women’s Premier Cup

S Sudarshanan17-Jul-2024Eight countries will compete for the Women’s Asia Cup 2024 over ten days in Dambulla. Sri Lanka, the hosts, India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh are joined by Thailand, Nepal, UAE and Malaysia, all of whom qualified by topping their respective groups in the ACC Women’s Premier Cup 2024.ThailandThailand are one of the emerging teams to watch in women’s cricket. They beat Pakistan in the previous Asia Cup, in 2022, and made the semi-finals for the first time. They now have a new head coach – Nitish Salekar, who took over from Harshal Pathak in January 2023 – and a new captain in 20-year-old Thipatcha Putthawong, whom they are looking at as a long-term leader.Their batting mainstay Natthakan Chantham picked up an ACL injury during the Women’s T20 World Cup Qualifier in May and had surgery last month. Naruemol Chaiwai, their regular captain, is also injured. As a result, Thailand’s depth could get tested in this Asia Cup.Related