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Julian Hunte, the President of the WICB, will meet with Allen Stanford during the Twenty20 World Championship in South Africa. Stanford has been invited to the final by the ICC and a meeting between him, Hunte and ICC representatives is planned for September 23 in Johannesburg.The second Stanford 20/20 is scheduled for January and February 2008 and the WICB said: “A formal agreement has not yet been signed but the board has included the event in its 2007-08 calendar.”The meeting will also allow discussions of Stanford’s plans to take the game to an international level. During the first event in 2005-06 he had planned for South Africa to take on an All-Stars XI before the match fell through and there have been rumours of other teams being approached to take part in big-money matches.Meanwhile, the WICB is going to start advertising for a new CEO to replace Bruce Aanensen, who resigned from the post last week.Also discussed at the WICB board of directors meeting on Saturday was the creation of a Combined Campuses and Colleges Team which will take part in all future regional one-day and four-day tournaments.The board also agreed that a WICB-selected Under-19 team will play in all future regional one-day tournaments. The 20-member training squad for the Under-19 World Cup will play in this year’s KFC tournament. The regional season will start in with the one-day tournament in October 2007 and end in July 2008.

The former England captain, Tony Greig, believes that the England & Wales Cricket Board is right to resist calls for its contracted players to be allowed to play in the lucrative Indian Premier League, but has rubbished suggestions from the board’s chairman, Giles Clarke, that there are parallels between the current situation and World Series Cricket.Greig was one of the prime movers in Kerry Packer’s revolution, which changed the face of cricket forever in the late 1970s, and he never played again for England after taking part in the first competition in 1977-78. On Monday, Clarke warned England’s current stars, not least Kevin Pietersen, that a spell in the IPL could have a similar effect on their careers.Clarke told reporters at Lord’s: “Thirty years ago, Tony Greig thought it was important to play in World Series Cricket, and Ian Botham appeared to replace him from pretty much nowhere.” Greig, who played alongside Botham in two Tests of the 1977 summer, as well as the previous year’s one-day series against West Indies, described that version of events as “hogwash”.”I picked Ian Botham to play for England when I was captain and he was always going to replace me as England’s allrounder,” Greig told Cricinfo. “My joining WSC simply gave Ian a permanent position a little sooner than may otherwise have been the case.”Clarke’s attempt to draw a comparison with World Series Cricket is absolutely ridiculous,” added Greig. “We, the England players of the day, were being seriously ripped off by Clarke’s ECB predecessors who didn’t give a damn about the plight of the then-county and Test cricketers, especially where their remuneration was concerned.”Thanks to WSC they were forced to change their attitude,” he continued. “It provided me with the security the Clarkes of the day weren’t prepared to offer. All they gave us was a threat that, if we didn’t stay on, we wouldn’t receive our tax-free benefits. The situation now is very different because players are being well-paid and also have the security of the contract system that the Players Association worked so hard to implement.”Broadly speaking, however, Greig agreed with the ECB’s attitude towards the IPL, not least because he believes that England is in a much stronger position to build a sustainable Twenty20 competition. “Clarke is on the right track,” he said. “All he and his board has to do now is form the England Twenty20 Cricket League and play it sometime during the English summer when all the players from around the world will be available.”Unlike India, England is the perfect venue for an annual Twenty20 festival because, with very few exceptions, teams are out of season or touring England.”The Australians, New Zealanders and South Africans should consider doing the same in the Southern Hemisphere during their summer,” said Greig, “although their tournament will have to be along the lines of the Super 14 rugby tournament because the players from Asia and the Northern Hemisphere will be otherwise occupied.”

Scorecard and ball-by-ball details

On a roller coaster day at the Wankhede Stadium, where fortunes kept swinging from one side to the other, North Zone managed to grab a slight advantage with a 66-run lead. Siddharth Trivedi left North reeling at 97 for 4 with an incisive spell of seam bowling before Rajat Bhatia and Yashpal Singh added 128 for the fifth wicket to steer them out of trouble. Another mini-collapse left North on par with West before VRV Singh and Ashok Thakur charged them to a valuable lead.The drama started with the first ball of the day. Trivedi had Aakash Chopra edging to third slip before he prised out Karan Goel for a duck in the same over. In a blink, North were limping at 53 for 2. Cue Shikhar Dhawan and Mithun Manhas, to try and start the repair job.Trivedi continued to move the ball both ways while the other bowlers maintained the pressure with a disciplined bowling performance and eventually, the pressure started to tell. Dhawan fell trying to cut Trivedi and Manhas, trying to be aggressive, nicked a loose drive behind and North were struggling at 97 for 4.In walked Bhatia, who had scored a century in the Ranji Trophy final to save Delhi from a precarious position, and he proceeded to repeat the rescue act here. The pair of Bhatia and Yashpal started off in an uncertain manner, playing and missing quite a lot. Sandeep Jobanputra was the unlucky bowler as he went past the outside edge, especially Yashpal’s, on many occasions. Slowly, as the sun came out and the wicket lost its sting, they prospered. Bhatia was strong on his legs, whipping anything full through midwicket while Yashpal started to connect with his drives.The second session belonged to North as the pair pulled away before Parthiv Patel, West’s captain, got into the act. With seven men on the leg side, he told Rakesh Dhruv to bowl from over the wickets to an outside-leg-stump line, tempting the batsmen to go inside-out to the offside. After resisting initially and padding away those deliveries, the pair started to go for the shots and it led to Yashpal’s dismissal. He went down the track and heaved straight to mid-off. Dhruv went on to induce a nick off Uday Kaul.The new ball got rid of Amit Mishra, Bhatia, top-edging a hook, and Vikramjeet Malik in quick succession leaving North at 274 for 9. With the scores level, VRV swung his bat merrily while Thakur played conservatively to push the scores along. The field spread out and VRV wisely started to pick singles and the lead crept past 60 before he was stumped off Dhruv.Wasim Jaffer and Sahil Kukreja saw out two patient overs to finish the day with West 2 for 0.

The cream of the country’s talent will take part in the Pentangular Cup, due to begin in cities around Pakistan, from February 10. For the first time in its 34-year-old history, only provincial teams will be competing for the prize, which includes Pakistan’s four provinces as well as a team representing the Federal Areas.Unusually for a domestic competition, the country’s top players are taking part, a result of the board’s policy to make it a tournament of the top 75 performers from the Quaid-e-Azam trophy. Additionally, 25 of the most promising young players from around the country have been called up to the squads.Shoaib Malik, Pakistan’s captain, will lead Punjab, Shahid Afridi is Sindh’s captain, while Younis Khan leads the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP). Shoaib Akhtar, who is playing in a bid to prove his fitness before Australia tour Pakistan, will lead the Federal Areas, which includes players from Islamabad and surrounding regions. Balochistan, historically Pakistan’s weakest cricket province, will include guest players from around the country in a bid to strengthen the side and will be led by Naseem Khan.The tournament has undergone a number of format changes, often including departments and not always restricted to – as the name suggests – five teams. This year’s tournament, however, is a return to how the tournament was originally intended and is among the most financially rewarding: not only do the winners claim a Rs 1 million prize (approx US$16,000), each member of the playing XI will be paid Rs 25,000 (approx US$400) per match. Non-playing members of the squad will get Rs 10,000 (approx US$160). The tournament will also be televised on a local sports channel.There will be a short break after the first round of matches as general elections will be held in the country on February 18, but the four-day matches resume from February 22. The tournament, which kicks off with Sindh taking on NWFP in Karachi and Punjab playing the Federal Areas in Lahore, will be played on a single-league basis.Squads
Punjab: Shoaib Malik (capt), Mohammad Yousuf, Salman Butt, Mohammad Hafeez, Misbah-ul-Haq (vice-capt), Kamran Akmal (wk), Naved Latif, Adnan Raza, Ammar Mahmood, Junaid Zia, Wahab Riaz, Waqas Ahmad, Mansoor Amjad, Mohammad Khalil, Abdul Rehman, Mohammad Salman (wk), Aizaz Cheema, Kashif Raza, Nasir Jamshed, Azhar Ali, Mohammad Asif (will be included in the team after a fitness test).Sindh: Khalid Latif, Khurram Manzoor, Shadab Kabir, Shahid Afridi (capt), Naumanullah, Hasan Raza, Faisal Iqbal (vice-capt), Asim Kamal, Fawad Alam, Rizwan Ahmad, Sohail Khan, Anwar Ali, Mohammad Sami, Faisal Athar, Danish Kaneria, Sarfraz Ahmad (wk), Hanif Malik (wk), Tahir Khan, Uzair-ul-Haq, Asif Zakir.Federal Areas: Shoaib Akhtar (capt), Rao Iftikhar (vice-capt), Yasir Arafat, Sohail Tanvir, Rauf Akbar, Naeem Anjum (wk), Afaq Raheem, Raheel Majeed, Naveed Qureshi, Usman Saeed, Bazid Khan, Shahzad Azam Rana, Omair Khan, Atif Maqbool, Fayyaz Ahmad, Bilal Asad, Asher Zaidi, Babar Naeem, Yasir Ali, Asadullah Sumeri.Balochistan: Usman Tariq, Imran Nazir, Saeed Anwar jnr, Shoaib Khan, Naseem Khan (capt), Sohaib Maqsood, Rameez Alam, Bilal Khiljee, Saeed Bin Nasir, Jalat Khan, Abdur Rauf (vice-capt), Kamran Hussain, Azharullah, Tanvir Ahmad, Mohammad Irshad, Imranullah Aslam, Gulraiz Sadaf (wk), Nazar Hussain, Faisal Irfan, Yasir Arafat (jnr).NWFP: Younis Khan (capt), Yasir Hameed (vice-capt), Riffatullah Mohmmand, Wajid Ali, Aftab Ahmad Khan, Wajahatullah Wasti, Riaz Kail, Asad Shafiq, Zulfiqar Jan (wk), Aslam Qureshi, Yasir Shah, Khurram Shahzad, Shakeel-ur-Rehman, Nauman Habib, Fazl-e-Akbar, Adnan Raees, Waqar Ahmad, Fawad Khan (wk), Junaid Khan, Samiullah Khan, Umar Gul (will be included after a fitness test).

Scorecard
Delhi Giants scored an easy win over Ahmedabad Rockets after being set a paltry target of 108 in Panchkula. Avishka Gunawardene was unbeaten on 55 as the Giants lost only one wicket and knocked off the runs in 15.3 overs.The Rockets struggled right from the start, losing three wickets in the first four overs. TP Sudhindra got a wicket with his first ball as Sachin Dholpure inside-edged the delivery on to his stumps. Two run-outs pegged them back further: Wavell Hinds was caught short by an alert Ali Murtaza for 5 in the third over and Abhinav Bali knocked over Murray Goodwin’s stumps in the next.The 62-run fifth-wicket partnership between Damien Martyn and Sridharan Sriram revived the spluttering innings briefly, but the run-rate remained sluggish. Martyn tried to lift the momentum as he drove and pulled Shane Bond for two fours in an over. But Bond broke the partnership when he ran out Sriram for 32 in the 18th over.Three balls later Martyn, the innings’ highest scorer, was caught off Jai P Yadav. Reetinder Sodhi hit 11 off four balls to take the Rockets to 107. His six, slog-swept over midwicket off Yadav, was the only one of the innings.The Giants raced to 66 in their first ten overs, and though they lost Monish Mishra for 18, Gunawardene was in fine attacking mode. He took medium-pacer Rakesh Patel for 17 runs in an over, which included two sixes and a four. Gunawardene also reached his fifty with a six in only 36 balls. At the end of 15 overs, the Giants needed just nine more to win, and Bali finished it off with three successive fours.With this win, the Giants have four points and are on top of the table along with Lahore Badshahs, who have played a game less.

Mohammad Ashraful will lead Bangladesh’s 15-man squad to play the three-match ODI series in New Zealand next month. Mashrafe Mortaza has been named his deputy; the tenures of both the captain and vice-captain have been extended until December 2008.Opener Shahriar Nafees and offspinner Mahmudullah have been dropped from the team that were run over by Sri Lanka in July. They have been replaced by Junaid Siddique, who scored 71 in the only match he played during the ICC World Twenty20, and Nazmul Hossain, an up-and-coming fast bowler.The squad has two other openers in Javed Omar and Tamim Iqbal, while the bowling attack will be lead by Mortaza, and includes Syed Rasel, Abdur Razzak and Shahadat Hossain, besides allrounders Shakib al Hasan, Mehrab Hossain jnr and Farhad Reza. Mushfiqur Rahim continues as wicketkeeper, while Aftab Ahmed – who has often thrilled with his brief but breathtaking stroke play – will play alongside Ashraful in the middle order.Bangladesh, who have only played two Tests previously in New Zealand, are scheduled to begin their tour with a warm-up match against Northern Districts starting on December 19 although there has been talk of organising a charity Twenty20 match to raise money for the cyclone victims in Bangladesh.Bangladesh squad Mohammad Ashraful (capt), Mashrafe Mortaza, Javed Omar, Tushar Imran, Abdur Razzak, Shakib Al Hasan, Syed Rasel, Aftab Ahmed, Mushfiqur Rahim (wk), Shahadat Hossain, Junaid Siddique, Farhad Reza, Mehrab Hossain jnr, Tamim Iqbal, Nazmul Hossain.

ScorecardNetherlands brushed aside Bermuda with ease in the second one-day international at Rotterdam to sweep the series 2-0. Netherlands bowled Bermuda out for 115 in 43.4 overs and needed only 19.3 overs to knock off the target with eight wickets in hand.Bermuda had lost the first ODI against Netherlands by 172 runs and started the second on the wrong foot after they lost the toss. They were soon struggling at 55 for 4, having lost their top order inside 15 overs. Netherlands, led by Maurits Jonkman who took 3 for 23, chipped away and ensured that Bermuda did not build a partnership of greater than 20. Ryan ten Doeschate bowled a tight spell that yielded 2 for 16 off ten overs.Bermuda needed quick early wickets to have a chance of bowling out Netherlands but Tom de Grooth and Alexei Kervezee dashed those hopes by adding 59 for the first wicket in 9.4 overs. de Grooth fell for 31 off 23 balls but Kervezee remained unbeaten on 50 off 59 balls as Netherlands cruised to victory.

Kandurata, led by Sri Lanka’s vice-captain Kumar Sangakkara, qualified for a place in Sunday’s final when they recorded their third straight win in the competition, defeating Hirdaramani Ruhuna by 43 runs under the Duckworth- Lewis method in a night match played at the R Premadasa Stadium.Winning the toss and choosing to bat, Kandurata made their third total in excess of 250 through half-centuries from Thilan Samaraweera (71 off 96 balls) and Chamara Kapugedera (63 off 65 balls). The innings was given a late boost by Thilan Thushara who slammed a breezy 47 off 27 balls with four sixes and a four.Ruhuna could not sustain an adjusted target of 282 from 47 overs despite fifties from Upul Tharanga and Indika de Saram and were dismissed for 238 in the 44th over, with Thushara once again being the stumbling block taking 3 for 29.Basnahira South, captained by Tillakaratne Dilshan, registered their first win by beating Basnahira North by six wickets, again under the Duckworth-Lewis method, at the SSC grounds. Put into bat, Basnahira North could manage only 207 for 9 in 50 overs, their batsmen being restricted by young left-arm spinner Milinda Siriwardene who took 6 for 40 off 10 overs.Basnahira South’s run chase was curtailed by rain and their revised target saw them set 175 for victory off 36 overs. Ian Daniel with 74 off 75 balls (5 fours, 2 sixes) led the way to victory which was achieved with eight overs to spare.

Suresh Raina is playing the patient game. He has no other option and he understands that. Two years ago he was earmarked for the future but he dropped off the radar, having failed to regain his mojo after which the team management lost its patience. He went back to domestic cricket to work out his faults but it was not a smooth drive and he had to encounter obstacles and navigate tight corners to work his way back into the Indian dressing room.”I didn’t make use of the time I spent in the middle”, Raina admits reflecting back on the form slump he faced in 2006 after starting off his international career on a high note. After returning home midway through the series in South Africa in December 2006 Raina scored a century against Tamil Nadu in a Ranji Trophy game. The selectors gave him another chance when they picked him for the last two ODIs of the home series against West Indies. Raina only played in the final game in Chennai, and his 23 was the last score he made for India.Soon it was back to the domestic grind but Raina suffered a knee injury during the one-day domestic tournaments and had to undergo surgery. He didn’t let that interfere with his focus and tried to work on his shortcomings. “I had to improve my footwork and my fitness is much better now”, he said.Raina agrees it is tough to make a comeback after one year, but he is now more positive and derives confidence from that. “I play very positively whenever I play any form of cricket. It’s good for me I got some big runs in the Ranji season. It’s always tough to come back, but the Indian players spoke with me to keep my confidence high.”Raina proved he had recovered completely from the injury with handy scores for Uttar Pradesh which played a crucial role in getting his side to the final for a second time in three years. UP lost the final to Delhi but Raina had scored 683 runs in eight Ranji games, including a double-century, a hundred and three half-centuries. In addition he worked on his fitness and more importantly sought to understand different match situations, which he feels is the key to success in the middle.He learnt by watching the seniors. “His [Tendulkar] practice session is different: his batting style, the selection of the balls is good learning. He has always been good at understanding the position of the game and adapts accordingly.” Raina now intends to do the same as he talks about the changes he has brought into his game during his break from international cricket. “Now I keep myself in a positive frame of mind and make sure I read the situation, understand the player at the other end and adapt”, Raina said, stressing that he has been working hard in the nets despite not yet getting a chance in the CB Series campaign.He understands that getting a chance in the series isn’t going to be easy since there are at least four players vying for the same No. 6 position. With Mahendra Singh Dhoni coming in at No. 5, Raina will first have to compete with Yuvraj Singh who, despite his minor form slump, will still be favoured for his experience. Dinesh Karthik and Manoj Tiwary are also waiting for call-ups.But competition and batting position don’t bother Raina too much. “What mattes is how you read the situation. I learned a lot of Yuvraj batting at No. 6. So I don’t see any pressure”, Raina said, pointing out that there was still one more practice session before the next game against Australia on Sunday. With four more games left in the league phase Raina is not losing hope yet.

Australia will rely on the sheer pace of Brett Lee and Mitchell Johnson to cover the huge gaps left by Glenn McGrath and Shane Warne. Justin Langer has also departed but filling the holes of two men who captured 1271 wickets is the main concern as the hosts attempt to retain their all-conquering ways.Sri Lanka will face a fast-bowling attack at the Gabba on Thursday that has a combined tally of 68 Tests and contains the debutant Mitchell Johnson. Brett Lee is the main man, having appeared in 59 matches, while Stuart Clark will probably begin his fourth series at first-change. The collective inexperience does not bother Ricky Ponting and he is confident the trio can kick-start the new era.”You have to look to somebody else to do the job that they [Warne and McGrath] were doing,” Ponting said. “They were great at building pressure. Now we might have to come back to sheer pace to get our breakthroughs with Brett and Mitchell.”Extra responsibility will also fall on Stuart MacGill as he tries to fit back into the team after an 18-month absence. One of the reasons Australia preferred MacGill to the swing of Ben Hilfenhaus was due to Warne’s strong performances in Brisbane, which he rated as a perfect venue for legspin because of the extra bounce.”We know Stuart MacGill’s wicket-taking ability is second to none in the history of the game,” Ponting said. “And we know we’ve got the options.”Sri Lanka’s recruiting of Trevor Bayliss, who was the New South Wales coach in June, has come with the bonus of intimate knowledge of almost half the Australian team. Mahela Jayawardene, the captain, said Bayliss had been passing on tips to his new team about what to expect from Clark, MacGill, Lee, Michael Clarke and Phil Jaques.”Trevor has been giving us a lot of information and we’ve been discussing a lot of plans,” he said. “It’s always good to have a lot of plans, but you also need to concentrate on what’s going on out there and go with your instincts.”Australia would like to bat first even though the pitch contains significant moisture and they may get their wish if Sri Lanka push for a four-man pace attack. Ponting, who has discussed the threats of the opposition bowlers with his team, felt playing so many would be risky.”If you look historically at things at the Gabba, sides that bat first win more often than not,” he said. “If they did want to play four they’d be going against that. And if the keeper [Prasanna Jayawardene] bats six it leaves them a little thin.”