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Scorecard

Ravindra Jadeja continued his magnificent form to restrict Karnataka and help Saurashtra gain the upper hand on the opening day of their quarter-final clash. In a marathon 30-over spell of accurate and incisive left-arm spin Jadeja bagged his fourth five-for of the season which included three wickets in seven balls to overshadow Robin Uthappa’s brilliant century.At stumps R Vinay Kumar remained unbeaten on 22 after partnering Sunil Joshi in a 40-run eighth-wicket stand that frustrated Saurashtra.Jadeja was introduced in the ninth over after lunch and bowled unchanged from the Churchgate End until stumps, troubling every batsman with his variations and bounce. In matter of a few overs either side of tea Jadeja swung the momentum in Saurashtra’s favour with a flurry of wickets that included the prize scalp of Rahul Dravid, who was beginning to flourish in a third-wicket partnership with Uthappa.Dravid, who struggled initially against the nagging off-stump attack of Jadeja and Jayesh Odedra, grew in confidence and was beginning to find his timing when Jadeja induced an edge with a delivery that turned and spat off the pitch. New man C Raghu tried to defend an armer that hit his pad in front of the stumps before Jadeja trapped his third victim, Thilak Naidu, with a similar delivery. Jadeja then attacked Uthappa and was unlucky not to get him when Sagar Jogiyani failed to latch on to an edge off an attempted cut.The run-flow, which had gathered momentum in the second session, dropped after tea as Jadeja did the strangle act. He stuck a double blow once again, picking up two wickets off five balls. B Akhil, the Karnataka allrounder, went for an unconvincing sweep and was bowled. With Karnataka desperately needing Uthappa to survive the final session, Jadeja nailed him on the front pad as Uthappa prodded at a delivery outside off stump. Sanjay Hazare, the umpire, took a while to make his decision but Jadeja deserved the success for his doggedness.Jadeja’s success defied the teams’ strategy to go in with an extra seamer: Karnataka chose to go in with debutant left-arm medium pacer S Aravind, while Saurashtra opted for Odedra, who repaid the trust with two early wickets.A few damp spots on the pitch had delayed the start by half hour in the morning, but Karnataka openers, Uthappa and KB Pawan, progressed in a relaxed fashion after Saurashtra elected to field. Though the new-ball pair of Sandeep Jobanputra and Balkrishna Jadeja, both left-armers, tried to keep an off-and-middle stump line in their attempt to get the ball back into the right-handers, their strategy did not yield a positive result in the absence of any breeze, and the duo’s lack of pace helped Karnataka to flourish.Uthappa got off to a confident start with two punched drives to the midwicket boundary, and was quick to latch on to anything short, full, or wide. He had his share of luck too, when an inside edge off an attempted cut whistled over the stumps.The openers had added 53 for the first wicket when Odedra struck with his variations in pace. Getting the ball to break off the pitch by rolling the fingers over the seam, he kept the batsmen guessing. Pawan wafted at a one that moved away after pitching and CM Gautam, the centurion in the previous game, shouldered arms to one that pitched on off and moved in to hit the stumps.However, the fall of wickets did not impede Uthappa’s progress as he flicked a couple of fours behind square to bring up his fifty. He cut Balkrishna for a boundary in the first over after lunch before driving him behind square for another four in the next over. As ever, he was inventive in his strokeplay. He utilised the 7-2 off-side field to quickly shuffle across and work the deliveries through midwicket.Uthappa lofted the offspinner Kamlesh Makwana over wide long-on for the first six before reaching his ton with an aggressive straight drive. It brought up his third century of the year but the celebration was muted as the job was only half done. Unfortunately Jadeja did not allow him to end on a high.

Peter Moores, the England coach, has defended Monty Panesar’s poor show in India’s record chase in Chennai, blaming it on lack of practice ahead of the series. Panesar last played a first-class game in September and went in to the first Test without a warm-up game, after the scheduled match was cancelled following the Mumbai terror attacks.Moores echoed the words of David Capel, Panesar’s coach at Northamptonshire, who said Panesar lacked bowling practice and needed time to work on his variations.”One of the keys to Monty in this Test match is that he’s not had a run of games and I don’t think it was as easy as the pitch looked because otherwise Harbhajan [Singh] and [Amit] Mishra would have run riot and they didn’t,” Moores said.Harbhajan and Mishra took three wickets each in the first innings but managed only one each in the second as England scored 311 to set India a mammoth target of 387. Panesar, who also took three in India’s first innings, went wicketless and conceded 105 runs in the chase.”As you go through your overs you get into a rhythm so that’s quite challenging for someone who is suddenly charged with the job of bowling out an Indian Test match team that are playing very good cricket,” Moores said.Panesar’s record in Tests, he said, compared very favourably to a lot of spinners who had started out in the game around the same time and he was still very young. “People talk about him developing and changing pace and that takes time, we know that with spinners. They have to add things to their game as batters do and all cricketers do to stay ahead of the game.”In his first 17 Tests, Panesar took 65 wickets at 28.40 with six five-fors and a ten-wicket haul while in the last 17 he took 52 at 37.82 with two five-fors.”He wants to develop his game and he is developing his game and he’s at that point in his career where he is learning all the time. Once you learn something, you practice it and then you can start to use it in a game. It’s not an overnight process.”

Scorecard

A fine double from Mathew Sinclair and Brad Patton’s second century in four first-class games led Central Districts to the top of the State Championship table with an eight-wicket win over Otago in Napier. Sinclair, the captain, followed up his 108 in the first innings with 52 not out while Patton struck 110 from 168 balls, including 11 fours and a six, as the home side reached 261 for 2 with 8.2 overs to spare.Craig Cumming started the match well for Otago with 133 and Neil Broom chipped in with a useful 60 as the visitors posted 357 on the opening day. Ewen Thompson captured 4 for 64 while his opening partner Mitchell McClenaghan picked up 2 for 48. After Peter Ingram collected 51, Sinclair’s century put Central Districts on track for the two first-innings points and the bonus, which pushed them ahead of the leaders Wellington, was achieved with a pair of 36s from the tailenders Thompson and Richard Sherlock.Faced with a 21-run deficit, Otago relied on Greg Todd’s 74 and 73 not out from Derek de Boorder to stretch Central Districts’ target. Jacob Oram, who is overcoming back and finger injuries, delivered another 18 overs to follow his 17 in the first innings and grabbed three wickets for the game in a promising sign for the Test series against West Indies, which starts on Thursday.

Scorecard
West Indies Women, buoyed by centuries from openers Deandra Dottin and Stefanie Taylor, beat Sri Lanka Women XI comprehensively by 112 runs in their only tour match at the P Saravanamuttu stadium in Colombo on Monday. In pursuit of a formidable 273, the Sri Lankans took their time to get some valuable batting practice ahead of the first ODI on Wednesday, eventually reaching just 161 for 7, with Hiruka Fernando top scoring with 34.After being put in, the West Indies openers chose to make the most of their time at the crease. Dottin made 103 off just 68 balls, including 12 fours and four sixes, and added 216 for the first wicket with Taylor, whose century came off 113 balls. Both batsmen gave up their wickets by voluntarily retiring out to give their other team-mates a batting stint before the first ODI. Sri Lanka used as many as eight bowlers with Sanduni Abeywickrama being the most economical of the lot, conceding just 24 runs in ten overs and bowling Juliana Nero out for 19. Nero made 19 off 42 balls, and Charlene Taitt, who came in at No. 4, made 23 off 59 balls, eager to bat as long as possible to get used to the Sri Lankan conditions.Sri Lanka’s intention to bat out the match was conspicuous in their sedate response, with opener Dilani Manodara, making 33 off 107 balls, and Dushanti Dedunu, her partner, making 6 off 33. They then lost two quick wickets, Dedunu, and Sumudu Fernando, both run out as Sri Lanka stumbled to 25 for 2. However, Manodara and Sumudu Fernando added 59 for the third wicket to lend some stability to the team’s innings. Sumudu’s sister Hiruka Fernando was the side’s top scorer with 34. West Indies used ten bowlers in all, with Afy Fletcher being the pick of the lot, taking 2 for 13 in five overs.

James Franklin, the New Zealand fast bowler, hopes to start the 2008-09 domestic season on time and wants to last the whole season without breaking down.Franklin last played a Test for New Zealand in December 2006 and he hasn’t appeared in one-dayers since the 2007 World Cup in the West Indies. Since then he missed the World Twenty20, the tour of South Africa, the home series against Bangladesh, and the home-and-away series against England. Franklin underwent surgery for a patella tendon injury in his right knee last November.He has just returned to New Zealand after playing three weeks of Twenty20 games and one-day cricket for Australian Capital Territory. He had also played in the Emerging Players tour to Queensland in July after being named among New Zealand Cricket’s [NZC] 20 contracted players in April.”It’s nice they’re [NZC] behind me, but first things first,” Franklin told the . “I’ll be stoked if I can start the season on time and get through the whole summer. That would be a massive tick in the box for me.”Franklin, however, said he wasn’t looking as far as a New Zealand call-up just yet. “If I’m feeling well with no worries then you never know but obviously a lot of time has passed since I played for New Zealand,” he said. “The guys who’ve come in the past year have done well. It’s all competition among one another and that can only be a good thing for New Zealand cricket.”

The new selection committee has sprung two surprises, naming Jhulan Goswami, the fast bowler, as India’s captain for the women’s tour of Australia and recalling the former captain Anjum Chopra to the 15-member squad. Goswami takes over from Mithali Raj, who led the team since the 2005 World Cup. The tour, starting October 28, features five ODIs and one Twenty20 international.”I am really excited and honoured by the Board’s decision to make me the captain of India,” Goswami told the .”I am ready for the job and looking forward to playing in Australia.”Goswami also welcomed the return of Chopra, who is India’s second highest run scorer in ODIs but last played for India in the Quadrangular Series in February 2007 in Chennai. The forthcoming tour will be India’s last series ahead of next year’s World Cup, also in Australia. “Anjum carries a great amount of experience which will help the side immensely. It is an important tour for us because the World Cup will follow soon after.”The other players making a comeback are batsman Anagha Deshpande, allrounders Reema Malhotra and Thirush Kamini and offspinner Nooshin Al Khadeer. Kamini was sent to Cricket Australia’s Centre for Excellence in August just before the tour of England.Raj said India’s 4-0 loss on their recent tour of England could have prompted the selectors to replace her. “England was miserable and that’s the reason I think the selectors chose to name another captain,” she said. “Jhulan is good. Her captaincy might give the team a much-needed boost, with the World Cup round the corner.”Squad:
Jhulan Goswami (capt), Rumeli Dhar, Jaya Sharma, Sulakshana Naik (wk), Mithali Raj, Anjum Chopra, Thirush Kamini, Amita Sharma, Priyanka Roy, Snehal Pradhan, Gouher Sultana, Anagha Deshpande, Reema Malhotra, Nooshin Al Khadeer, Seema Pujare

“One day I’ll just get out of bed and come down to the ground and think ‘I’ve had enough’. Whether that comes in July, August, September or while in a gym in October, who knows, but I’ve always hoped that’s the way it will happen.” That was Graeme Hick on the eve of his 40th birthday, two years and three seasons ago, and his prophecy has proven to be spot-on. Aside from a niggling elbow injury that has hindered his participation this summer, there was no obvious sign that the end – finally – was nigh. Had Hick taken guard for one more season in 2009, no-one would have been the slightest bit taken aback, except perhaps the county bowlers who must now be breathing a wistful sigh of relief that their 25-year sentence has been lifted.There is still the best part of a month of the 2008 season remaining, and with Worcestershire sitting at the top of the second division of the Championship, Hick has the chance to sign off with a measure of the glory that his lengthy service deserves. But win or lose, he will soon be gone, and while those whose judgment derives solely from feats achieved at the highest echelons will size up his Test record and shrug, countless others will rightly mourn the passing of one of the gentle giants of the game.More than any other cricketer, Graeme Hick has come to embody – for better and for worse – the fading magnificence of county cricket, a version of the game that has existed since the early 1800s but whose relevance in this 100mph world of Twenty20 cricket seems to face new questions on a daily basis. But those that live fast, die young, and leave little for the memories. Hick chose instead to slow down and endure – like a stately galleon, he proved ill-equipped for the iron-clad warfare of modern Test cricket, but his billowing sails patrolled the calmer waters of the shires for a full quarter of a century.Does it matter that he was found wanting at the very highest level? Of course it does, and doubtless retirement will afford him plenty of time to dwell on the moments that might have made a difference. If only he could have adopted a less cluttered mindset when facing Curtly Ambrose during that traumatic debut series in 1991. If only he could have read the match situation better at Sydney in 1994-95, and hustled to his hundred instead of compelling Mike Atherton to leave him high and dry on 98 not out.If only the security of the central contract system had arrived ten years earlier, and bonded him to a team ethic that was palpably lacking for much of his piecemeal international career. Whatever the reasons for his shortcomings, the limelight never suited him. Instead the definitive period of Hick’s career was not his turbulent decade in and out of the England team, but the 15 languidly brilliant years at New Road that bookended his time at the top. His six Test hundreds are mementoes he’ll doubtless treasure, but for his county he scored no fewer than 106 – out of a grand total of 136 that places him eighth on the all-time list of first-class century-makers.That list, however, is already a living anachronism. Mark Ramprakash, whose career mirrors Hick’s in so many ways (and whose England debut came in the same Headingley Test in 1991) became the 25th man to reach 100 hundreds earlier this season, but the chances of anyone ever emulating that feat are as good as non-existent. From WG Grace through Frank Woolley to Geoff Boycott and Graham Gooch, there once was a common narrative to the game of cricket. All that is changing at a frightening pace, and the notions of love and loyalty that sustained Hick throughout his Worcestershire career are fast being replaced by the quest for a quick buck.And perhaps, tragically, that fate has also been forced upon Hick himself, because as he conceded in a tearful farewell to the media, the prospect of him signing for the rebel Indian Cricket League has not been entirely ruled out. At the age of 42, but with the fitness of a man half his age, who could begrudge him the chance to secure a nest egg for retirement, especially in a form of the game for which his bold strokes might have been invented? But in the light of the woes that befell Kent this season, there’s no alternative but for a complete severing of Hick’s cricketing umbilical cord.

That means tearing himself away from Worcestershire, the one team to which Hick truly belonged during his days as a professional in his adopted country. With its bucolic river-frontage and cathedral backdrop, it’s not hard to understand why Hick, the modest son of a Rhodesian tobacco farmer, felt at peace in such surroundings, and he repaid them with the finest days of his life. The bright lights were never his scene – except, perversely, for the occasions in which he batted under them in one-day internationals for England, when instinct was able to surplant circumstance, and the full array of his talent was given a chance to breathe.Hick never had such problems being his own man on the county circuit. When he arrived at Worcestershire as a callow 18-year-old in 1984, he stunned the old stagers with the uncomplicated certainty of his strokeplay – that season he made 84 unbeaten runs on debut against Surrey, and in 1986, became the youngest player ever to pass 2000 runs. England recognition followed the moment he completed his qualification period in 1991, and though we’ll never truly know why he couldn’t reproduce his county form for his country, that inevitability of selection, coupled with the anxiety of waiting, surely helped to turn him into a marked man.The scars of his England experience have long since healed, and the Hick who heads for retirement is a man who knows he gave his all for the sport – and the club – that he loved. Quite what he leaves behind him, however, is another matter entirely. Perhaps his very longevity has perpetuated the era that he helped to define, but without his totemic presence in the first-class averages, there’s suddenly a void that may never be adequately filled.

The best cricketers in the six Associate countries are gearing up for the ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier to be held in Belfast in two weeks’ time.Bermuda, Canada, Ireland, Netherlands, Scotland and Kenya have each announced their squads, with plenty at stake: the two finalists will qualify for the ICC World Twenty20 in England next year. Furthermore, the ICC announced last week that there will be a reserve day to accommodate a possible third and fourth-place play-off. If Zimbabwe step down from the competition, which has yet to be confirmed by their board, a third Associate will replace them.Ireland, the top seed, will be led by William Porterfield, the 23-year-old left-hander who is currently playing for Gloucestershire, and who succeeded Trent Johnston as captain this year. Porterfield is yet to captain Ireland in an ODI but has led his team in five Friends Provident Trophy matches. And although his side lost four of the matches, Porterfield inspired his team to a four-wicket victory over Warwickshire, which was Ireland’s first win over a county side in two years.Kenya, meanwhile, will be led by their veteran, Steve Tikolo, in a squad that features 11 players who participated in the last World Twenty20 in South Africa in 2007. Captain since 2002, Tikolo was instrumental in not only earning ODI status for Kenya but also a place in the 1999 World Cup when he scored 147 against Bangladesh in the 1997 qualifiers. Thomas Odoyo, the Associate ODI Player of the Year, is the other veteran, having played in all four World Cups in which Kenya have participated.Third seed Scotland, led by Ryan Watson, have opted for continuity in naming a squad which has just three changes from the side which participated in last year’s World Twenty20.The Netherlands squad is less certain, however. Alexei Kervezee, their gifted young batsman who plays for Worcestershire, pulled out of their Intercontinental Cup match against Ireland two weeks ago, and is unlikely to be fit in time for the qualifiers. There is better news, however, with the inclusion of Ryan ten Doeschate, the Essex allrounder and one of Associate cricket’s most exciting batsmen.38-year-old John Davison returns to bolster a very inexperienced Canada while Bermuda, who are again in a state of flux and redevelopment, will be captained by Irving Romaine. As ever, their batting relies upon David Hemp.The qualifiers get underway on August 2.

Yorkshire will travel to the home of their rivals Lancashire on Thursday for the disciplinary hearing at Old Trafford which will decide their fate in the Twenty20 competition. They face being booted out of the competition, or having to replay a crucial group match against Nottinghamshire when they fielded the ineligible Azeem Rafiq, or even another course of action.The hearing will be chaired by Judge Edward Slinger, with James Pickup QC and Simon Schanschieff also sitting. The ECB will issue a statement after Thursday’s hearing.Stewart Regan, Yorkshire’s chief executive, has already accepted responsibility for the club omitting to have registered Rafiq, a former England Under-15 captain who does not have a British passport.Yorkshire’s Twenty20 Cup quarter-final away to Durham on Monday was called off just minutes before the start after the ECB ruled they’d failed to register Rafiq as a first-class player. Rafiq is understood to have been eligible to play for Yorkshire at every level below the first team – but he bowled two overs against Nottinghamshire.The county’s registration error could end up costing the county a chance of winning £2.5 million on offer to the inaugural Champions League winners later this year, in a tournament featuring leading domestic Twenty20 sides from around the world.

Match facts

Sunday, May 25, 2008
Start time 20:00 (local time), 14:30 (GMT)

The Big Picture

Kings XI Punjab will play their second dead match in two days when they take on the Kolkata Knight Riders in Kolkata. Sealing a spot in the semi-finals did not stop Punjab from putting on a convincing performance against the Deccan Chargers and they will want to match the consistent form of their fellow semi-finalists, the Rajasthan Royals. Their previous two games went down to the last over and Punjab will look to avoid that this time round.For Kolkata, it is the final game of the season and they will want to end on a positive note, giving the Eden Gardens spectators something to cheer about. In their last four games, Kolkata haven’t scored more than 149, and only one of their batsmen has managed a half-century – Salman Butt against the Chennai Super Kings.When the two sides played in Mohali, Kolkata fell nine runs short despite a 73-ball 71 from David Hussey.

Tournament position

Kolkata Knight Riders: P13, W5, L7, NRR -0.167
Kings XI Punjab: P12, W9, L3, NRR +0.431

Form (last five matches, most recent first)

Kolkata Knight Riders: LLLWW
Kings XI Punjab: WWWWL

Watch out for …