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Cricinfo previews the 16th match of the IPL, between Chennai and Punjab at Chepauk

Siddarth Ravindran20-Mar-2010

Match facts

Chennai v Punjab in Chennai
Sunday, March 21
Start time 2000 (1430 GMT)

Big picture

Kings XI Punjab will be wary of Matthew Hayden and his Mongoose which wreaked havoc against Delhi•Indian Premier League

Kings XI Punjab’s horror start to the IPL, continued on Friday when they were defeated by a team they had never lost to before. Kumar Sangakkara would love to set the balance right on Sunday by winning against a team they have never beaten.Punjab may have lost all three matches so far, but none of them have been knock-outs. They will also take heart from the performance of fellow strugglers Rajasthan Royals, who shrugged off their long injury-list to get the better of Kolkata Knight Riders in Ahmedabad on Saturday.Punjab’s opponents, Chennai Super Kings, are again going to miss their star player and regular captain, MS Dhoni, but are high on confidence after two impressive wins in a row. Their home fans will also be eager to see the Mongoose bat which Matthew Hayden used to such brutal effect in the victory over the fancied Delhi Daredevils. That win featured the first significant batting performances from Hayden and stand-in captain Suresh Raina, their two most important batsmen along with Dhoni.However, Chennai’s bowling, with the exception of the accurate Muttiah Muralitharan, remains a source of worry – they have conceded 185 or more twice in three matches.

Team talk

Chennai’s batting wears a settled look, and they are likely to go with the same top seven they played against Delhi. The only major selection headache for the Chennai think-tank is which of the Indian seamers should partner L Balaji – Sudeep Taygi, Manpreet Gony and Joginder Sharma have all got a game each without inspiring confidence.Punjab will have to decide whether they want to pick four overseas batsmen again, or whether to choose one of the South African fast bowling pair of Yusuf Abdulla and Rusty Theron, especially after Sreesanth’s two horror matches, where his seven overs have leaked 93 runs. If they stick with the four foreign batsmen policy, medium-pacer Love Ablish, who had a solid domestic season, is a potential starter.

Previously…

Chennai 5 Punjab 0
Chennai have won all five previous encounters between the two sides, including the semi-final of the first season in Mumbai. Most of Chennai’s batsmen have had at least one good game against Punjab: in the first game the two teams played in the IPL, Michael Hussey’s century overpowered Punjab, in the next it was 60s from Subramanian Badrinath and Dhoni, and Raina’s brisk half-century finished off the semi-finals early. Hayden bludgeoned 89 in the first encounter in 2009, and Parthiv Patel top-scored with 32 in a low-scoring skirmish the last time the teams met.

In the spotlight

Yuvraj Singh’s return from injury hasn’t quite gone to plan, failing to get into double-digits in each of his three innings so far. A return to form is vital for Punjab’s most imposing batsman.Chennai’s fielding was one of the factors in their win over Delhi Daredevils – Justin Kemp’s one-handed effort ended Virender Sehwag’s onslaught, and Raina held a couple of smart ones to send back two other dangerous batsmen – Tillakaratne Dilshan and AB de Villiers.

Prime numbers

• Yuvraj may not have contributed with the bat, but he is Punjab’s most economical bowler this season, giving away only 5.55 runs each over
• Suresh Raina is third on the list of most sixes hit in the IPL, behind only Adam Gilchrist and Yusuf Pathan

Chatter

“I am surely happy on winning two games. But there are another eleven matches to go. We have experienced that one can go in superb form and suddenly lose the momentum.”

“We executed our plans on the field well but it was the first six overs that cost us the match… Hopefully we can turn around the results in the next games. The guys are working very hard.”

Rajat Patidar, batting on 42, will be the key on the third day

ESPNcricinfo staff02-Oct-2025Despite Abhimanyu Easwaran’s half-century, Vidarbha’s bowlers put their side on top on the second day in the Irani Cup match against Rest of India. At stumps, Rest of India were 142 for 5, trailing Vidarbha’s first-innings total of 342 by 200. Rajat Patidar, batting on 42, will be the key going into the third day.Vidarbha resumed the day on 280 for 5 with Atharva Taide batting on 118. But their innings did not last long. Yash Thakur and Harsh Dubey fell in successive overs to leave them on 295 for 7.Darshan Nalkande hung around with Taide and the two added a crucial 37 to take the side to 332. Gurnoor Brar broke the stand by having Nalkande caught behind for 20. The end was swift as Saransh Jain picked the remaining two wickets in one over. He bowled Taide for 143 and, two balls later, had Aditya Thakare caught off Ruturaj Gaikwad.Abhimanyu and Aryan Juyal gave Rest of India a steady start of 52 before Nalkande trapped Juyal lbw. Yash Dhull came out with an attacking intent and hit two fours off Dubey, the second of those via an outside edge. But it was Dubey who had the last laugh when he had Dhull stumped for 11.Abhimanyu and Patidar took the side past 100. Abhimanyu brought up a half-century via an inside-edged four off Parth Rekhade before getting lbw in the same over. That triggered a mini-collapse. Gaikwad hit Thakur for back-to-back fours but was caught at deep-backward point off the following delivery. Ishan Kishan did not last long either, Rekhade having him lbw for 1.That left Rest of India at 124 for 5. Patidar and Manav Suthar, though, ensured there were no more setbacks till stumps.

Garth, Gardner, Perry and Molineux ran through Bangladesh, bowling them out for 89 in 26.2 overs to set up the win

AAP27-Mar-2024A ruthless Australia showed little mercy to Bangladesh, thumping them by eight wickets to sweep their ODI series in Dhaka on Wednesday.Already 2-0 up, Alyssa Healy won the toss and had little hesitation in bowling. And opening pair Kim Garth and Ellyse Perry dominated early, removing the top three batters – Fargana Hoque (5), Sumaiya Akter (0) and Murshida Khatun (8) – by the end of the eighth over with just 24 on the board.Bangladesh never recovered, and stumbled throughout the innings, losing wickets at regular intervals to be bowled out for 89 in 26.2 overs.It could have been worse for Bangladesh, though, but Australia bowled 14 wides, helping extras finish as the top-scorer with 20. Captain Nigar Sultana was next best with 16, which she made off 39 deliveries.Garth, who had returned in place of the rested Megan Schutt, claimed 3 for 11 in seven overs to claim the Player-of-the-Match honours, while Ash Gardner, Perry and Sophie Molineux provided solid support.Australia didn’t waste much time to knock off the target with Healy (33 in 34 balls), Perry (27 not out in 28) and Beth Mooney (21 not out in 22) helping them get to 93 for 2 in 18.3 overs.The two wickets to fall were of Healy – leg before to Rabeya Khatun – and Phoebe Litchfield, who was caught and bowled by Sultana Khatun for 12.Gardner’s three-wicket haul earned her the Player-of-the-Series award, given her exploits in the opening matches. She made 32 and took 3 for 22 in the first ODI, and in the second claimed 2 for 22 and made an undefeated 20.Australia will now meet Bangladesh in three T20Is, the first of which will be played on Sunday, March 31, and will be followed by matches on Tuesday, April 2 and Thursday, April 4. All the games will be played in Dhaka.

Bangladesh allrounder says T20 league may actually be inferior to the country’s domestic one-day tournament

Mohammad Isam04-Jan-2023Two days before the start of the new season, Shakib Al Hasan offered sharp criticism of the Bangladesh Premier League, going so far as to say the tournament may very well be inferior to the Dhaka Premier League, the country’s domestic one-day competition.Asked what changes he would bring if he was made head of the BPL, Shakib highlighted the problems they are facing, especially this year, when he said he would have ensured a timely players’ draft and a schedule where it wouldn’t clash with other T20 leagues.”If they made me the BPL CEO, it would take me one or two months to correct everything,” Shakib said. “You have seen the movie right? If you want to do something, you can do it in one day. I would do the players’ draft and auction (on time) and hold the BPL during a free time. We will have all the modern technologies. There will be quality broadcast and home and away venues.”Related

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• Isam: BPL has fallen behind in race to sign big names

The BPL took their time in selecting owners for each of their seven franchises, which in turn delayed their player draft to November 23. By that time, the two other tournaments that are also taking place in the same January-February window – UAE’s International League T20 and South Africa’s SA20 – had snapped up most of the big name talent. Even those they managed to sign won’t be around for the full season, a fact which left Shakib a bit displeased.”I don’t see what’s stopping us if we have the willingness (to correct things),” he said. “If we are willing, I don’t see any reason not to have the DRS, the draft or auction not being held three months in advance, or the teams wouldn’t be confirmed two months in advance. The players are only available for one or two matches. Nobody really knows for how long they are available.”Shakib said that the BPL may be an inferior tournament to the Dhaka Premier League, the domestic one-day competition that has been in place for nearly five decades. He even had an example to back up the assessment.”I saw in the news that the jersey is not ready. It is a messy situation. Maybe our DPL is more organised. They can arrange the team ahead of time. They know what their team is going to be. Every DPL team knows who is playing where for the next edition.”We don’t really know what’s going in the BPL. It only starts when the BPL matches start. Tournament starts from January 6. There’s no BPL before that. Before this, everyone is practicing on their own.”Shakib added that the BPL has never been marketed properly even in Bangladesh where cricket is the No. 1 sport.”There’s no market because we never created the market. If we could have added value to this market, it would have been really big. Cricket is played everywhere in this country, even in remote villages.”It is a very popular sport in a country of 160-180 million, so I don’t believe there can’t be a market for cricket here. It is a huge failure in terms of marketing.”Despite the BPL being telecast in several countries, Shakib said that performances in the tournament don’t carry the same weight as performances in the Caribbean Premier League or the Pakistan Super League.”They show a list of countries where the BPL is telecast, but nobody really watches the tournament. When an uncapped player does well in PSL or CPL, they get a national call-up. It doesn’t happen when they play in the BPL. It is quite disappointing that we have remained at this stage.”

Somerset saved by rain as DLS calculations unable to kick in before deluge

ECB Reporters Network05-Aug-2021Somerset 220 (Goldsworthy 96, Moriarty 4-30) vs Surrey 66 for 0 – No Result
Lewis Goldsworthy’s impressive 96 and Dan Moriarty’s controlled 4 for 30, both List A bests, were the stand-out performances of a rain-ruined Royal London Cup match at the Kia Oval in which Surrey were left an agonising two overs short of gaining victory against Somerset on Duckworth Lewis Stern calculations.Surrey, to their huge frustration, were cruising at 66 for no wicket from just eight overs when rain intervened for the final time, in reply to Somerset’s 220 all out in 48.3 overs. With a minimum of ten overs needing to be bowled at the team batting second, both sides ended up with a point apiece from the no result.Initially chasing 217 from 48 overs, due to the first of several afternoon rain squalls, Surrey were 7 without loss from 2.3 overs when more heavy rain arrived.After a delay of 100 minutes, play resumed with Surrey’s DLS target now 147 from 25 overs and, immediately, openers Mark Stoneman and Ben Geddes set about Somerset’s attack to plunder 59 from 5.3 overs.Stoneman, unbeaten on 29, smashed Josh Davey through extra cover and straight drove Sonny Baker powerfully for another four, while Geddes also hit out attractively with five boundaries to reach 31 not out before more rain forced the abandonment.Goldsworthy, the highly-promising 20-year-old Cornishman in his first full season, had earlier almost single-handedly dragged Somerset past 200 with a superbly-paced 105-ball innings that featured three late sixes and also six fours.It was, however, an ultimately disappointing day for a near 5,000 crowd and unbeaten Somerset now have three wins and two no results from their first five group 1 games, while Surrey have two wins and two no results from their initial five Royal London fixtures.Matt Dunn struck two new ball blows after Somerset had chosen to bat, the Surrey paceman producing excellent deliveries to have Sam Young caught behind for a duck, driving, in the third over and James Rew pouched at second slip for 6 four overs later.Steven Davies swung Rikki Clarke for six and also struck seven exquisitely-timed fours in a 32-ball 45 before steering Nick Kimber’s pacy seamers to backward point, and James Hildreth unfurled one beautiful extra cover driven four off Kimber before Clarke had him caught behind for 19 with the first ball after a drinks break.Goldsworthy, who had narrowly avoided being yorked by Kimber first ball, could only watch as Moriarty had Eddie Byrom lbw for 2, prodding half-forward, and then sent back Davey for 5, edging to keeper Jamie Smith an attempted reverse-sweep.That was 114 for 6, in the 24th over, but at least Kasey Aldridge and then George Drissell hung around long enough to help Goldsworthy put on 27 and 25, respectively, for the seventh and eighth wickets.Both made 12 but Aldridge edged a rising ball from Kimber to slip and Drissell was smartly stumped by Smith from a legside ball from Moriarty that would have been called as a one-day wide had he not overbalanced.Marchant de Lange was then bowled by Moriarty for 4, aiming a legside swipe when he might have better concentrated on supporting Goldsworthy, and it took a sensible 7 not out from last man Baker to enable Somerset’s rising young batting star to press down the accelerator in the closing overs.Goldsworthy first swung Clarke high over long on before adding two more sixes, both off Dunn in a 47th over costing 22, again clearing the ropes over mid wicket and long on besides collecting two fours with a thick-edged slash to third man and a punch through extra cover.There was one final four, a flat-batted pull off Kimber wide of mid on, before Goldsworthy was caught above his head on the wide mid wicket ropes by Tim David as he clubbed Ryan Patel’s medium pace to leg in a bid to reach three figures.

A year after losing their unofficial world Test crown to Australia, West Indies have revenge on their minds

The Retropreview by Andrew Miller16-Apr-2020For our latest #RetroLive match, we rewind to March 1996, and a classic World Cup semi-final between Australia and West Indies in Mohali. The sides had had contrasting fortunes in the opening rounds of the tournament, but their recent history pointed towards another thriller.

Big Picture

It would have been hard to fathom a fortnight ago, when they were being humiliated by the part-timers and part-talents of Kenya in Pune, but West Indies now stand on the verge of their fourth World Cup final, having summoned a response to savour after one of the lowest days in their history.But standing in their way are the players who have already supplanted them as Test cricket’s unofficial world champions, following a tussle for the ages in the Caribbean last spring, and who are doubtless still smarting themselves, after feeling the initial backlash from Richie Richardson and his chastened men in Jaipur last week.It’s West Indies versus Australia for a place in the World Cup final. The two-times inaugural winners of the tournament, versus the side that came home with the trophy on the last occasion it was staged in the subcontinent, in 1987. It’s become one of the most compelling rivalries in world cricket in recent years – and now it’s been granted another showdown to savour.West Indies’ standards may be slipping from their matchless peaks of the 1980s, but the individual talents that make up their squad still include some of the most peerless performers the region has ever produced. And there really was only one fitting course of action for such men after they had been rolled aside for 93 in 35.2 overs by Kenya – surely the World Cup’s most shocking result since Australia were toppled by Zimbabwe in 1983.Sure enough, the skipper Richardson took it upon himself to guard against the unthinkable – elimination before the knockouts – with his matchwinning 93 not out against the Aussies in Jaipur, and then it was over to Brian Lara to blow South Africa aside in their Karachi quarter-final, with the sort of statement innings that only the truest of greats are able to conjure up when the critical moment comes.Can they repeat the dose with a place in next week’s final in Lahore at stake? West Indies could hardly ask for a more apt opponent to goad them into another statement performance. For these two teams have been at each other’s throats for the past three years – quite literally in the case of Curtly Ambrose’s famous tete-a-tete with Steve Waugh in Trinidad last April. And as cricket’s fading giants seek to reassert themselves after finally being toppled in the Test arena, it seems only right that the team that most observers believe will form the sport’s next great dynasty should have to fight their way through the old guard one more time.In contrast to their skittish campaign on home soil four years ago, Australia’s path through the tournament to date has been poised and confident. They’ve had their challenges along the way, most notably in their quarter-final against New Zealand, who really should have put 300 on the board after Lee Germon and Chris Harris had added 168 for the fourth wicket. But their settled line-up has found match-winners at every turn – not least Mark Waugh, whose all-round display in their tight victory over India in Mumbai was masterful.And now, of course, we already know the identity of the team that awaits the victors in Lahore on Sunday. Last night’s shameful scenes in Calcutta may have robbed Sri Lanka of the on-field moment of glory that their endeavours in this tournament have warranted, but they had, to all intents and purposes, trounced the hosts long before Eden Gardens descended into anarchy.And that is more than Sri Lanka had been able to do in their group-stage fixtures against these two opponents, after both Australia and West Indies chose to forfeit their matches in Colombo due to security concerns. Admittedly West Indies came closer than they might have expected to missing out on the last eight, but the structure of the tournament meant that neither side had any realistic reasons to rue the lost points. Whether they will have riled their snubbed opponents into redoubling their efforts in the final, however, will be a question for another day…Mark Waugh hits out during his century against India in Mumbai•Getty Images

Form guide

Australia WLWWW
West Indies WWLLW

In the spotlight

He’s the forgotten Waugh no longer. Mark Waugh may have spent the first decade of his professional life in the shadow of his elder twin Steve, but in one-day cricket, he’s at last found the perfect stage for his silken flamboyance to take hold. It was way back in March 1993, against New Zealand in Dunedin, that Australia first experimented with Junior at the top of the ODI batting card. But it was as recently as January this year that the management finally bit the bullet and unleashed him against the new ball on a permanent basis, and they must now be wondering what held them back for so long. Waugh racked up a man-of-the-match-winning 130 in his first outing against Sri Lanka in Perth, a series-sealing 73 in the second B&H final in Sydney, and then came the World Cup itself, in which his returns have transformed his standing in the world game, not to mention his family power-dynamics. He’s racked up three more hundreds and an unbeaten 76 in five games – having scored just four centuries all told in his first 106. Just as Sachin Tendulkar and Sanath Jayasuriya have been liberated in one-day cricket since being pushed up to open, Waugh’s at the vanguard of a new wave of power batting that will surely be this tournament’s most lasting legacy.Think of Curtly Ambrose and you probably envisage the stares, the menace, the lurking sense of danger that seems to inhabit those signature wristbands as they whir towards the batsman from a cloud-scraping altitude. It’s possible that you overlook the parsimony, the metronomic economy, the death by a thousand dot-balls that seems to come as a by-product of all his other attributes. And yet, as Ambrose has demonstrated, time and time again in this tournament, that ingrained sense of thrift is actually the bedrock of everything he has achieved in the game, and represents West Indies’ most likely means of adding to those inaugural world titles, the second of which was spearheaded by his spiritual forebear Joel Garner. In five matches to date, he’s gleaned eight wickets at 18.00, but at the remarkable economy rate of 3.09 – including four analyses in which he’s gone for less than 30 runs. His most expensive day out was against India – 8-1-41-2 – but even then he bowled both Ajay Jadeja and Navjot Sidhu in his opening burst. Height, pace, accuracy and relentless drive. The batsman who can claim to have the measure of such attributes hasn’t yet been born.

Team news

Their Jaipur loss notwithstanding, Australia have hit upon a settled and successful formula for this campaign, and – injury permitting – there’s no reason to think they’ll be springing any surprises tomorrow. Taylor and M Waugh at the top, Law, Bevan and Healy in the middle, bookending the youth-and-experience engine-room of Ponting and S Waugh. And then an attack led by four front-line bowlers, now that the seam-hitting experience of Paul Reiffel has been preferred to the all-sorts options that Shane Lee had been providing in the earlier stages of the tournament. They’ve got the class to dominate, and the resilience to stay in the game, depending on which version of West Indies turns up tomorrow.Australia (possible): 1 Mark Taylor (capt), 2 Mark Waugh, 3 Ricky Ponting, 4 Steve Waugh, 5 Stuart Law, 6 Michael Bevan, 7 Ian Healy (wk), 8 Shane Warne, 9 Paul Reiffel, 10 Damien Fleming, 11 Glenn McGrath.Steve Palframan is caught and bowled by Roger Harper•Getty Images

West Indies have been ringing the changes at the top of their order, seemingly as randomly as the shuffling of a pack of cards, but having launched their campaign with Sherwin Campbell and Richie Richardson ensconced at 1 and 2, they seem now to have settled on Shivnarine Chanderpaul and the wicketkeeper Courtney Browne, neither of whom has yet set the tournament alight but who have at least provided some old-school resistance against the new ball, and given Lara and Richardson a chance to thrive in the middle overs. A decision needs to be taken on the identity of the fourth seamer, with Roland Holder deemed surplus to requirements in their quarter-final win over South Africa, and Cameron Cuffy overlooked since the Kenya loss. Ottis Gibson, with two five-wicket hauls in Australia earlier this year, could be ripe for a recall despite an underwhelming tournament so far.West Indies (possible): 1 Shivnarine Chanderpaul, 2 Courtney Browne (wk), 3 Brian Lara, 4 Richie Richardson (capt), 5 Jimmy Adams, 6 Keith Arthurton, 7 Roger Harper, 8 Ottis Gibson, 9 Ian Bishop, 10 Curtly Ambrose, 11 Courtney Walsh.

Pitch and conditions

Mohali has so far hosted an inaugural ODI against South Africa, as well as a maiden Test that West Indies will doubtless hope counts as a good omen. But this, to all intents and purposes, is the stadium’s true opening night. It is the project of the BCCI president, Inderjit Bindra, and while the man himself admits that there’s some landscaping to be done before its true splendour is revealed, the lush outfield suggests that the pitch itself will have received similar levels of TLC – although there is a covering of live grass on a firm cracked surface which will doubtless encourage the quicks on either side. One slight oddity are the improbably low floodlights, a requirement due to the nearby airfield. Though they’ve been designed according to baseball specifications, there may be a few outfielders hoping not to face too much aerial bombardment in the match’s closing stages.

Stats and trivia

• West Indies have won five of their previous six World Cup encounters with Australia, including the inaugural final in 1975 and the recent showdown in Jaipur. Their only setback came in Melbourne in 1992, where Australia’s 57-run win in their final group match wasn’t enough to salvage their own campaign, but did mean that Pakistan leapfrogged West Indies into the last four.
• Brian Lara needs 74 more runs to reach 4000 in ODIs. He will be playing in his 98th match.
• Mark Taylor needs 48 more runs to reach 3000 in ODIs. He will be playing in his 95th match.
• Shane Warne is five wickets away from becoming the fifth Australian, behind Craig McDermott, Steve Waugh, Simon O’Donnell and Dennis Lillee, to reach 100 ODI wickets.

RetroLive

Sam Curran, Tom Curran and Ben Foakes all commit to The Oval after prominent seasons for England

ESPNcricinfo staff01-Feb-2019Surrey have secured the continued services of three of the current stars of the England set-up, by confirming contract extensions with Sam Curran, Tom Curran and Ben Foakes.At the age of 20, Sam Curran earned the Man of the Series accolade in last year’s 4-1 Test series win over India, after a series of match-turning performances with both bat and ball.He went on to become the break-out star of last year’s IPL auction, in which he was bought by Kings XI Punjab for Rs7.2 crore (approx. £800,000. His new two-year deal with Surrey will keep him at The Oval at least until the end of the 2020 season.Foakes, like Sam Curran, is currently playing for England in the Test series in the Caribbean, having himself been Man of the Series during England’s 3-0 series win in Sri Lanka before Christmas – his first appearances for England.He has agreed a three-year extension, as has Sam’s brother, Tom, who will link up with England’s white-ball squad in the Caribbean later this month, having enhanced his reputation with some eyecatching performances this winter for Sydney Sixers in this year’s BBL.Sam and Tom Curran made their senior debuts for Surrey in 2015 and 2013 respectively, while Foakes joined the club from Essex in 2015.Director of Cricket Alec Stewart said: “I am very pleased to have extended the contracts of three of our current England players. It’s a credit to everyone at the club that our players want to sign contract extensions and help play a major part in building on the success of last year.”

Legspinner Imran Khan took seven wickets in the match and struck an unbeaten 84 to lead Trinidad and Tobago’s innings rout of Leeward Islands in North Sound

ESPNcricinfo staff04-Dec-2017Legspinner Imran Khan took seven wickets in the match and struck an important 84 unbeaten runs to lead Trinidad and Tobago’s innings rout of Leeward Islands in North Sound. T&T’s big win puts them more than five points clear of Jamaica for the second place, while Leeward, stuck with a solitary win after five matches, are on fifth position.Imran took 3 for 26 in the first innings as Leewards buckled for 207 after opting to make first use of the surface. Devon Thomas held Leeward’s innings together and tried to build it with 46. But Leeward lost wickets regularly at the other end to be brought down to 93 for 5. Thomas then finally found support in the form of Rahkeem Cornwall, the Leeward captain, who struck 43 and partnered Thomas for a sixth-wicket partnership of 66. The stand ended with the dismissal of Cornwall, while Thomas fell two overs later, having top-scored for his side. Shane Burton’s 29 quick, unbeaten runs hauled Leeward past 200 before Imran mopped up the last two wickets to end Leeward’s innings on 207. Medium-pacer Roshon Primus took wickets all across the line-up and finished with 4 for 57.T&T made a dominant start to their reply, with their openers Kyle Hope and Amir Jangoo stitching together 187. Both batsmen fell short of centuries – Jangoo for 96 and Hope for 84 – in successive overs. That triggered a spectacular slide as T&T lost seven wickets for 48 runs. But Imran extended Leeway’s stay on the field substantially by putting on an eight-wicket partnership of 79 with Khary Pierre (23). Imran stayed not out on 84 as T&T piled on 360 for a first-innings lead of 153. Terrence Warde took three wickets for Leeward.Barring a first-wicket stand of 86, Leeward’s second innings made for woeful reading. Montcin Hodge displayed oodles of patience in compiling 54 off 198 balls, while Chesney Hughes struck 42 off 96 balls with the help of five fours and a six. Apart from the two, only the No. 9 Jeremiah Louis moved to double figures as Imran and Pierre tore through Leeward with nine wickets between them. Pierre finished with his first-class best figures of 5 for 44, while Imran took 4 for 17.

India completed a 3-0 whitewash in devastating fashion as a seven-wicket haul from R Ashwin shot New Zealand out for 153 in their last innings of the series

The Report by Karthik Krishnaswamy11-Oct-2016
Scorecard and ball-by-ball details5:56

Agarkar: If Ashwin stays fit, can’t see India in much trouble this home season

India completed a 3-0 whitewash in devastating fashion as a seven-wicket haul from R Ashwin shot New Zealand out for 153 in their last innings of the series. India declared just under an hour from tea, after Cheteshwar Pujara had completed his eighth Test hundred, to set New Zealand a target of 475 and give themselves a day and a half to take 10 wickets. They only needed 44.5 overs, as New Zealand lost nine wickets for 115 runs in the post-tea session.Ashwin’s figures of 7 for 59 were his best in Test cricket, as were his match figures of 13 for 140. He picked up his 21st five-wicket haul, his sixth ten-wicket match haul, his seventh Player of the Match award and seventh Player of the Series award – fourth in a row – as well. There probably isn’t a more influential cricketer anywhere in the world today. Certainly no one has played a bigger part in India securing the No. 1 Test ranking, a feat they got to celebrate when Virat Kohli was handed the ICC Test championship mace at the end of the match, in front of a capacity crowd in Indore.Set a similar task last year in another dead-rubber Test, on a similar slow turner at Feroz Shah Kotla, South Africa chose to block their way to a draw. They didn’t succeed, but they did make India toil for 143.1 overs. New Zealand, having until now given India a harder time on this tour than South Africa did in theirs, adopted an entirely different approach and collapsed spectacularly.Their two most accomplished batsmen, Kane Williamson and Ross Taylor, exemplified this approach. Both came out looking to attack Ashwin, their tormentor through the series, and ended up playing a part in their own undoing.Williamson hit Ashwin for three fours in his first two overs, either side of tea, but in that time also gave the bowler enough of a clue that he was looking to step across his stumps and play him with the turn as much as possible. He shuffled across again to the eleventh ball he faced from Ashwin, premeditatedly, and a flatter, quicker one turned in and trapped him in front. Like he had done to Kumar Sangakkara on the 2015 tour of Sri Lanka, Ashwin had dismissed Williamson four times in four innings.In his first over at the crease, Taylor jumped out and hit Ashwin over the top for a four and a six off successive balls. As Ashwin’s spell continued, he stepped out again to whip him over midwicket, and then drove him against the turn through the covers. Having gone to 32 off 24, though, he chanced a sweep off a ball that was too full for the shot. It sneaked under his bat and bowled him.Luke Ronchi, James Neesham and Martin Guptill all fell in the next seven overs, the latter two to Ravindra Jadeja, and it seemed almost certain that the match wouldn’t go into a fifth day. BJ Watling and Mitchell Santner hinted that it just might, while putting on 24 for the seventh wicket, but Ashwin came back to break their partnership, bowling over the wicket to the left-handed Santner and beating him with natural variation. Coming forward to defend, Santner inside-edged the ball into his pad and then onto the stumps.India didn’t have to wait too long for the eighth and ninth wickets, but Watling and Trent Boult briefly raised the possibility of their having to come back on Wednesday to take the tenth, by putting on the longest partnership of the innings. They stuck around for 10.1 overs, causing India a bit of frustration – Jadeja bowled a 45kph donkey drop to Boult, Ashwin dragged down a legbreak to Watling – and threatening to take the fourth day into an extra half-hour, before Boult came down the track to drive Ashwin and popped back a waist-high return catch.Cheteshwar Pujara finished with a century and three fifties in the series•BCCI

India declared halfway through the morning session, one ball after Pujara brought up his hundred by helping a short ball from James Neesham to the fine leg boundary. It was a fitting way to reach the landmark, given that the area behind the wicket had fetched him 57 of his runs and six of his nine fours, with the lap-sweep and late cut his go-to shots against the spinners. Having gone to lunch batting on 50 off 98 balls, he had sped away to score 51 off 50 in the second session. At the other end, Ajinkya Rahane helped an unbroken fourth-wicket stand of 58 hurry along at 6.44 an over, stepping out to play his favourite chips down the ground and inside-out drives.Ahead by 276 overnight, India had only extended their lead by eight runs when M Vijay was run-out by a brilliant piece of fielding from Guptill in the eighth over of the morning. In walked Gautam Gambhir, who had retired hurt late on the third evening with a shoulder injury. His re-entry sparked an immediate upsurge in India’s run rate, as he took frequent singles against New Zealand’s one-day fields, and pounced on anything remotely loose, his standout shot a drive drilled past extra-cover off Boult.Gambhir’s urgency rubbed off on Pujara as well. He ran as fast as his troubled knees would take him, ending up with a dirt-streaked shirt from all the times he had to dive into the crease, and looked outside his usual repertoire of shots, even jumping out of his crease at one point to flat-bat Boult back over his head.The pair added 76 for the second wicket before Gambhir fell for 50 off 56 balls, chipping Jeetan Patel to short extra-cover. Kohli, the first-innings double-centurion, fell in the sixth over after lunch, given lbw looking to sweep Patel although replays suggested the ball may have struck his pad outside the line of off stump.With nine overs to bat out before tea, New Zealand lost one wicket, Umesh Yadav going around the wicket in his first over and attacking the stumps to get Tom Latham lbw playing around his front pad. New Zealand were 38 for 1 at tea. They probably wouldn’t have imagined that it would all be over after just one more session.

Lahiru Thirimanne will lead the Sri Lanka Cricket Board President’s XI in the three-day encounter against the West Indians, at SSC

Andrew Fidel Fernando02-Oct-2015

SLC Board President’s XI squad

Udara Jayasundera, Kusal Mendis, Lahiru Thirimanne (capt.), Minod Bhanuka (wk), Milinda Siriwardana, Angelo Jayasinghe, Sachith Pathirana, Nuwan Kulasekara, Suranga Lakmal, Vishwa Fernando, Suraj Randiv, Lahiru Milantha, Lasanda Rukmal, Kasun Madushanka, Sahan Nanayakkare

Lahiru Thirimanne will lead the Sri Lanka Cricket Board President’s XI in the three-day encounter against the West Indians, at SSC. Batting allrounder Milinda Siriwardene, and seamers Suranga Lakmal and Vishwa Fernando, all of whom are in contention for Test call-ups, have also been named. Seamer Nuwan Kulasekara, offspinner Suraj Randiv and spinning-allrounder Sachith Pathirana find places in the Board XI squad as well.With Sri Lanka’s A team overseas, a younger crop of players also feature in this squad, including Kusal Mendis, the 20-year-old batsman who recently led the Sri Lanka Under-19 team. Other recent graduates from the Under-19 side include left-arm spinner Sahan Nanayakkare and wicketkeeper-batsman Minod Bhanuka.The match begins on October 8. It is West Indies’ only warm-up match on the island. The first Test begins on October 14.