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Part-time offspinner Martin Guptill proved to be quite effective – and rather lucky too – in one bizarre over in Delhi

Arun Venugopal20-Oct-2016Martin Guptill had an interesting day at the Feroz Shah Kotla. He walked out to bat in the afternoon heat. Two minutes later, he was walking back after having added no runs to his small aggregate on the tour. Guptill then spent a couple of hours watching Kane Williamson do his thing before returning to the field.Under lights, Guptill flung himself around the Kotla, using his long arms to cut off speeding balls. He did not have much else to do, that is until the 41st over, when Williamson summoned him to the bowling crease. Guptill was up against Axar Patel. His first ball drifted down the leg side for a wide. For those who missed it, Guptill did it one more time. Before Williamson could consider developing a temper, though, Guptill waddled in and bowled a full toss against which Axar unleashed a mighty whack. Six? Four? No. Mitchell Santner, haring in from long-on, lunged forward and pouched the ball inches off the floor.And so Guptill had his third ODI wicket in his 131st match; he marked the occasion with another wide down the leg side, this time to Amit Mishra. Three more deliveries went by, uneventfully: one, one, dot. Just in case boredom was setting in, Guptill struck once more; Mishra top edged a swipe to be caught by substitute fielder Doug Bracewell at short fine leg. Guptill responded with another – by now signature – wide down the leg side. A plain, old, length delivery for no run finally finished the over. Guptill walked away with a sheepish grin.Ten deliveries, one bizarre over, and two dismissals that hurt India in their chase of 243.

England managed early wickets and James Anderson made an impressive return – but the left-off for Virat Kohli may have condemned their chances

George Dobell in Visakhapatnam17-Nov-20163:02

Compton: Anderson looked really revved up

There is a moment – a brief moment – at the start of when the naive might be seduced into thinking it is a gentle road-trip movie.You know things are going to go wrong, though. The word “massacre” is a pretty unsubtle clue as to where the plot is heading. You know you’re in for a tough ride.It was a bit like that on the first day in Visakhapatnam. England started well enough but, the second they lost the toss on this surface, you feared there was trouble ahead. From the moment Virat Kohli got off the mark with a cover-driven boundary off James Anderson, he looked daunting. And, on a pitch that is already showing signs of uneven bounce and spin, you know already that England face a monumental struggle to stay in this game.’I’ve missed playing’ – Anderson

James Anderson admitted he had missed the buzz of international cricket despite a tough opening day in Visakhapatnam. Anderson, playing his first game since August after recovering from a shoulder injury, was particularly satisfied with his wicket-taking return.
“It was great to be back,” Anderson said. “I have spent the last two months working really hard to get back into the side. It’s been frustrating at times but it’s been worth it. Getting back out there with the lads was a great feeling in itself but to get a few wickets on the board made it even better.
“I have missed it. I have missed playing and taking wickets. That sort of feeling you can’t get in any other walk of life – at least I struggle with it – so to get amongst it, get some wickets meant a lot.
“I always thought I would get out here for some part of it, but it was a surprise to a lot of people I got out here this early. The rehab has gone well and when I came back to bowling I progressed really quickly. They thought it would take time get back to full pace but it took me less.”

The toss in Rajkot was crucial, too. It gave England a chance to apply some scoreboard pressure and the time to ease their way into the series. But the anticipated deterioration in that surface came too late to influence the outcome.It looks as if Visakhapatnam is going to be different. Even before lunch on the first day, one delivery from Stuart Broad jagged away from the bat sharply off the pitch and a few deliveries seemed to take a piece of the surface when they bounced. Batting last is likely to prove much tougher.In such circumstances, it is vital the bowling side take any half-chance that comes along in the first innings. Think of the Ashes Test in Adelaide in 2010. Australia won the toss and batted first on a typically excellent batting pitch, but a brilliant bit of fielding by Jonathan Trott in the first over resulted in the run-out of Simon Katich and England took advantage.Something similar might have happened here. Had Adil Rashid been able to cling on to a tough chance offered by Kohli when he had scored 56, England would have had a key breakthrough. But the chance went to ground and Kohli went on – and on – to make a high-class century. He may well have made the defining contribution to this Test already. The next time Rashid sees Chris Scott (the Durham keeper who dropped Brian Lara in the early stages of his 501 in 1994) they will surely exchanging knowing looks.While it might be tempting to dismiss the chance as ‘one of those things’ there was an element of self-inflicted injury about it. With the bowlers unable to find any swing and both batsmen having a couple of questions to answer against the short ball – Cheteshwar Pujara has been hit four times in this series and Kohli is an almost compulsive hooker and puller – England had clearly decided upon a plan of attack. Ben Stokes was to pitch short in the hope that one of the batsmen might hit the ball to one of the men back for the hook.The flaw in the plan was the choice of fielder at long leg. Rashid is not, by domestic standards, a bad fielder and has pretty safe hands. He is a little slow by the standards of this team so it would, under normal circumstances, make sense to hide him at long leg.But in these circumstances, with the slips all but out of business and the mishit hook offering England’s best chance of a catch, it would have made more sense to place a better fielder in the position.Rashid was a little slow to react and, though he just about made it to the ball, he was not in a good position to cling on to the catch. It was not straightforward, but it was the sort of chance that several of this England team would have taken far more often than not. To compound the error, Rashid let the ball slip under his body to the boundary later in the same over. Stokes looked as if he could drink hot blood.Alastair Cook recognised the error. Within a few minutes, he had replaced Rashid with the quicker and more athletic Anderson at long leg. But the moment had gone. Kohli had learned his lesson. He wasn’t going to make the same mistake.If it seems harsh to focus on such a fleeting moment, it is because Test cricket in such circumstances is harsh and unforgiving. Attention to detail over such issues can make all the difference and, by leaving Rashid at long leg, England failed to make the most of their perfectly reasonable plan.Later, Cook also failed to take advantage of the second new ball. Just two balls after Anderson had Ajinkya Rahane edging a classic outswinger, Ravi Ashwin might have been caught at gully edging a similar delivery. Instead, England had a third man and a deep square leg.The decision to introduce Zafar Ansari into the attack for the 11th over might also attract some criticism, too. The score was 36 for 2 at the time and Ansari, though he bowled nicely enough in that first spell (six overs for 19 runs), was unable to sustain the pressure.There was some logic in the decision to turn to him, though. As a left-arm spinner, he was trying to take the ball away from the two right-handed batsmen and Stuart Broad was off the pitch (at that stage he was struggling with a cut sustained in Rajkot and opened by a committed piece of fielding; later he struggled with a sore right foot that may well see him rested for the third Test). It wasn’t that the decision was wrong, it was just it didn’t work out.That England remain with any sort of foothold in the game is largely due to the performance of Anderson. Unable to gain much movement with the first ball of the match, he nevertheless took three of the four wickets to fall – bouncing out M Vijay with a sharp short ball and persuading Rahane to nick an outswinger – and managed to gain dangerous swing with the second new ball.”We thought the way the new ball played in the morning it was the easiest time to bat and didn’t swing that much,” Anderson said afterwards. “Every time I pitched it up Vijay hit me for four, so I went short. I watched the first Test so I knew there was a chance with the short ball.”The pitch is quite abrasive and not chewing the ball up as we would like. The outfield is lush so there are not many areas to get the ball to reverse. We got a little bit from 40 to 55 overs but it was tiny.”I thought we bowled pretty well. There were a couple of periods we let it get away: half an hour before tea we let ourselves down a bit with the ball and in the field. But on that pitch we are reasonably happy with that.”The wicket was tough to bowl on. The outfield was heavy – there will be some sore legs tomorrow – and the pitch played well. The two guys who got hundreds they set about their business and showed they are world-class. They made it very difficult to bowl at them.”Anderson also warned that conditions could deteriorate sharply, so it was essential for England to strike early on day two and for their batsmen to score heavily in the first innings.”I’m not sure the pitch will stay together as well as Rajkot,” he said. “There are signs of it keeping low. There will be more variable bounce and we have seen a few spin. So we are in tough position and we need to have a good day with the ball and an extremely good go with the bat.”

Plays of the day from the fourth ODI between New Zealand and South Africa played at Hamilton’s Seddon Park

Andrew McGlashan in Hamilton01-Mar-2017The landmark – but of a different kindQuinton de Kock was one innings away from setting a South Africa record. Instead, he gave himself a different landmark. He came into the game with five consecutive 50-plus scores in ODIs and a sixth would have been the best by a South Africa batsman (although Kepler Wessels scored one representing Australia). Instead, the run ended in abrupt fashion. Trying to open the face against his first ball from Jeetan Patel, he provided a thin nick for the wicketkeeper. It was his first golden duck in international cricket and only the second of his career in any cricket at professional level.The lost grip that didn’t cost muchMartin Guptill’s comeback was talked up in terms of his batting (more on that later) but he is also a terrific fielder. He almost showed it in 20th over when JP Duminy flicked a ball in the air towards midwicket. Guptill flung himself low to his right, clutched the ball but in the process of landing it bounced out. It was not overly costly for New Zealand as Duminy again struggled for fluency and dragged on against Tim Southee for 25.The batting adjustmentIt really shouldn’t surprise when AB de Villiers brings something brilliant out of his locker. However, the shot he played in the 49th over was stunning for the awareness it showed. He was keen to exploit third man being inside the circle and was prepared to reverse ramp or scoop anything full from Trent Boult, but the bowler also realised this and dropped the ball in short. But that didn’t stop de Villiers. Instead, he stood tall, flicked the bat around and got the ball away by playing a reverse scoop between the keeper and short third man from a standing position.The returnGuptill has batted twice this year due to his dodgy hamstrings. He scored 112 for Auckland and 61 for New Zealand. He has been able to net during his rehab but, still, a month without being in the middle, coming back against South Africa, would surely test him. Well, he slotted back in seamlessly and was racking up sixes as early as the fourth over when he cracked a blistering pull off Wayne Parnell which landed on the grass banks at deep midwicket.And the reprieveGuptill was racing along on 62 off 49 balls when he was given lbw to Dwaine Pretorius. It was a crunch moment of the game, with an uncertain clutch of allrounders to come for New Zealand. Guptill pondered for a moment then called for the review. He was spot on. Guptill was out of his crease, the ball had struck him above the pad flap and would comfortably have carried over leg stump.

England’s batsmen have hogged the limelight, but today it was the bowlers’ turn, not least Mark Wood, whose solitary wicket may have sealed the win

Andrew McGlashan in Cardiff06-Jun-2017Was a match of 564 deliveries and 533 runs decided by one ball? On a surface becoming increasingly tricky for batting, Kane Williamson was closing in on back-to-back centuries. It was less serene than his innings against Australia, but he had come through a rattling blow to the helmet from Liam Plunkett to steer his side to the 30-over mark of their chase. The requirement certainly wasn’t easy – 155 needed off 20 overs – but Williamson had the bit between his teeth.Then came Mark Wood. A bowler who has had three ankle surgeries in a year and has an ODI bowling average of a tick under fifty. He’s also in possession of a central contract which indicates, even when he had doubts about whether the ankle would allow him to return, there was a huge amount of faith and hope invested in him.And this was why. Banging the ball in back of a length with a cross seam, exploiting some variable bounce which had developed during the second half of the game, he made a delivery rise and nip back at Williamson, cramping the New Zealand captain and taking the glove to Jos Buttler.”He’s a very good bowler, unique in the fact that he bowls at such good pace, off maybe a five-metre, 10-metre run-up, which you don’t see too much around the world,” Williamson said. “And he’s performed very, very well for England over a period of time, especially coming back after injury on very good surfaces. So certainly a strength of their bowling attack.”It was not the first time this summer that Wood had claimed a kingpin of the opposition. During the first ODI against South Africa, at Headingley, Hashim Amla had been leading a strong chase. He had dominated Wood early on with a collection of beautiful drives, but Wood then cannoned one into his pads as he shuffled too far across. From there South Africa faded away. The same was true of New Zealand after Williamson’s departure.”Guys like him are so valuable to the team,” Eoin Morgan, England’s captain, said. “I think given games that we’ve played against South Africa recently where we’ve turned games around, the game in Leeds where Amla and Faf [du Plessis] got going, and we managed to take two wickets quite quickly, and the Southampton game where we pulled it out of the bag out of nowhere, it breeds a bit of confidence.”Wood’s delivery was the match-seizing, semi-final securing, ball but there was collective excellence around him. The England attack battled a buffeting gale which, while helping push the showers quickly across the ground, was also strong enough to blow over the electronic sponsors’ boards on the boundary edge, repeatedly blow off the Zing bails, and also send Bruce Oxenford’s hat flying towards long-off.Mark Wood claimed the prized wicket of Kane Williamson for 87•Getty ImagesIt was a bowling line-up which took a different shape than may have been expected. After all the pre-match talk of England having not played two spinners here last year, they recalled Adil Rashid, who responded with an impressively accurate ten overs, although in the end it was still just a one-spinner innings with Moeen Ali not called upon because of the impact of the quicks. Rashid was a beneficiary of Ben Stokes’ improving fitness, which would have allowed him to bowl his full ten overs if needed.”I thought they did an outstanding job. They were truly the highlight of the day,” Morgan said. “Our batting performance was probably par or below par. So pretty average. So I thought the bowlers today as a collective unit were brilliant, really.”The tone was set by Jake Ball who began the innings with back-to-back maidens and whose performance was a reward for faith from the captain and selectors. He was named Man of the Match for his 2 for 31 off eight exacting overs. It’s the outcome England are hoping will pay dividends for Jason Roy, although he has yet to turn the corner having battled to lay a foundation before walking across his stumps at Adam Milne. After this bowling display, Roy remains the only significant negative facing England, and one they appear willing to continue to absorb.Ball had been looking like a weak link in the pace attack after conceding more than 80 in three of his last seven outings. Steven Finn, the man he pipped to the final spot in the original squad because of a greater variation to his bowling, could justifiably have come straight into the team, or David Willey for his left-arm angle.Instead, they stuck with Ball and promoted him to the new-ball vacancy created by Chris Woakes’ injury. He did not concede a run until his 18th delivery – and that because of a misfield at backward point – finding zip which had been lacking against Bangladesh, albeit on a very docile Oval surface. The pick of his early deliveries was the fourth ball, a sharp nip-backer which whistled through the gap left between Luke Ronchi’s bat and pad to remove middle stump.”It was a settler for me,” Ball said. “The little bit of rain we had in the break just juiced the pitch up a little and there was a bit there for the bowlers. The cross-seam [deliveries] and the rain made the pitch a little more uneven, a few balls jumped up and fortunately they found the edge today.”Ball would later return and follow Wood’s dismissal of Williamson, removing Ross Taylor when he clubbed a catch to midwicket towards the end of a three-over spell for 11 runs that helped build the pressure on New Zealand. When allied with Liam Plunkett’s hostile bursts – he cleaned up the lower order to claim his second consecutive four-wicket haul – and the growing confidence in Stokes’ workload, it was a day that ticked a lot of bowling boxes for England.And that was timely. The omission of Rashid from the opening match and injury to Woakes had brought some scrutiny despite the convincing nature of the victory against Bangladesh. The plaudits for this side are so often centred around the batting, to the extent that a total of 311 felt a little underwhelming, but today it was the bowlers who should take the acclaim.

From leading Trinity to a rare triple crown in schools cricket to being touted as a future Sri Lanka captain, the wicketkeeper-batsman is now set for his first international in his home of the hill country

Sidharth Monga in Pallekele10-Aug-2017Despite all the hype around mystery cricketers, Sri Lankan cricket would not have risen without a more prosaic, solid supply line from the schools. Arjuna Ranatunga’s one big lament has been the decline of schools cricket, otherwise “the best system in the world”. Schools cricket in Sri Lanka has been stuff of legend. There are about 30 Big Matches, traditional annual matches played between two certain schools. The Royal-Thomian is the biggest Big Match, a phenomenon in itself with a festival-like atmosphere over the three days of the match and on days leading up to it. Up in the hill country, the Big Match of Kandy, the battle of the blues, between St Anthony and Trinity, was a one-sided affair when Sampath Perera took over in September 2008.Trinity at that time cared only for rugby. The cricket team, which gave the world Kumar Sangakkara, was in division two. Eight years ago, the whole team had been suspended by the school’s principal for lack of discipline. Now, Perera was brought in on the insistence of old boy Sangakkara. In the first week with the team, Perera realised only one of the 21 boys given to him could play the forward-defensive properly.Niroshan Dickwella has a variety of sweeps in his repertoire•AFPSo, Perera didn’t go after technique. He looked for temperament instead. And he picked the Under-15 wicketkeeper for the Under-19 side. Then he fast-tracked him into the main side. There were three more senior wicketkeepers in the squad; their parents obviously complained. There were petitions. Perera, though, stuck with this wicketkeeper, who went on to become the most successful captain at Trinity. Not only did Trinity win the Big Match under him for the first time in 26 years, he also led them to the triple crown of two-day league, one-day knockouts and T20 championship, which no school has ever managed to achieve.”He is a very positive guy,” Perera now says of his big selection at Trinity. “He is a very cunning fellow. He was the fourth in line so there were a lot of petitions against me. ‘What is this?’ ‘This coach is bullshit.’ But I knew. He just needed some time. I thought one day he would play for Sri Lanka.”Niroshan Dickwella has not just played for Sri Lanka, some even talk of him as the future Sri Lanka captain. That has not got to do with the runs he has scored. His numbers, in fact, are not going to grab your attention. An average of 30 in nine Tests, and two ODI centuries in 19 matches are not stats that guarantee you a secure position in these fickle times in Sri Lankan cricket, leave alone a leadership role. It is his attitude that has impressed observers.Perera noticed that when Dickwella led Trinity to a double crown in 2011 and the triple crown the next year, Dickwella had older players to lead. “He built good relations with other players,” Perera says. “His communication skills are very sharp. He is a good motivator. He might shout at his players, but very next second he goes and speaks to them.”Captaincy at school can be a headache for a player, which is why a lot of it is done by the coach. When you meet a good captain, though, if you teach him everything, game tactics, bowling changes, how to handle a situation, you don’t need to talk. Niroshan was the same thing. He did everything. Bowling changes, fielding setting, trapping other batters, analysing the batters. He will never give up. If he thinks ‘I want to do this’, definitely he will do it.”At Trinity, Niroshan Dickwella and others would play at least 250 sweep shots a week•AFPDickwella mostly led by his runs, though, which come mainly through the sweep against spinners. After his half-century at the SSC against India, Dickwella was asked at a press conference who pushed for sweep in the team management. Dickwella’s reply probably went back years ago to school cricket. It was almost as if he was singing, “To everything, sweep, sweep, sweep.”Perera says 80% of the bowling you face at lower levels in Sri Lanka is spin. The pitches are treacherous. You can’t just use your feet the way the Indian batsmen do. You just, as Perera says, “Mark the off stump and do the sweep.””We use the sweep as a threat for the bowlers,” he says. “If they don’t sweep, we are shouting from outside, ‘Sweep the bowler’.”At Trinity, Dickwella and others would play at least 250 sweep shots a week. Schools cricket is an age when a player’s technique is being moulded. It is important that it be taught the right way. “Identify the guard, align your outer eye with the off stump,” Perera says. “Anything outside that eye is outside the line so that is not out. Second thing is control the ball. Bat should come from high to low. Slog sweep and paddle sweep are different, but first you need to learn to keep it along the ground. First thing is, before the ball is pitched, you should base your back leg on the ground and get into position with the high back lift.”By his reckoning, Dickwella swept 80% of the deliveries he faced from India spinners. He was happy with that stat. He had done so against Zimbabwe, too, as he and Asela Gunaratne rescued them from what would have been a huge upset at home. “The positive thing is, he never changes his game,” Perera says. “Any situation, he applies his game. One or two days, I scolded him, called him donkey. One day he told me, ‘If it goes for four, you will only clap.’ So I knew. I shut my mouth. Next game he scored 200.”Perera loves using the word donkey. Ask him about the shot Dickwella played to get out to Shami, trying to ramp him first ball of a new spell and getting bowled, and Perera says, “It is a donkey shot. Difficult thing is batting against spin. He did that and then this.” This shot even has a name: the Dickscoop, which he used to hit Kagiso Rabada for a six once.Ask Perera how Dickwella was at studies: “not a donkey, not a professor”. Dickwella knew how to score marks. Nobody had to worry he might fail an exam.Shades of Sangakkara? Niroshan Dickwella appeals like his idol•AFPPerera says that as a coach you have to be like a father, an enemy, a brother, a friend to the players. He has hit Dickwella on two occasions when he got into mischief he doesn’t want written about. He was like a father when the financial manager of Trinity, Perera’s family friend, told him of the arrears against the star player’s name. Perera asked him what was up. His father, a diabetic patient, had some pension issues and couldn’t afford to pay the fees, which was about LKR 30,000 a term. Perera immediately spoke to an old boy and arranged for a scholarship that ran up to Rs 300,000.Perera insists Dickwella is not the most talented cricketer he coached at Trinity, but such is the Colombo-centred nature of cricket in Sri Lanka that many an outstation gem gets lost in the transition. For Dickwella, he arranged for a contract at Nondescripts Cricket Club (NCC). In his case, there was support both from SLC and NCC to help him move to Colombo. With Dinesh Chandimal away on national duty, Dickwella kept getting chances for NCC, and kept piling on the runs.Once Dickwella had played for Sri Lanka, Perera called him up and asked him to move out of the SLC accommodation and rent a house on his own. “You are not a beggar, neh?” he told Dickwella. “And vacate it for someone else who might be in need as you were.”If not for Sampath Perera there will be no Niroshan Dickwella as he is the one who guided me, made me understand my priorities and moulded me to the player I am today,” Dickwella told .That is, perhaps, the most serious sentence you could get Dickwella to speak. He doesn’t have the articulation of Sangakkara, but already in a short career, Dickwella has become known for the impishness that was a Sangakkara trademark. At one stage, Perera created a fake Facebook account to follow what his wards were up to. “You can see the ‘last seen’ stamp, neh?” He found that Dickwella was the most active.”He is a funny character,” Perera says. “If he gets free time, when he was playing in school, he will do the dance, drama or whatever. So many dry jokes. He is not keeping his mouth shut. Always (like scissors). Even when keeping.”Once Dickwella senior called up Perera and told him about stickers of stars on the ceiling of Niroshan’s roof. When Perera asked him about the stars, he said, “When I go to bed, I like to see stars.” He had posters of Sachin Tendulkar, Brian Lara and Sangakkara in his room. He wanted to be like Sangakkara, which is natural.The Dickscoop, as demonstrated by its inventor Niroshan Dickwella•Getty ImagesDickwella even appeals like Sangakkara. However, he needs to learn the finesse of the “old dog Sangers” as Danny Morrison once called him. Already, he has been reported to the match referee for waiting for Zimbabwe’s Solomon Mire to lift his foot so he can stump him. He has earned demerit points for physical contact on the field with Kagiso Rabada. He has been punished for showing dissent.”The thing is, he wants to win anyhow,” Perera says. “In my side, he didn’t get any complaints. The rule is, if the umpire complains, next match you are out.” However, Perera also acknowledges that outside internationals, it is difficult to police all the gamesmanship, and that is where Dickwella has honed his game. He will continue to be street-smart.Perera doesn’t coach at Trinity now. He has applied twice for the Sri Lanka Under-19 job, but has on both occasions been left disheartened. Instead, he has found himself a new challenge: to bring back to first division a team in whose decline he played a part, St Anthony. He keeps in touch with Dickwella. Recently he noticed Dickwella’s shoulder was dropping when he played his shots, which meant he was becoming an exclusively midwicket player. Immediately he got on the phone and asked him to keep his chin and shoulder together. He tells him often to not go on hitting every ball he faces because international cricket is tougher.On Saturday, Dickwella will play his first international match in his home of the hill country. If he tries to go back to his school, chances are he might be sent back because exams are on and discipline must be maintained. The exams that he had no trouble clearing even if he didn’t study. In the bigger examination of cricket, he might need someone in his ear. “If he doesn’t lose his discipline, there is no limit on how far he might go,” Perera says. “If he is not… he is a bit of a funny character.”

Rather than the fifth-day surface, it was England who ended up cracking as West Indies’ relentless challenge refused to fade

Alan Gardner at Headingley29-Aug-2017The wheels didn’t come off for England all at once. It was more like the team bus picking up a series of punctures over the course of a steady climb towards an expected destination in the hills. When they dropped Kraigg Brathwaite in the first 20 minutes of the morning session, it felt pivotal; when they dropped Shai Hope in the final half hour, it was damning; when they dropped Jermaine Blackwood with six runs required and the shadows lengthening it was close to bathetic.Against a team as low on confidence as West Indies, they could still hope to break the game open heading into the last session, induce a few nerves and spark a collapse. But it was England who looked the shakier by then. Joe Root held his head in his hands when Roston Chase edged James Anderson through a vacant first slip – the captain was the only man in the cordon and he was standing wide – and then threw himself for a catch that didn’t carry off the very next ball.Five runs from two outside-edges brought West Indies’ target down to 82. They had started the day needing 317. In the next over, Chase nudged Stuart Broad towards backward point and Hope came haring down for the single… only for Ben Stokes’ wild shy to beat the fielder backing up and fly to the rope for overthrows. Root, picked out by the TV cameras, looked aghast but appeared to be urging his players to calm down. England strove in pursuit of wickets throughout the day but, as those moments summed up, they lacked precision in their execution.Although a fifth-day crowd of more than 8000 had long fallen silent by the time Blackwood was merrily carving the last few runs under the glowing petals of Headingley’s white rose floodlights, they had played their part as England’s proverbial 12th man. But England seemingly needed 13 or 14 men to win against a suddenly inspired opponent. It was perhaps indicative of their messy all-round performance that the biggest ovation of the day – other than for the victorious West Indies – was for Mason Crane, the substitute fielder who took an outstanding catch to remove Chase and briefly reignite English hopes.Anderson, who took five wickets in the first innings, began the day three short of 500 – and ended it three short. The plangent chorus of “Oh, Jimmy Jimmy” when England took the second new ball rang out more in hope than expectation.England can have few complaints, given the degree to which West Indies had themselves bestowed favours in the field – over the course of both innings, they benefited to the tune of 238 runs through dropped catches; a figure which also doesn’t account for Moeen Ali’s no-ball reprieve (another 52). A mistake of their own then turned out to be the most costly of the lot: Alastair Cook’s failure to hold a regulation edge off Brathwaite in the fourth over of the morning, when he had made 4.Stuart Broad rues a missed chance•Getty ImagesThe drop came off Broad, who was England’s best bowler during the opening hour, and it set the tone. There was aggression and intent but some of it wayward – although Broad did remove Kieran Powell to a catch at fourth slip, his spell read 8-0-45-1 as Brathwaite made the most of his life. Broad also dropped Brathwaite on 29 but managed to spill it on to the stumps at the non-striker’s end, a moment that ended Kyle Hope’s innings and fleetingly suggested England might make it home despite their flaws.When he returned during the afternoon, Broad’s frustrations extended to sticking a boot into the pitch. A delivery on the pads allowed Brathwaite to glance four and take the third-wicket stand past 100 – Broad’s angry scuff at the turf resulted in a word from the umpires. Rather than the fifth-day surface, it was England beginning to crack.Soon after, with Brathwaite and Hope replicating their second-day steel, the crowd sensed that England were potentially in a fix. It started during a Broad over, with a half-full Headingley clapping him into the crease and continued with Ben Stokes hammering in during a spell from the other end. A top-edged hook against Stokes brought Brathwaite four – and possibly a curse from the bowler – but still the partnership did not look like being broken.”Come on, Jimmy!” yelled a lone voice, as he embarked on a third spell of the day – his second up the hill from the Football Stand after a brief salvo at the other end. It was from the Kirkstall Lane End that the wicket finally came, to a throaty roar, as Brathwaite fell five runs short of becoming the first man to score a century in both innings of a first-class match (not just a Test) at Headingley. Undaunted, Hope took up the mantle – and the record.England came into the second Test playing down the suggestion that West Indies were there for the taking but confident, surely, of a fourth successive win as they continued to build for the Ashes. Instead, questions remain over the batting, most notably Tom Westley at No. 3, and possibly the wisdom of bringing back Chris Woakes having only played one other first-class game in 2017. If England have to pick their strongest XI for the decider at Lord’s, it could well be argued that Toby Roland-Jones deserves to play on his home ground.Moreover, Root’s captaincy has taken a dent – not quite up there with David Gower’s declaration at Lord’s in 1984, at least in terms of sheer brutality, but one that will live in the memory for different reasons. Then again, when set against the turbulent history of Headingley, Yorkshire and England, when has the job ever been easy?

A rash slash against Nathan Lyon looks to have cost Joe Root his final chance to make an impact with the bat on England’s defence of the Ashes

George Dobell in Perth17-Dec-20171:37

Swann: Root dismissal was ‘weak’

It is remarkable how quickly hope turns to disappointment.Barely two weeks of playing time after England went into this series with dreams of glory, they are on the brink of relinquishing the Ashes. Instead of heading into the Christmas period full of excitement, there is every chance they will do so with disappointment the primary emotion and talk of transition in the air.Nobody will be more disappointed than Joe Root. He arrived in Australia so full of excitement and enthusiasm. Accompanied by both his parents, partner and young son, he had a genuine sense that he could pull off a memorable success with his own batting one of England’s key weapons.Yet despite all his planning and hard work, Root has been unable to shape the series with the bat and unable to coax any magic from his side. Whereas he started the series in Brisbane with original fields and engaging plans, he has increasingly been reduced – like England captains before him – to throwing the ball in the direction of James Anderson and asking him to ‘bowl dry’ and wait for batsmen errors. Spending 150 overs in the field, game after game, will crush the spark out of any captain.And, to rub salt in the wound, he had seen his opposite number, Steven Smith, excel with the bat. It was probably fitting that Smith produced the outstanding catch – he somehow clung on to a chance that ricocheted unpredictably from Tim Paine’s gloves; truly the man’s reaction time is freakish – to end Root’s second innings on Saturday. As Root trudged off, the pain of regret and disappointment was etched all over his face.There have been signs in this game that Root is starting to feel the burden of his role. That second-innings dismissal, driving at a wide one from Nathan Lyon – the spinner’s first delivery – was uncharacteristically loose and followed a missed chance – he failed to react to an edge that flew past him at slip – and his public show of dissatisfaction with the decision to give Mark Stoneman out on review in the first innings. Root reacted to Aleem Dar’s decision to overrule the on-field umpire’s not out verdict by thumping the dressing room door in disgust. It was an unusual display of anger from a laid-back man.But disappointment will do such things to a player. The chance to captain your country in an away Ashes series occurs rarely and very possibly only once. To see a lifetime of hope and several months of planning come to nothing is hard to take.The positive interpretation of all this is that Root may be able to harness his pain and disappointment and use it as a motivating force next time. However, if he were to remain as captain in four years’ time,especially after what is shaping up as such a heavy defeat, it would go massively against the grain of England’s Ashes history. The last England captain to lead two away Ashes campaigns was JWHT Douglas, either side of the First World War in 1911-12 and 1920-21.The more immediate concern must be whether England are compromising the effectiveness of their best player by asking him to lead the team. He is still averaging 50.27 in the role, however, and while he remains frustrated by his conversion rate (he has reached 50 47 times in Test cricket, but only converted 13 of those into centuries) this was only the second of his eight Tests as captain in which he has failed to reach a half-century. It’s hard to sustain the argument that his form has been too badly compromised.His dismissal here, however, did hint at a cluttered mind. He was trying to be positive and trying to stop Lyon from settling into that line and length that has troubled England all series. But as he walked off, he will have known that his last chance to influence the campaign with the bat probably went with him.It was the second such dismissal he has suffered this series. After Australia exploited his propensity to fall over to the off side twice in Brisbane – he was leg before in both innings – he sliced an ambitious drive in the first innings at Adelaide before he was undone by a good ball (and a bit of uneven bounce) in the second. If he was a bit unfortunate in the first innings here – he was caught done the leg side – it might only have served as a reminder of how dearly he should have sold his wicket in the second.Steve Smith’s elated after taking the catch to dismiss Joe Root•Getty ImagesHe is walking a path familiar to many of his predecessors. To stand in the field for session after session, impotent in the face of the Australian batsmen, to see the hope of the thousands of travelling supporters – and the England fans have attended this series in remarkably numbers – turn to dust, to see your senior players fail to produce the contributions you know they must, and to be unable to make up for it with his own batting, has been a kind of torture for Root. It’s not surprising he is showing one or two signs of the experience.That failure of his senior players to contribute has added to Root’s burden. If England were going to win this series, they needed Cook and Root – their two senior batsmen – to score heavily. As it is, Cook is averaging 13.83 and Root 29.33. It’s nowhere near enough. And when he won the toss and decided to bowl first in Adelaide, he needed his senior seamers to exploit the conditions expertly. Instead they dropped short and any chance that might have existed was squandered.There’s been no lack of effort from anyone. But Lyon’s pre-series comments about ending careers may yet prove prophetic. Certainly Stuart Broad, who here finished with the worst single-innings analysis of his Test career and hasn’t taken a five-for for nearly two years, and Cook, who has not reached 40 in his last 10 Test innings (he has only reached 25 once) require strong performances in the final two Tests to quieten such talk. Broad, it might be noted, had a scan on his left knee before this Test. While the team management insist it is not a cause for concern and is not affecting his performance, they tend not to send players for scans unless there is some sort of issue.And perhaps, in quiet moments, Root could be forgiven for wishing Ben Stokes had chosen to have an early night that fateful day in Bristol. It would be unfair on an excellent Australia performance to suggest it might have made all the difference, but there is no doubt that Root’s most potent weapon was replaced by a burden that night.In truth, Root wasn’t dealt a handful of aces when he took this side to Australia. His squad lacks the quality spin or sharp pace that is usually required to prosper here and the batting has been betrayed as fragile. Perhaps in Brisbane, perhaps in Adelaide, perhaps here in Perth, he has had the same moment of realisation as all the England supporters that his side lacks the tools to hurt Australia. He will also know, however, that he and Cook and Moeen Ali and co have under-performed with the bat and it is that knowledge that may smart the longest. There is a gap between these sides, but it is not, perhaps, as large as it has looked in recent weeks.It used to be said that a player doesn’t recover from a disappointing tour of Australia. While there are several examples of players that have bucked that trend – Anderson and Root are obvious examples – it is certainly the case that such series tend to book-end careers. Root may need careful managing – including, perhaps, a break once this series is concluded – to ensure what remains a gem of a player is not dulled and drained by his disappointment.Whatever happens from here, it seems England will persist with this group of players for the rest of the Ashes campaign. The Lions squad has, Mark Wood apart, now flown home, meaning there is no access to Keaton Jennings, Liam Livingstone, Dan Lawrence, Joe Clarke, Nick Gubbins et al who might have provided reinforcements in Melbourne or Sydney. As a result, the likes of Cook and Broad are going to be given every opportunity to show they still have what it takes to succeed at this level.

Set alongside the performances of David Willey and Moeen Ali, this was a highly encouraging fightback from England

George Dobell at Lord's14-Jul-20181:01

Bopara: Moeen, Rashid built pressure on India

A year to the day until the World Cup final will be played on this very ground, England gained a morale-boosting victory that ensured they will end this series as the No. 1 rated side in ODI cricket.But this was a performance that holds significance well beyond such rankings or even the result. It showed that England had learned lessons quickly and how they could, on their day, defeat this daunting-looking India side who arguably set the bar in this format of the game. It was, from an England perspective, a hugely encouraging day.Perhaps the most pleasing aspect was the manner in which Joe Root played. It wasn’t so much he demonstrated a return to form – it was only six ODI innings since his last half-century and nine since his last century, after all – but that he showed his value playing in exactly the same way he has played throughout the rest of his career.So instead of trying to blast his way to success, or attempting to innovate with strokes outside his normal repertoire, he simply played the game situation. He rotated the strike, he deflected and nudged and he ran hard. Only 7.75 percent of his strokes brought a boundary – a lower percentage than any of his last nine ODI hundreds – but, with nobody else passing 53, he showed the value of including a batsman who could rebuild an innings and retain their composure.Of significance, perhaps, for the Test series and beyond, was that he seemed to read Kuldeep Yadav. Before this match, Kuldeep had dismissed him with two of the three deliveries he had bowled to him in international cricket but here Root hit him for four boundaries including a couple of sweetly-timed cover drives and a late cut from the quicker ball. There will, no doubt, be surfaces that offer Kuldeep more but Root – and England – will take great confidence from this.”Ultimately you have got to trust your game and your technique,” Root said afterwards. “You have got to make sure that you stay strong and trust the stuff you have been doing well for such a long period of time. It was about spending some time out there and trusting the way I play spin. I haven’t faced much of his type of bowling but having a few overs under my belt gave me quite a lot of confidence.”It is faintly absurd that Root’s selection was any sort of discussion point anyway. He averages in excess of 50 in ODI cricket and, in this innings, drew level with Marcus Trescothick as the scorer of most ODI centuries for England. Both now have 12, but Root averages 13 more and has a slightly higher strike-rate. His place, in this format at least, shouldn’t be in much doubt.It was a good day for Eoin Morgan, too. Not only did he score a half-century, but his decision to bat first upon winning the toss – which seemed oddly negative at the time, hinting at a fear of India’s spinners – was fully vindicated.ESPNcricinfo LtdIt wasn’t so much that the pitch turned as the day wore on – though there was some assistance – as much as it slowed and rendered timing the ball increasingly difficult. Understanding this – the benefit, perhaps, of playing on his home ground – Morgan didn’t introduce his spinners until the 19th over; the latest they have been introduced in ODIs since the Champions Trophy. India managed just one boundary between the 15th and 34th overs and, in the last half-hour, Lord’s witnessed the unusual occurrence of a crowd barracking MS Dhoni for slow scoring.There were other encouraging performances for England. David Willey followed his maiden ODI half-century – a 30-ball effort that provided vital impetus to England’s innings – with a decent new-ball spell that showed he could maintain a semblance of control even without any swing. Jos Buttler, meanwhile, clung on to a couple of outstanding catches behind the stumps, Liam Plunkett ended with four wickets as reward for his well-controlled cutters, Adil Rashid with two for his well-controlled leg-spin and Moeen Ali didn’t concede a boundary for his first eight overs and claimed the memorable wicket of Virat Kohli. For the spinners to claim 3 for 80 in 20 overs against India was outstanding but, really, wherever you looked, England players were enjoying a fine day.There are, as ever, caveats. It is almost unthinkable that Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Jasprit Bumrah – both of whom are currently absent due to injury – would have conceded so many runs at the death (England scored 94 from the final 10 overs, largely through Willey) and, had India conceded perhaps 25 fewer, there would have been far less pressure on them in their run chase.The toss, too, probably proved to be disproportionately important.But there was a lesson here. And that was, for all their batting firepower, India can be put under pressure if the score is challenging enough. They remain, no doubt, the team to beat in this format of the game. But England will take confidence and knowledge from this victory. The series decider – at Headingley on Tuesday – could be a cracker.

Australia’s issue surrounds the production line of talent, and the way young players are schooled. They once led the world in this respect, and now lag behind many

Daniel Brettig in Dubai09-Oct-2018Marnus Labuschagne stood transfixed on the crease. He looked down the pitch at the umpire Richard Kettleborough, who had raised his finger to rule him out, caught off bat and pad for a second-ball duck on debut. The double noise and deflection were obvious, the Pakistani celebration spontaneous. But Labuschagne stood there, unable to walk off for a moment. This wasn’t dissent. It was shock.The numbness felt by Labuschagne, the Australian side’s junior-most member, was mirrored across the team as they fell apart for the umpteenth time against the spinning and reverse-swinging ball. Not in the hands of Yasir Shah and Wahab Riaz, known and respected quantities, but Bilal Asif and Mohammad Abbas, the sorts of talents that always seem to be lurking in a Pakistani domestic system with far more depth than Australia’s. All 10 of the touring team’s wickets were lost for 60 runs, with them effectively the match.Depth was what Australia’s effort needed to be built upon in this series, given the suspensions of Steven Smith and David Warner, and the rehab plans of Josh Hazlewood and Pat Cummins. Three of that quartet were in Sydney for Fox Sports’ launch as Australian cricket’s host broadcaster, and all were left wincing in the same manner as the many thousands of Australian cricket watchers and listeners on television and web radio while they witnessed the promise of an opening stand worth 142 broken by the shallowness beneath.This team, led by Tim Paine, coached by Justin Langer, selected by metrics like hundreds scored and frequency of scores over 30, pared down by assessments of character and willingness to do the team thing, bound by a new charter of agreed behaviours, was supposed to be a new one. Australia, we were told, had gone on a journey of introspection and education since the Newlands scandal, to a place where “character over cover drives” and team above all else, were non-negotiable. This was epitomised by the choices of three debutants, in Aaron Finch, Travis Head and Labuschagne, who were all deemed outstanding young men.Others had fallen short of the required standards, be it Peter Handscomb amid technical changes, or Glenn Maxwell amid being Glenn Maxwell. There had even been a late decision to make an example of Matt Renshaw, who recovered well from a concussion only to be told he had not done enough in terms of training and attitude to prove himself worthy. Instead of forming part of the top six, Renshaw joined Ashton Agar in exhausting fielding drills during the breaks, followed by skills work to test their resilience when fatigued.Dealing with fatigue was certainly something Australia’s batsmen had to contemplate across nearly two days in the field. After the pacemen Mitchell Starc and Peter Siddle had toiled admirably, and the spin bowlers Nathan Lyon and Jon Holland without great effect, Finch and Usman Khawaja did well to get through the final 13 overs of day two despite tired legs and minds. When they carried on through the third morning, it seemed momentarily that Australia did possess the required resilience.Mitchell Marsh was trapped lbw•Getty ImagesAs mature cricketers, despite the latter’s lack of previous Test experience, Khawaja and Finch had both been exemplars of the Langer regime. Each worked assiduously to get himself fitter than ever, losing weight and gaining endurance to bat time and also field more freely. For most of the morning they found an ideal balance between attack and defence, enjoying a modicum of good fortune, not least when a Khawaja bat-pad appeal was given not out and then not reviewed, despite replays showing an inside edge.With Pakistan’s captain Sarfraz Ahmed spending much of his morning bickering with the umpire Richard Illingworth, it had seemed that Australia might be able to gain a foothold in the match. But with the ball spinning, bouncing and reversing on a tinder dry surface, it always felt as though one wicket would bring more – finding the one would be the trick. So in time honoured fashion, Pakistan’s bowlers tightened up their lines, Sarfraz set straight fields and patience was played upon, either side of lunch.Eventually, the chance came: Asad Shafiq good enough to hang on to a very low catch at short mid-on when Finch strained to hit Abbas through the line of the ball. Finch, then, had been bored out, a dismissal needing due credit to the fielding side, but also awareness that in Test cricket, especially in these parts, a greater level of ruthlessness is required. Why? The next two or so hours provided Australia’s painful answer.Shaun Marsh, a little inattentively, drove at Bilal’s tempter and edged out of the rough to slip. Khawaja, so prosperous on the sweep of both orthodox and reverse varieties, misread Bilal’s length and offered a wretched top-edge to short leg. Head, who had struggled enormously against spin in the past, offered another hard-handed drive at an offbreak and edged to second slip. And Labuschagne, in the very same over, was unable to be precise enough in footwork or judgement to avoid a bat-pad catch.Those wickets, plus a dropped return chance by Yasir from Mitchell Marsh’s hard hands, more or less told the tale of the day. Paine and the tail were never likely to mount a sustained challenge in such circumstances. Pakistan built their lead for the loss of three wickets in the fading Dubai light, showing that conditions had become more difficult for batting, but not 10 for 60 difficult.So how did a new Australian team, so much more mentally and physically prepared for the task, add another fresh chapter to an old and familiar story of brittleness, now stretching to seven losses of 10 wickets for fewer than 100 runs since the start of the 2016 Sri Lanka tour? The lack of Smith and Warner naturally contributed, but so did a wider issue, one that is beyond the reach of Langer, Paine or the Simon Longstaff and Rick McCosker-led cultural reviews soon to be released.That issue surrounds the production line of talent, and the way young players are schooled. Australia once led the world in this respect, and now lag behind many. Money does not appear to have helped, nor the centralisation of power and decision-making at CA. All are issues above the station of Labuschagne, who could not really have done things any other way.

Talking points from the squads picked by India to play West Indies and Australia in November-December

Sidharth Monga26-Oct-20186:36

Agarkar: Leaving Dhoni out is the right call

Did it really happen?MS Dhoni. Dropped. Raise your hand if you ever thought Dhoni was that rare Indian cricketer who would never let it come down to this and would see the signs. The selectors can put whatever positive spin they want to, but if you are not retired, if you are fit, if you play as little cricket as Dhoni does, there is no other way of putting it: he has been dropped.Of all the Indian cricketers, you would have thought Dhoni would be the last one to become too attached to his position. He knows all too well it is near impossible for selectors to drop legends in India. They usually wait for their retirement except if the slide becomes too long. Dhoni has shown he is all too human, and has forced the selectors to make the call. His 2019 World Cup slot remains certain, but the World T20 in 2020 could feature a new wicketkeeper.It will also turn focus on how much cricket Dhoni now plays outside internationals because he is not in the best form and he hardly gets enough balls to play himself back into form. Happy days for Jharkhand?Spare a thought forMayank Agarwal, who virtually broke the door down leave alone knocking it with a truckload of runs, but didn’t get a chance in the XI in the West Indies series. M Vijay’s experience seems to have beaten him to a spot on the Australia tour. With Prithvi Shaw already in there, perhaps two inexperienced openers was too much of a punt.Karun Nair. Six Tests on the sidelines. Out without a match. He is out of the A side for the first game in New Zealand. You can only hope this has nothing to do with his interview in which he said he was not informed why he was not being selected in the XI.The puntsRohit Sharma, dropped after a dismal South Africa tour at the start of year, and back without playing a first-class match since. And it’s not as if he’s set the Test stage alight since the early West Indies centuries.This selection says two things. Rohit has got the natural talent – and indeed the back-foot play – for the selectors to be able to punt on him like the England selectors did on Jos Buttler. The other unfortunate message is that neither the team management nor the selectors see enough quality in the batsmen who rack up the runs in Indian first-class cricket.0:57

Dasgupta: Dhoni’s omission a sign of the coming future

As much as objective fairness matters, selection is also a subjective exercise. You would hope they have got it right finally after swinging wildly on Rohit, the only A-plus contracted player to have been dropped altogether from one format for a major part of the year.Bye byeFive bowlers? With Hardik Pandya not fit, and with batting having been popularly identified as India’s weak link, it seems India will be playing six batsmen in Australia. Unless they play Ravindra Jadeja as the allrounder.WelcomeShahbaz Nadeem. Krunal Pandya. To the T20I sides. Krunal, especially, is an interesting pick as the spin-bowling allrounder ahead of Jadeja, who made his ODI comeback recently. This is just reward for consistent performances in the IPL. For Nadeem it is that one chance with the dream of an India career becoming more and more distant every passing year. With Dhoni out, with new spinners and allrounders being tried, the selectors are finally showing they have some direction for the T20I side.What did you say again, Mr Selector?His foot must be his favourite body part, because MSK Prasad keeps putting it in his mouth. After having decided Dhoni was going to play Vijay Hazare knockouts, only for Dhoni to prove him wrong, Prasad went on the truth-or-false game with Kedar Jadhav. After the selection for the first two ODIs against West Indies, Prasad said the injured Jadhav will come back for the rest of the series. Jadhav was then flown in to Delhi to play a Deodhar game, having proved his fitness, on the day of the selection.When Jadhav, who said he had cleared all fitness tests and then proved it in match conditions, was shocked at not being picked, Prasad said he had left Jadhav out because of his dubious fitness history. A day later, Jadhav has been added to the fourth and fifth matches having done nothing else in the interim to prove his fitness. “He has demonstrated his fitness in the Deodhar game,” Prasad said 24 hours after saying one match was not enough for Jadhav to be cleared fit. In the bargain, Jadhav has lost out on a chance to represent India at his home venue.