MUMBAI, Dec 27: Star batsman Rahul Dravid has opted out of the forthcoming one-day series against England to undergo treatment for a shoulder injury, he is believed to have been carrying for quite sometime..........more

Langer and Hayden
bat Australia into
powerful position

MELBOURNE, Dec 27: The prolific opening pair of Justin Langer and Matthew Hayden had South Africa firing blanks with yet another imposing stand to have Australia dictating terms in the second cricket test here today..................more

Jayasuriya dazzles with
92 in opening test

COLOMBO, Dec 27: Skipper Sanath Jayasuriya slammed an impressive 92 to strengthen Sri Lanka’s position on the opening day of the first cricket test against Zimbabwe here today.............more

Laxman tops year
of the one-man show

LONDON, Dec 27: Cricket will remember 2001 as the year of the one-man show.

The previous 12 months had been all about the team — Australia — and their transformation of test cricket from five-day attrition to three-and-a-half day sprint.......more

By Sanjeev Sharma

JAMMU, Dec 27: Leaving aside the otherwise fundamental role of promoting the game......more

47th National School Games in Football
Sukhwinder makes
hat trick as Punjab
trounces Gujarat 3-0

Excelsior Sports Correspondent

JAMMU, Dec 27: The hosts Jammu and Kashmir, after winning the first tie against....more

Things were entirely
changed at Science
College grounds

Excelsior Sports Correspondent

JAMMU, Dec 27: Things were entirely changed at the GGM Science College grounds....more

Open Chess Tournament
Fourth round completed as
Bankim remains at the top

Excelsior Sports Correspondent

JAMMU, Dec 27: With end of the fourth round of league matches in the ongoing Open Chess.....more

Dravid to undergo treatment, miss one-day series

MUMBAI, Dec 27: Star batsman Rahul Dravid has opted out of the forthcoming one-day series against England to undergo treatment for a shoulder injury, he is believed to have been carrying for quite sometime.

Dravid, who also ruled himself out of the January 10-13 Challenger Series, will utilise the time to visit South Africa and undergo treatment for his shoulder problem so that he may be fully fit before India’s tour to Zimbabwe in march, cricket board executive secretary Sharad Diwadkar said here today.

The Indian team for the one-dayers will be selected at Bangalore on January 13, he added.

The decision means Dravid, who aggregated 121 runs from four innings in the just concluded three-test series against England, will miss the five one-dayers, and possibly a sixth one, the venue and date of which are still to be decided.

The five matches are to be played at Kolkata (Jan 22), Chennai (Jan 25), Mumbai (Jan 28) Delhi (Jan 31) and Kanpur (Feb 3).

The stylish middle-order batsman had been one of the few Indian players to remain fully fit till the shoulder problem surfaced during the team’s tour to South Africa in October-November. (PTI)

Langer and Hayden bat Australia into powerful position

MELBOURNE, Dec 27: The prolific opening pair of Justin Langer and Matthew Hayden had South Africa firing blanks with yet another imposing stand to have Australia dictating terms in the second cricket test here today.

Restricting South Africa to 277 in their first innings, Australia made a rousing start and by the close of a seven-hour day were cruising at 126 without loss.

Langer was unbeaten on 67 with Hayden not out 55, the pair scoring at a rate of almost four runs an over.

Hayden and Langer have blossomed into a formidable opening duo with two double-century and two century stands since they were united in the fifth Ashes test against England at the Oval last August.

The two left-handers have scored 823 runs in opening stands and are averaging 117.5 runs per partnership.

Their dominance highlighted the lack of new-ball penetration by the South African fast bowlers with ageing test warhorse Allan Donald having trouble with his bowling rhythm and Shaun Pollock and Nantie Hayward posing few problems.

Donald went for 34 off nine overs, Pollock 41 off 10 overs and Hayward 33 off five.

Australia, comprehensive 246-run victors of the first Adelaide test, are well on the way to seizing control of this one and with it the series with a new year test to play in Sydney.

South Africa were looking to make early in-roads into the Australian top order in the post-tea session, extended to make up for lost playing time through rain on boxing day.

But Langer and Hayden, who’ve developed a telepathic understanding in their short time together, batted them out of it.

The pair, who put together 158 in their first knock together against England, amassed stands of 224 and 223 in consecutive tests against New Zealand in Brisbane and Hobart last month.

Hayden has had a phenomenal year and is this year’s leading scorer in test cricket with 1,305 runs at 62.14.

The South Africans were heading for a first innings total of less than 250 until Pollock and Hayward slapped on 44 runs for the last wicket before South Africa were dismissed for 277 just before tea.

The Australians were in command at 233 for nine, but Pollock, farming the strike from no.11 Hayward, added crucial runs before Hayward was snapped up in the slips by Ricky Ponting for 14 giving andy bichel his third wicket of the innings.

Pollock remained unbeaten on 42 off 93 balls in his best knock of the series after scores of 0 and 1 in Adelaide.

Bichel finished with 3-44 off 19.5 overs as well as taking a catch to dismiss Mark Boucher and running out Claude Henderson with a direct throw.

Australia applied the squeeze in the mid-afternoon session, removing Mark Boucher for 43, Neil McKenzie 67, Claude Henderson five and Allan Donald for a duck before picking up Hayward’s wicket. (AFP)

Jayasuriya dazzles with 92 in opening test

COLOMBO, Dec 27: Skipper Sanath Jayasuriya slammed an impressive 92 to strengthen Sri Lanka’s position on the opening day of the first cricket test against Zimbabwe here today.

The left-hander rattled off 16 fours in his 164-ball knock as Sri Lanka went to stumps at 211-3 after being put in to bat.

Wicket-keeper Kumar Sangakkara was batting on 62 and Russel Arnold on four when bad light and rain stopped play with 16.4 overs left.

Sri Lanka were indebted to Jayasuriya and Sangakkara for posting a respectable total against a disciplined Zimbabwean attack on a day when batting was slow in the first two sessions, which produced 142 runs.

Zimbabwe, playing with four seamers and taking just one wicket before tea, had to rely on part-time spinner Trevor Gripper to restrict Sri Lanka after a 78-run stand between openers Jayasuriya and Marvan Atapattu (25).

Off-spinner Gripper, with one wicket in his nine tests, tried to restore balance when he dismissed Jayasuriya and Mahela Jayawardene (18) in his four overs after tea.

Jayasuriya missed his ninth test hundred, top-edging a sweep to give wicket-keeper Andy Flower his second catch of the innings after adding 72 for second wicket with Sangakkara.

Jayawardene stepped out to try a big shot, but mistimed it to be caught by skipper Stuart Carlisle running back from mid-on. Sangakkara, however, steadied the innings and reached his seventh test half-century with a pulled six over midwicket off Gripper. He has so far hit nine fours and one six.

The Sri Lankan captain alone played attacking shots in the first two sessions of slow batting, cutting and driving firmly on way to his 20th test half-century.

Sri Lanka made 68 in the morning and 74 in the afternoon, finding scoring difficult against the all-seam Zimbabwean attack. Gary Brent was the most economical bowler, conceding 26 in 17.2 overs.

Even a hard-hitting Jayasuriya had to wait patiently for the loose deliveries to punish, with the Zimbabwean seamers providing few scoring opportunities.

Zimbabwe’s decision to put the hosts in to bat failed to produce the desired results on a pitch which usually favours seamers in the morning.

The tourists had just one chance to grab a wicket in the opening session when atapattu flicked heath streak to mid-wicket, where a diving Hamilton Masakadza failed to latch on to the ball.

Atapattu, let off on 21, did not captitalise on the opportunity though as he added four more runs before being caught behind down the leg-side off streak in the sixth over after lunch.

Earlier, Carlisle took over as captain after an out-of-form Brian Murphy had dropped himself for the test. Murphy had only recently returned to the squad after recovering from a finger injury sustained in Bangladesh last month.

The 25-year-old leg spinner said he had decided to step down as he had hardly bowled during the past six weeks. "I am not bowling well, so I decided to drop myself." (AFP)

Laxman tops year of the one-man show

LONDON, Dec 27: Cricket will remember 2001 as the year of the one-man show.

The previous 12 months had been all about the team — Australia — and their transformation of test cricket from five-day attrition to three-and-a-half day sprint.

But 2001 stood out for breath-taking individualism.

Courtney Walsh set the tone in April.

He scattered Allan Donald’s stumps in Kingston for a world-record 519th test victim before the West Indian pace bowler’s aching body finally ground to a halt.

Behind him, however, the spinners, with their short run-ups and fully functioning knee cartilages, were already gathering like vultures.

Shane Warne crossed the 400-mark in August as he claimed 31 wickets during Australia’s 2001 Ashes cakewalk. Muttiah Muralitharan was in his ample slipstream after 24 wickets in the three-test whitewash of West Indies.

The year’s undoubted climax, though, came from a man previously labelled an underachiever.

All that changed in the second test against Australia at Calcutta’s Eden Gardens in March. When Vangipurappu Laxman approached the wicket on the third day, India were 52 for one in their second innings, needing 222 to avoid an innings defeat.

Laxman and his pock-marked bat departed 10-1/2 hours later, 281 runs in credit, as India became only the third team in history to win a test after following on.

Rahul Dravid played his part in a 376-run stand but it was Laxman who attacked to change the mood of both game and series.

His feat may also have changed the mood of world cricket, ending a run of 16 successive Australian victories.

If that was not enough, the deciding test produced as grand and as unlikely an individual achievement.

Second-choice spinner Harbhajan Singh was better known at the time for a bad attitude and a bad action.

Hugely impressive in the second test, when he had become the first Indian to take a test hat-trick, he was phenomenal in the third in Madras. Seven wickets in the first innings were followed by eight for 84 in 41.5 overs in the second.

"The turbanator", as he was immediately nicknamed, added the perfect finish by hitting the winning runs to clinch a knife-edge series.

"It was the best and most demanding i have ever played in," Australia captain Steve Waugh said. "It really was quite amazing." Brian Lara, of course, has a long association with the improbable. Most, though, suspected his best days had passed.

In Sri Lanka in November Lara, despite a niggling hamstring, begged to differ.

West Indies lost 3-0 but lara still managed 688 runs at 114.66 per visit. In the final test he became the first man in history to score a hundred and double hundred in a test and still lose.

You don’t get many more obvious one-man shows than that —Andy Flower apart.

Zimbabwe are a below-average team who, the mirror image of Australia, managed to lose 16 one-day internationals in a row.

Wicketkeeper Flower, though, is among the world’s best batsmen, with a test average of 56. Half way through 2001 he hit 962 runs in 11 innings, at an average of 106.88.

He then topped that with centuries in each innings against South Africa, 142 and 199 not out, in Harare in September. And still Zimbabwe lost.

The year 2001 was ending perfectly, with Australia hosting South Africa and the top place in the World Test Championship at stake.

Off the field, though, things were less rosy.

As if cricket’s match-fixing scandal were not enough, India and South Africa defied the world governing body in November by sacking International Cricket Council (ICC) match referee Mike Denness — he angered the Indians by censuring six of their players — and going ahead with a game stripped of official status. Denness, some Indians even suggested, was a racist.

Ironically, the ICC had only just pledged to give the sport a stronger lead in rooting out match-fixing, improving umpiring and refereeing and cracking down on player indiscipline.

Equally ironic, it was the ICC’s former head, Indian board chief Jagmohan Dalmiya, who undermined those goals so publicly and so soon.

What Don Bradman, the greatest one-man show in cricket history, would have made of it is anybody’s guess.

Bradman died in his Adelaide home in February, taking his memories, his 92 years and his test average of 99.94 with him. (AGENCIES)

War of supremacy in Roller Skating Association
Present confusion hampering the prospects
of skaters: Parents
* Confused parents come out with suggestions to end the deadlock

By Sanjeev Sharma

JAMMU, Dec 27: Leaving aside the otherwise fundamental role of promoting the game, the office bearers of the two factions of the State Roller Skating Association have indulged themselves in a war of supremacy, thus destabilising the one-time most popular and highest medal winning game in Jammu and Kashmir and brewing chaos and confusion amongst the players.

These office bearers, most of whom are old skaters, are fighting for the last over two years for their supremacy to handle the affairs of the association.

The association broke into two factions two years back after the new State body was formed under the supervision of the J&K State Sports Council.

Unfortunately, at the time of formation of the new body, the sitting president was not present, who later made it an issue that the election, wherein he was ‘shunted out’, was held in his absence, said the sources. This resulted into beginning of a controversy between the outgoing president and the new elected body, the J&K Amateur Roller Skating Association, which subsequently got recognition from the governing body in the State, the State Sports Council. And in the process, the outgoing president started raising voice against the elected body and demanded re-election.

It was in this election that the Secretary, State Sports Council, Sheikh Fazal Ahmed was named as vice-president of the Association.

However, the new body never got the recognition from the governing body at the national level, Roller Skating Federation of India, because of the good links of the outgoing president with the president of the apex Federation.

In the meantime, the Federation, who refused to affiliate the new State body and bring into its fold, appointed the outgoing present, G S Khurmi as their representative in Jammu and Kashmir to look after the selections and other affairs related to the selection of the State teams for the national and international competitions.

And outcome of this controversy later took the ugly shape when both factions leveled allegations and counter allegations against each other and started a war of supremacy in the Roller Skating Association in the State.

The two groups, one having the patronage of Federation and other getting full backing of the State Sports Council, drew a line between the players, which resulted into the State Association starting holding the district and State level competitions, but with no permission to select the team for nationals. While, on the other hand, the Federation representative started naming the state teams for national participation.

This remained in practice for one and half year, but it finally became public, when one group organised a tournament at M A Stadium rinks, other took the lead to hold competitions at some other venue, putting the parents and participants in utter confusion where to compete and whom to support.

The war took ugly shape when the Amateur Roller Skating Association of Jammu and Kashmir announced to hold the 16th State Championship at M A Stadium from December 28 to 30 and also noted to select the State team for the forthcoming nationals. And, by the next day, the Roller Skating Federation of India faxed a handout to EXCELSIOR and termed the news sent by Association as "misleading".

Furthermore, the handout said, "the Amateur Roller Skating Association of J&K has been disqualified last year by the Federation and has neither been invited to attend the said nationals nor has been authorised to conduct the selection trials for the J&K team". In the same handout they named the selection committee of their own to conduct the trials and select the State team on the same day when the State championship is scheduled to begin, i.e December 28, at some other venue.

Such announcements from two factions have totally confused the parents and their wards, who are in a fix where to go.

If, one goes through the rules, the team selected by the Federation representatives has no right to take any funding from the State Sports Council because Council has the provision to release grants to those associations which are recognised by the latter.

Moreover, as per the Council officials, if a team participates in the nationals without the Council permission, its certificates will not get the Council sealing.

With no end to the deadlock and problems getting compounded with the passage of time, parents have started raising fingers on the concerned people. Talking to this Correspondent, one of the parents,who didn’t want to be named said, "the State Sports Council, which is running the sports in the State, should have played its role positively and must have come with some final conclusion".

Council should call both the parties together and try to iron out the controversy. And if failed, it should directly communicate with the apex Federation and the Union Sports Ministry for the permanent solution to the present deadlock, commented another parent.

The present Amateur Roller Skating Association of Jammu and Kashmir is being led by H S Chib, while Ajay Gupta is the general secretary. Union Minister of State for Food Processing, Prof Chaman Lal Gupta has been made the patron-in-chief of the Association.