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Openers’ 140-run stand helps Giants get off the mark after four straight defeats

Firdose Moonda06-Mar-2024Gujarat Giants 199 for 5 (Mooney 85*, Wolvaardt 76, Molineux 1-32) beat Royal Challengers Bangalore 180 for 7 (Wareham 48, Gardner 2-23) by 19 runs It was fifth time lucky for Gujarat Giants who won their first match of this year’s WPL in Delhi, after four defeats in Bengaluru. The change of venue worked a charm for Giants who bucked the Chinnaswamy chasing trend by choosing to bat first and racked up the second-highest total in their WPL history thanks to their first century stand. Laura Wolvaardt and Beth Mooney put on 140 for the first wicket and though the middle order fell away, they asked Royal Challengers Bangalore to pull off the highest successful WPL chase of 200.If any team was up for the task, it was them. RCB chased down 189 against Giants last year, when Sophie Devine scored 99 from the opening berth and she looked in the mood for a repeat. Batting at No.4, Devine was at the crease two balls after the powerplay, with RCB on 42 for 2. She took them to halfway in a good position in 76 for 2 but then was bowled by left-arm spinner Tanuja Kanwar to leave RCB’s middle order to finish the job.Richa Ghosh played a spirited hand with 30 off 20 balls and shared in a stand of 33 with Georgia Wareham, who scored 48 off 22, but skied an Ash Gardner full toss to Meghna Singh at cover and all but ended RCB’s hopes. The result means Giants have their first points and will enter the race for the knockouts, with three more league matches left to play.

First fifties for Giants

Lack of runs was the main problem for Giants after the Bengaluru leg of the competition, with no top-order partnerships of more than 50 runs (Ash Gardner and Phoebe Litchfield had a 52-run fourth-wicket stand against UP Warriorz) partnerships and no individual scores of fifty or more. They put both of those right in their first outing in Delhi. Mooney and Wolvaardt’s opening combination worked well for the second time in three matches. After posting 40 against Warriorz, they got to 50 off 27 balls in the fifth over with Wolvaardt the aggressor and Mooney the accumulator. Theirs is the only opening stand in Giants’ history that has gone past a half-century, with no fifty-plus opening stands in 2023 either. Wolvaardt went on to record the first fifty by a Giants batter this year and she did so off just 32 balls with a stunning straight drive past Ellyse Perry and their stand grew to 140 – Giants highest in their history.Laura Wolvaardt notched up 76 off just 45 balls•BCCI

Bisht – and RCB – vs Umpires Wolvaardt’s dismissal for 76 gave RCB an opportunity to get back into the innings and the two overs cost just 15 runs. But after Devine was brought back and her third over costing another 15 runs, the pressure was on the left-arm spinner Ekta Bisht. Mooney hit the first ball straight past her for four, then couldn’t get the second away. For the third, Mooney brought out a reverse-sweep and missed, prompting a loud appeal from Bisht for lbw, which was denied. RCB reviewed. Replays showed Mooney had inside-edged onto her front pad. Bisht kept the next ball full, Phoebe Litchfield tried to scoop and missed, RCB appealed again and were denied again. RCB reviewed again, only to see the ball pitching outside leg. Later, the same umpire gave Smriti Mandhana out in the chase when she missed a pull off Gardner and she reviewed the call. Replays showed the ball was hitting leg stump and Jayapal was right again.

All RCB at the end

Mooney’s onslaught didn’t blunt RCB’s fielding efforts and Mandhana was quick to respond when Mooney called Litchfield through for a non-existent single in the penultimate over. Her throw found Richa Ghosh in time to catch Litchfield out of her crease and run her out for 18. Giants promoted hard-hitting Gardner to No.4 and she sent the first ball she faced to Simran Bahadur at long-off to depart for a duck. Wareham conceded two wides and a single to close out the over. With Mooney off strike to start the last over, D Hemalatha stepped out of her crease to try and smack Sophie Molineux through the in-field but missed and was stumped. Four balls later, Mooney was facing again when she hit the ball to point and called Veda Krishnamurthy through for a single. Veda was never going to make her ground and became the third Giants batter to be run out. RCB closed out the innings with two overs that cost only 12 runs and brought them four wickets.

Mooney gets her own back

Mooney was on strike for all three Giants run-outs, and it was her calls that left her partners in tricky situations, but she made up for that when she completed a run-out in RCB’s innings. S Meghana was coming back for a second run off Meghna Singh but took on Wolvaardt’s arm and always looked in trouble. The throw came in and Mooney collected and whipped the bails off to give Giants a clear advantage just after the powerplay.

Wareham mayhem at the death

RCB’s hopes of a win were almost certainly out of mind when Wareham decided to have some fun. She’d just seen Ghosh dismissed, her team needed 71 off 24 balls and Tanuja Kanwar delivered a juicy full toss on offstump which she could not resist. Wareham cleared the front leg and boshed the ball over deep mid-wicket for her first six and RCB’s sixth. She hit one more, off Meghna over wide long-on, and RCB finished with eight sixes, an interesting statistic considering Giants only hit one six, but ended up on the losing side.

She will be replaced by wicketkeeper-batter Dilara Akter for the three-match series

Mohammad Isam27-Mar-2024Fargana Hoque has been left out from Bangladesh’s T20I squad for the three-match series against Australia. Fargana was among three changes from the ODI series which the visitors won 3-0 quite convincingly.Fargana had scores of 0, 7 and 5 in the three ODIs although the rest of the Bangladesh team couldn’t even cross 100 runs in any of the matches.Dilara Akter has replaced Fargana while Fariha Trisna and Shorifa Khatun have come in place of Disha Biswas and Nishita Akter. All three of those replacements have some T20I experience.”Trisna got the nod ahead of Disha as she is a left-arm pacer and adds variety to the bowling,” chief selector Sajjad Ahmed said. “Dola has been picked over Fargana. She is a wicketkeeper-batter who we believe, has the talent to succeed in the T20 format. Shorifa Khatun is an allrounder who bowls off-spin and bats in the late order. She can also develop into a T20 specialist.”The three T20Is will also be held at the Shere Bangla National Cricket Stadium in Dhaka on March 31 and April 2 and 4. All three matches will start at 12:00pm local time.Bangladesh T20I squad: Nigar Sultana Joty (capt), Nahida Akter, Murshida Khatun, Sobhana Mostary, Sumaya Akter, Shorna Akter, Ritu Moni, Rabeya, Sultana Khatun, Fahima Khatun, Marufa Akter, Farzana Akter Lisa, Fariha Islam Trisna, Shorifa Khatun, Dilara Akter Dola.

Mitchell Starc bowled Abhishek Sharma in the first over, and there was no way back for SRH

Sidharth Monga26-May-20240:46

Moody: Starc’s jaffa to Abhishek is the ball of the tournament

Just like the 2015 World Cup final, Mitchell Starc led the rout of the second-best team of the tournament as Kolkata Knight Riders fashioned the most one-sided IPL final to secure their third title. Starc started with arguably the ball of the tournament, and the most complete attack of the tournament was too good for Sunrisers Hyderabad on a pitch that offered seam movement for at least seven overs followed by grip off the surface too. SRH were bowled out for the lowest total in an IPL final, 113, which KKR chased down with 57 balls to spare thanks to Venkatesh Iyer’s blitz of 52 off 26.Five of the six bowlers used by KKR took a wicket in their first over, including a golden duck for SRH’s talisman Travis Head to Vaibhav Arora in the second over. It is hard to find fault with SRH who had to take risks while KKR’s strategy was straightforward: with the ball moving, just minimise the bad balls and experiment less. Whenever SRH looked to force the pace, they ended up losing wickets.

Scintillating Starc

Starc didn’t quite start the tournament the way he would have wanted after becoming the costliest player in IPL history, but he turned up for the playoffs all right. The first ball of the match swung away to beat Abhishek Sharma, who was taking first strike after Starc bowled Head second ball in the Qualifier 1. By the end of the over, Starc had worked himself into enough of a rhythm to pitch the ball on leg and hit the top of off. It was an unplayable delivery at Starc’s pace. You could forgive Abhishek for not lunging forward because it was pitched on a good length and the movement was late.Abhishek Sharma could not keep out Mitchell Starc•BCCI

Head got on strike only last ball of the second over, which is when Arora started on a good length outside leg, and swung and seamed it to finish just outside the top of off. Head pushed at it, edged, and was caught behind.While Arora mixed up his inswing with various-paced short balls, Starc kept using the scrambled-seam ball to threaten both the edges. One outside edge flew wide of slip, before Rahul Tripathi fell off a top edge as he tried to push back.

Rana starts the second slide

Seeing how the ball was moving, KKR used just the two bowlers in the powerplay, but Arora went for 17 in the final powerplay over, taking SRH up to 40 for 3. That seemed like a situation from which SRH could salvage the game, especially with an Impact Player up their sleeve.It wasn’t to be. In his first over, Harshit Rana bowled three straight slower balls before bowling the hard length at 146kmph and managing seam movement against the angle. Nitish Reddy had no choice but to go after it, and all he managed was an edge through to the keeper.Harshit Rana was flying high in the final•Associated Press

Aiden Markram and Heinrich Klaasen were now SRH’s last hope really. They batted cautiously together for three overs but when Markram tried to take Andre Russell on, he found long-on. Soon after Varun Chakravarthy produced the wicket of Shahbaz Ahmed with a top edge on the sweep from well outside off.In the next over, the Impact Player Abdul Samad gave Russell his 18th wicket of this IPL, the most he has taken in one edition. Rana came back to get Klaasen playing on to a slower ball. Russell would go on to add a 19th to his tally when ending the innings with Pat Cummins’ wicket in the 19th over.Not before Cummins managed the top score to take SRH past 100.

The chase as one long celebration

KKR continued their domination of Bhuvneshwar Kumar by charging at him even though they lost Sunil Narine for 6 off 2 at the other end. Venkatesh hit Bhuvneshwar for two straight sixes in a 20-run third over, and when he and Rahmanullah Gurbaz took another 20 off T Natarajan in the sixth over, KKR had put together the most in a powerplay in an IPL final (72).Gurbaz hit boundaries post the powerplay, but didn’t have the benefit of a review because of a technology breakdown when given out lbw for 39. That only allowed captain Shreyas Iyer to be in the middle for the winning moment after a tough year for him in which he has lost his place in and retainer with the Indian national team.

Southee and Boult picked up five wickets between them to demolish Uganda, as New Zealand completed the small chase in 5.2 overs

Andrew Fidel Fernando15-Jun-2024Trent Boult delivered searing, full inswing, Tim Southee went at the stumps as well, before Mitchell Santner and Rachin Ravindra tested both edges of the bat with their left-arm spin.The result was another Uganda collapse at the T20 World Cup, their inexperienced batters simply unable to contend with the quality of New Zealand’s bowling.Uganda were all out for 40 in the 19th over, with only one of their batters – Kenneth Waiswa – having made double figures. They struck three boundaries all through their innings, and were unable to find scoring options, the New Zealand bowlers frequently beating their bat.New Zealand ran down the target in 5.2 overs, with the loss of just one wicket.

Boult homes in on the stumps early

Even top batters from more established teams would have been tested by Boult’s first over. He began with a couple of inswinging yorkers to Ronak Patel, who managed to to get off strike second ball.Boult’s next two deliveries were big-swinging, and pinpoint. First he had left-hander Simon Ssesazi plumb in front, before cleaning up Robinson Obuya with a delivery that curved in through the gate.After Boult delivered that double-wicket over, conceding just one run, Southee bowled a maiden, then Boult delivered another maiden – Uganda’s top order often unable to make contact.The pair bowled right through the powerplay, and left Uganda 9 for 3, with Southee having trapped Alpesh Ramjani in front in his second over.

Spinners and Ferguson wreck Uganda’s middle order

Then it was over to Santner, Lockie Ferguson, and Ravindra. Santer struck first, drawing the outside edge of Ronak, held nicely by wicketkeeper Devon Conway.Ferguson then took out Waiswa’s stumps. Even Riazat Ali Shah, and Dinesh Nakrani looked incapable of scoring against New Zealand, and by the end of the 14th over, Uganda were seven down for 27.Their only minor consolation was getting past the 39 – their lowest T20 total ever – they had slumped to against West Indies.

The pursuit

The chase was largely smooth, and the only wicket Uganda got had a touch of good fortune about it – Riazat getting Finn Allen caught down the legside with a full delivery.New Zealand had trouble hitting boundaries too, finding the rope only twice in the first four overs. But with such a small target, singles and twos would work too. Conway finished the game with back-to-back boundaries off Jumo Miyagi.

Tom Alsop top scores for Sharks as Joe Weatherley, James Vince fifties land in losing cause

ECB Reporters Network21-Jun-2024Nathan McAndrew was electric with the bat and miserly with the ball as Sussex Sharks went second in the Vitality Blast South Group with a seven-run victory over Hampshire Hawks.Australian all-rounder McAndrew hammered 32 off 11 balls to boost an underwhelming score, with the help of Tom Alsop’s 43 off 27.James Vince bagged his fifth 50-plus score in his last six T20 innings against Sussex and Joe Weatherley picked up 68 not out.But McAndrew returned 1 for 21 – spoiled only by a penultimate ball no ball – before Danny Lamb defended 25 off the last over to give the Sharks a first Utilita Bowl win since 2020 and pull out a six-point buffer on Hampshire.The Sharks were stuck in and despite losing three wickets in the powerplay – all to a rampant Michael Neser – found regular contributors to reach a sizeable total.Neser – on his last Hawks appearance before Ottneil Baartman replaces him for the second half of the competition – had Harrison Ward skying straight up, Daniel Hughes bowled with a beauty which nipped back and John Simpson chipping to cover. The Australian returning 3 for 32.Fynn Hudson-Prentice forced wicketkeeper Ben McDermott to scramble under a high one and James Coles – who had held firm for 39 – was brilliantly caught by a sprawling Benny Howell at long off.At 73 for 5 at the halfway point, Sussex looked in danger but Hampshire old boy Tom Alsop and Danny Lamb settled things down with a 57-run stand.Lamb scooped a six but was otherwise jerky in his 28, but Alsop crescendoed through his innings, going from a sensible run-a-ball to 43 off 27 before he chipped to his former captain Vince at mid-off.If Alsop had been controlled for most his innings, McAndrew was unrestrained in his ball-striking from the moment his second ball disappeared into the square leg crowd.Two more sixes sailed into the stands and although he was dropped – a bizarre moment where Ollie Robinson was subsequently run out – his late innings blasting got Sussex to a defendable position.With 185 to win, Hampshire didn’t attack the challenge with gusto as McDermott and Fletcha Middleton fell in a flaccid 38 for 2 powerplay.
A couple of 30s had been the high points of Vince’s Blast campaign but he grew through his innings and found the perfect rotating-the-strike partner in Joe Weatherley – the duo adding 88 for the third wicket.There were glimpses of peak Vince with a glorious cover drive as his 71st T20 fifty came up in 35 balls. But he never managed to explode to the required rate and departed for 53 when he rolled the ball back onto his own stumps.Weatherley converted to a half-century – having scored 48 and 49 earlier in the tournament – but his 68 off 47 was ultimately too slow for the rate.Benny Howell swatted two early sixes but faded, and although Weatherley sweetly struck the first four balls of the final over for four, Hampshire ended up seven runs short.

“It didn’t put any more pressure on me at all, being the only black player in the team; that would’ve been torture”

Firdose Moonda30-Jul-2024If Kagiso Rabada had kept thinking that he was the only black African player in South Africa’s T20 World Cup 2024 squad, he would have gone through “torture” through the tournament. He said bearing that burden “didn’t put any more pressure on me at all”. Instead, Rabada embraced his role and encouraged a broader discussion on issues of transformation.”I’m a black player, yes. If I don’t feel like I should have been there on merit and if people don’t feel that way, then it’s fine. I’m not invincible. I can be dropped as well but I believe in myself,” Rabada said from Trinidad, where South Africa are preparing for a two-Test series against West Indies.Asked whether he was aware of the focus being put on the numbers of players in the squad – and in particular the black African contingent – and whether that created more expectation on him, Rabada said, “It didn’t put any more pressure on me at all. It would be such a heavy thought, during a World Cup, thinking about yourself being the only black player in a team. That seems like torture for me. That just takes away from focus.”Related

• Imraan Khan named new batting lead at Cricket South Africa

• Rabada to Test teams outside the Big Three: 'Play good cricket, give fans entertainment'

• Bavuma and SA ready for red-ball grind

• For South Africa, and those who know what they know

• CSA to address transformation issues holistically

If there’s one thing South Africa were at the tournament, it was focused. They enjoyed their most successful men’s World Cup and went on an unbeaten eight-match run to reach their first final. They lost, narrowly, to India but earned praise for their progress. However, they also faced criticism from various political and administrative quarters over the composition of the squad, which was also a major discussion point at CSA’s recent Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Indaba (DEI conference).CSA has acknowledged the failure of its policies to produce sufficient black African players, in particular, for the national squad, and has promised to respond to white-ball coach Rob Walter’s plea for the domestic system to “up the ante” ahead of the home World Cup in 2027. But the board also recognises the need to keep the current transformation numbers at an acceptable level for the sports ministry to be happy and has had to answer questions over why its T20 World Cup 2024 squad included only one black African player. So Rabada understands why he is in the spotlight.”These are certain challenges [we face] and you ask a valid question because you wonder how players must have felt in the past, how players in the future might feel. And these are things we need to address,” he said. “For me, it was just about winning [the World Cup]. But for other players, you never know how it feels. And also, what the media has to say about the situation can really mess up the players’ psychology or psyche. Those are certain things that we have to make peace with in South Africa because there’s a very unique landscape. And this whole transformation thing, it always seems to bubble up when we’re at World Cups for some reason.”A quick history lesson: South Africa have had transformation targets in place since 1999, seven years after readmission, which means the impetus to change has existed for 25 years. Initially, the national team was required to field four players of colour (any players who were not white) in every XI but since 2016, the target has become more specific but less rigid. Now, the national men’s team is required to field, on average over the course of a season, six players of colour of which at least two must be black African.The calculation of the target as an average means that the numbers do not apply to individual games, which meant they could go into the T20 World Cup with only six players of colour in the squad, and just one black African, but make up the target elsewhere in the season. This was the first time since 2016 that a South African World Cup squad only had six players of colour and the first time since 2015 that they have only had one black African player.Kagiso Rabada and South Africa fell at the final hurdle at the T20 World Cup•ICC/Getty Images

It was in fact, the 2015 ODI World Cup that caused a rethink, after Aaron Phangiso – the only black African player in that squad – went through the tournament without playing. It was also the 2015 World Cup where the transformation agenda resulted in interference in selection when then CEO Haroon Lorgat called coach Russell Domingo the night before the semi-final to remind him of the commitment to fielding four players of colour in each XI. Vernon Philander was then picked ahead of Kyle Abbott for the match against New Zealand.At this T20 World Cup, South Africa only ever fielded four players of colour per XI, and only one black African – Rabada. Although it was never explicitly stated that Rabada would be expected to play every game, had South Africa gone into a match without him, they would have had no black Africans in the side. He ended as their second-highest wicket-taker behind Anrich Nortje.The inclusion of Rabada, as a South African all-time great, in XIs is hardly ever up for debate but he explained there may be instances in which players of colour have cause to question themselves.”You ask yourself, what are some of these factors that might make a player feel that way [that they are only included because of their colour], and it’s factors such as we lost because of transformation or because we had to include players of colour or black Africans. And that always happens in World Cups,” he said. “When we’re winning series and we’re winning or losing other games, it’s not so much of an issue, so that’s where it might be a bit inconsistent. And if you ask yourself truthfully, looking back in the past, have we not won a World Cup because of transformation? You know, I mean, like, really? So sometimes things can get blown out of proportion.”Looking at 2015, it cannot be argued that South Africa lost because of transformation. The selection interference came in the semi-final, and there’s no knowing how they would have played against Australia in a final in Melbourne.The 2022 T20 World Cup was different, where South Africa committed to picking an underperforming Temba Bavuma, because he was the captain. But they had little chance of lifting the trophy in any case. They were eliminated in the group stage after losing to Netherlands in one of their worst World Cup shows.So Rabada, and CSA DEI Mudutambi Ravele, who last week asked whether the 2024 T20 World Cup squad did well “because they didn’t have black players” are right: South Africa have not lost a World Cup because of transformation. But there are still discussions to be had about how best to manage the issue of redress and a player like Rabada, who carries the current baton for black cricketing excellence, understands that.”It’s a unique system and a lot of people have different opinions on it because of where our country comes from,” he said. “And it’s not a system that is particularly easy to just understand and move on from. It’s something that has to be looked at in context.”And he is also able to separate those thoughts from the idea of celebrating achievement in whatever colour it comes. Asked to respond to South African swimmer Tatjana Smith winning the Olympic Games gold in the 100-metre breaststroke in Paris, Rabada did not miss a beat in celebrating her while identifying the similarities and differences between them.”She’s been making us proud. She’s phenomenal and really inspiring. When I look at that as an athlete, it makes me want to achieve the same feat,” he said. “She’s a white swimmer and I’m a black man, but as an athlete and as someone who wants to aspire to be better and better, I think she’s done a remarkable job. And people are watching. And they want to emulate that. Whatever field that they’re in, they just want to do the same things that these people are doing, representing us all over the world.”

Shubman Gill and Virat Kohli are at three and four, while Pathum Nissanka has risen to No. 8

ESPNcricinfo staff14-Aug-2024Babar Azam is still the No. 1 ODI batter in the ICC rankings, but Rohit Sharma has moved up to the second spot following the ODI series in Sri Lanka. Behind Rohit are Shubman Gill, who has dropped down one spot, and Virat Kohli, while Pathum Nissanka has risen one place to eighth.India lost the three-match ODI series 2-0 to Sri Lanka but Rohit was the top run-getter across the two teams with 157 at an average of 52.33. His sequence of scores was 58, 64 and 35. That took him up one spot, exchanging positions with Gill, and to 765 points. Babar is well ahead, though, with 824 points.

Full rankings tables

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For Sri Lanka, Avishka Fernando (137 runs), Dunith Wellalage (108), Kusal Mendis (103) and Nissanka (101) were the primary contributors with the bat. Nissanka, ranked the best among them before the series, consolidated his position in the top ten, while Mendis (up five spots to joint 39th) and Avishka (up 20 places to 68th) gained too.Wellalage also had a good time with the ball, the 5 for 27 in the final ODI the highlight, and that took him up 17 spots to 59th among bowlers.

Bavuma and Maharaj move up after Port of Spain Test

The first Test between West Indies and South Africa in Port of Spain was affected by rain but still got to a good finish after an aggressive declaration from the visitors, with all results possible before time ran out and the match ended in a draw.South Africa captain Temba Bavuma scored 86 in the first innings, and with 15 not out coming in the second, he moved up two spots to 16th on the batters’ table. Outside of the top 50, Tony de Zorzi rose 29 spots to 85th after scoring 78 and 45, while Jason Holder and Alick Athanaze also gained.Keshav Maharaj was the bowling star for South Africa with returns of 4 for 76 and 4 for 88, and that earned him the Player-of-the-Match award as well as a jump of seven spots to joint 21st on the Test bowlers’ table.

Australia report clean bill of health, but weather around Lord’s may influence contest

Alan Gardner26-Sep-2024

Big Picture: Ashes comeback redux?

Here we go, then. After finding themselves 2-0 down through a combination of hubris, inexperience and self-sabotage, Harry Brook’s bucks got themselves on the board up in Durham – from here on it’ll be Bazballs to the wall as they look to emulate last summer’s rip-roaring Ashes comeback (with the potential for a similarly underwhelming final outcome if the weather forecast holds true).Or perhaps not. Certainly, there won’t be the accompanying levels of interest, even if England can prove victory at Chester-le-Street to keep the series alive was not a flash in the pan. But there was undoubtedly something invigorating about the performance, with England’s one-day cricket perhaps at its lowest ebb since the disastrous 2015 World Cup campaign.Brook was to the fore as stand-in skipper, and one of the batters expecting to carry the side forward, scoring his maiden ODI hundred to make a chase of 305 look relatively straightforward (even if the rain meant England didn’t quite get to knock off the requirement themselves). With England seemingly floundering again at 11 for 2, the 156-run stand between Brook and Will Jacks was not only timely but demonstrated their ability to go through the gears in a format that requires stickability as well as crash, bang, wallop.It helped, of course, that Australia were missing their two best performers, in Travis Head and Adam Zampa – as did Brook winning the toss for the third time in a row. While England’s bowlers could not fully capitalise on useful seam-bowling conditions early on, as Alex Carey again lifted Australia clear of trouble, the pitch became more conducive to buccaneering strokeplay as the day wore on.For Australia, the end of their 14-game winning streak – second only to that put up by the legendary class of 2003 – will unlikely be cause for much lamenting. Steven Smith gave a reminder of his old-school qualities with his first fifty of the tour, while Aaron Hardie’s late-order cameo provided a glimpse of the future for this Australia side. The bowlers were not at their best but they have the experience and knowhow to saddle up and go again in a bid to seal the series at Lord’s.

Form guide

(last five completed matches, most recent first)
England WLLLW
Australia LWWWW

In the spotlight: Will Jacks and Alex Carey

While Brook took the headlines, Will Jacks was equally important to the Chester-le-Street turnaround. Although he was unable to press on to a maiden hundred, an innings of 84 from 82 balls was, by his own evaluation, his best international performance to date. Following his half-century at Trent Bridge, it suggested he is beginning to acclimatise to the format and his role at No. 3. Curiously, despite a body of work in T20 that dwarfs his List A experience (186 appearances to 32), it is in ODIs that he has currently had more of an impact with England.There was weather around as the teams trained at Lord’s•PA Photos/Getty Images

Alex Carey may have arrived back in the UK with a touch of trepidation, given his turbulent experience during last summer’s Ashes, but after being handed an unexpected opportunity with the ODI side after Josh Inglis’ injury he has seized it with both hands. Showing absolutely no ring-rust despite having not batted in a competitive scenario since March, Carey has top-scored for Australia two matches running while continuing to be an assured presence behind the stumps. It has, in the words of head coach Andrew McDonald, created a “good problem” for the team as preparation for the Champions Trophy gears up.

Team news: Archer set to play

Jofra Archer is expected to play back-to-back games so England could well be unchanged. Reece Topley has left the squad after suffering from illness.England: (possible) 1 Ben Duckett, 2 Phil Salt, 3 Will Jacks, 4 Harry Brook (capt), 5 Jamie Smith (wk), 6 Liam Livingstone, 7 Jacob Bethell, 8 Brydon Carse, 9 Olly Stone, 10 Adil Rashid, 11 Matthew PottsAfter the illness issues that dogged the start of the tour, Australia have reported a clean bill of health, which includes Adam Zampa, whose absence was significant at Chester-le-Street. The only issue is whether Inglis is yet match-fit, though Carey’s form makes that academic.Australia: (possible) 1 Travis Head, 2 Matthew Short, 3 Mitchell Marsh (capt), 4 Steven Smith, 5 Marnus Labuschagne, 6 Alex Carey (wk), 7 Glenn Maxwell, 8 Aaron Hardie, 9 Mitchell Starc, 10 Josh Hazlewood, 11 Adam Zampa

Pitch and conditions

Lord’s is not foremost among English grounds when it comes to playing like a billiards table, although England did put up 311 in their previous ODI in north London against New Zealand last September. Given the amount of rain around recently, it could well be another seamer-friendly track – that’s if the weather relents enough to get a game, with showers forecast for the morning and early afternoon.

Stats and trivia

• With two wickets in Durham, Starc overtook Mitchell Johnson to go clear in fourth on Australia’s ODI wicket-takers’ list. He has a bit of a climb to reach Shane Warne in third.
• Brook’s hundred was only his second in the 50-over format – and first since 2019, when he scored 103 off 105 balls for Yorkshire against Leicestershire. In the intervening period, he made 13 first-class centuries (five in Tests) and three in T20.
• Australia have a strong record at Lord’s, winning six of their last seven ODIs against England at the ground – including their 2019 World Cup group stage encounter.
• England have only played three ODIs at Lord’s since the 2019 World Cup final, winning all three.

Quotes

“We said once we were 2-0 down, we’re going to stay true to how we play. And I think we’d done that at Durham and backed everyone to play their own game. It paid off at Durham, so I don’t see there’s any reason [to change].”
Matt Potts says England are on the comeback trail again“None of the blokes are training, we’re only here for lunch.”

“What you need to do is to make sure that once you involve and engage somebody, you’ve got to give them clarity regarding the role”

Tristan Lavalette29-Oct-2024Former PCB chairman Ramiz Raja believes the hasty departure of Gary Kirsten could impact Pakistan’s ability to attract high-profile international coaching candidates in the future.Pakistan cricket descended into familiar tumult when Kirsten on Monday resigned as the head coach of Pakistan’s ODI and T20I sides. He was six months into a two-year contract and departed on the eve of Pakistan’s white-ball tour of Australia.Kirsten, who was at the helm of India’s triumph at the 2011 World Cup, leaves his role without having coached Pakistan in a single ODI.Even by PCB standards, the public struggles have been messy and threaten to deter prospective international coaches. Prominent candidates Shane Watson and Darren Sammy had previously been sounded out earlier this year before turning down offers to coach the national team.”When you search for international coaches, with the kind of backlash that you will probably get from Gary Kirsten’s resignation…it’s not going to be an easy, straightforward job for Pakistan to hire international talent,” Ramiz told reporters in a media interaction ahead of the Australia tour.”What you need to do is to make sure that once you involve and engage somebody, you’ve got to give them clarity regarding the role.”I don’t know whether that clarity was given to Gary Kirsten or how he wanted to get Pakistan into this one-day phase, what he wanted to achieve. I’m not privy to that.”It’s not great news [Kirsten’s departure] because Pakistan needed an experienced hand. From a distance, it doesn’t look great just before a tour.”A rift had developed between Kirsten and Jason Gillespie, Pakistan’s newly-minted Test coach, and the PCB since the board decided to strip them of selection powers after Pakistan’s first Test defeat against England.ESPNcricinfo understands that Gillespie, who will fill the shoes of Kirsten on the tour of Australia, has also been left thoroughly unimpressed by the recent changes. A new selection panel – a third in three months – was formed and, in an unusual development, included umpire Aleem Dar.”I don’t know about an umpire being a selector, so the jury is still out,” Ramiz said. “I still believe there’s a strong role for a leader in cricket. You can’t run cricket from the sidelines. The leader has to be made accountable and the only way to make him accountable is to give him some powers.”Pakistan will arrive in Australia with not only a fresh white-ball coach in Gillespie, but also with Mohammad Rizwan taking the captaincy reins following Babar Azam’s recent resignation.It looms as a tough initiation for Rizwan, who will lead a relatively inexperienced squad for a trio of ODIs and T20Is against Australia.”He’s got his chance and what he needs to do is to stamp his authority and maybe get the players that he wants,” Ramiz said of Rizwan. “Right now, there’s a little bit of hodgepodge where the selection committee is nominating the playing XI. I’m not too sure it happens anywhere else in the world.”I just hope Rizwan gets his playing XI that he feels comfortable with.”Having been widely lambasted for antagonising Pakistan Test captain Shan Masood during a television interview following the England series, Ramiz called for “quiet and calm” within Pakistan cricket.”I think it’s important for all the stakeholders to understand the value of a non controversial start to what appears to be an extremely heavyweight calendar,” he said.”I just hope things are on the mend. I think Pakistan clearly were on a desperate mode against England, and thankfully the series was won. I just hope they carry this momentum forward even though it’s a different format.”But it’s [Pakistan cricket] a difficult terrain, it’s a difficult area to govern because things happen very quickly.”

“We’re looking forward to the challenge, and hopefully we can lean back on the experiences that we’ve had here the last couple of times that we’ve toured”

Ashish Pant15-Oct-2024New Zealand Test captain Tom Latham is hopeful the cloudy conditions and the pitch being under covers for a length of time due to all the rain Bengaluru has received in the past week, will potentially bring the fast bowlers into play thereby helping the visitors get into the game in the first Test against India.”Yeah, certainly wasn’t expecting the weather that we’ve had over the last couple of days since arriving here,” Latham said on the eve of the game. “And looking at the forecast, it obviously does look sort of similar to what we’ve got today.”So, obviously wicket being under covers for a longer duration, and it not necessarily being as hot as what we would usually expect here. So that potentially brings the fast bowlers into play.””It’s hard to say because I haven’t really had a look at the wicket in terms of a team that we play. But, yeah, we’ll obviously cover both bases [spin and pace] depending on when we see the pitch tomorrow.”Related

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Spin has been New Zealand’s kryptonite in the current World Test Championship [WTC] cycle. They are coming into the series on the back of a 2-0 loss against Sri Lanka, where they lost 37 of their 40 wickets to spinners.Latham admitted the results in Sri Lanka weren’t ideal but said that New Zealand did manage to do “a lot of good stuff in that tour”. He pointed to the first Test in Galle where New Zealand managed scores of 340 and 211. They were then blown away for 88 in the first innings of the second Test but came back with 360 in the second dig. That didn’t prevent a loss in both Tests though.”Yeah, obviously results weren’t ideal in Sri Lanka. I think that first Test was a reasonably small margin in terms of the defeat. But we actually did a lot of good stuff in that tour,” Latham said. “It’s obviously easy to look at the result. But I think from a batting point of view, you take away the first innings of the second Test and you know we did a lot of good stuff there.”We sort of changed our approach a little bit in terms of how we played and just the way things unfolded. And I thought we played really nicely. And, yeah, I guess you come here to India, it’s slightly different conditions.”So hopefully it offers a little bit more here in India for the seamers. And then, you know, potentially later on in the next couple of Test matches, spin might play a little bit more of a factor.”This is Latham’s first assignment as full-time Test captain – he has led New Zealand in nine Tests previously – after Tim Southee stepped down in the aftermath of the Sri Lanka series. His own form in the WTC 2023-25 cycle has been patchy with 368 runs in 16 innings at 23.00.However, Latham has a decent record in Tests in India with five fifties in as many Tests while averaging 35.70. He has also led New Zealand in a Test match in India previously and is hopeful his past experiences will hold him in good stead going into the crucial three-game series.”It’s obviously a huge, exciting privilege for me to be in this position,” Latham said. “Regardless of whether I’m captain, not captain, I’m always trying to perform my role as best as I can for the team. And that’s certainly not going to be any different being captain.”Yep, there’s a little bit more responsibility, but I guess I’m lucky that I’ve been in this position before, have captained here in India before, and have done it back home as well. So I think, like most of the guys, I’m just excited to get into things. It’s been a bit of a build-up for me since, obviously, taking over.”While aggression and intent have been the flavour of the town in Test cricket, New Zealand have taken a more old-school approach. In their eight Tests in the WTC cycle, they have gone at an average of 3.37 runs an over. While Latham agrees that teams the world over have taken a more aggressive route in Test cricket, he wants his players to do what comes to them naturally.”Yeah, if you look around the world recently over probably the last 12 months, I think a lot of teams have sort of taken the approach of being a little bit more aggressive and putting bowlers under pressure a little bit more,” he said. “But I think if you look at our team as a whole, everyone’s got a slightly different game plan.”We’ve got different guys that play completely different ways. And for us, it’s about letting guys go out and express themselves as much as they can and try to stick to their plans as best they can.”New Zealand have never recorded a series win in India, and Latham admits his side will have to play “really well” to change that record. He is, however, banking on New Zealand’s recent visits to India and their sub-continent expeditions in a bid to force a win in the three-Test series.”They know how to play in their own conditions,” Latham said. “And I think when you look at India as a whole, you obviously look at the spinners when you come over these conditions. But they’ve got just as equally good seam attack in terms of [Jasprit] Bumrah, [Mohammed] Siraj, obviously [Akash] Deep, who’s played the last couple of Test matches against Bangladesh.”So just a well-rounded side from a bowling point of view. They have a lot of match-winners that can take a game away from you pretty quickly.”We’re obviously going to have to play really well. We’re looking forward to the challenge. And hopefully we can lean back on the experiences that we’ve had here the last couple of times that we’ve toured.”