Sourav Ganguly

Sourav confident of good
result in Zimbabwe

KOLKATA, May 22: The Indian team is fit and raring to go, Indian cricket captain Sourav Ganguly ..........more

Test championship system
is ‘stupid’, says Waugh

SYDNEY, May 22: The World Test Championship introduced this month is "stupid" because every.......more

IMG-TWI get sponsorship
rights for Indian
cricket team

NEW DELHI, May 22: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) today granted........more

BCCI hopeful of
sending team to Pak
for Asian Test Champ

NEW DELHI, May 22: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is hopeful of sending the......more

Excelsior Sports Correspondent

JAMMU, May 22: With the entry of 136, 50, and 39 Battalions in the last four stage, the semi-finals position .....more

2nd Sher-e-Kashmir Cup Cricket
Vishal beat Hanan club
to enter semi-finals

Excelsior Sports Correspondent

JAMMU, May 22: Vishal Cricket Club defeated Hanan Cricket Club by 53 runs to sail into the semi-finals of the 2nd Sher-e-Kashmir Cup day-night Cricket Tournament being held at Green Field ground, here. Earlier, Vishal Cricket club won the toss and decided to bat first. They set a challenging target of 203 runs for the loss of six wickets in the allotted 20......more

Fayaz Ahmed bags first
place in cycle race

Excelsior Sports Correspondent

PATTAN, May 22: Fayaz Ahmed Dar, a 12th standard student, bagged first position in the 12 kilometer long cycle race organised by the Higher Secondary School, Pattan, here. ....more

Sourav confident of good result in Zimbabwe

KOLKATA, May 22: The Indian team is fit and raring to go, Indian cricket captain Sourav Ganguly said here today before leaving the city for the Zimbabwe series.

"The team should do well. But we have to translate the fitness and mental tuning into action. The conditioning camp has done a world of good for the players but the acid test will be to perform on foreign soil and without home support," said Saurav with cautious optimism.

When asked to comment on the mental fitness of the team, the ambidextrous cricketer said it was only expected that a team playing at the international level would have to be fit mentally.

"The question is how well can they pull it off when the time comes. So we have to wait till the series gets started," Sourav added.

Talking about his use of bowling machine, the stylish left hander said, "I don’t think it is of any help other than practice because the machine lacks the instinct and thought process that a bowler will employ while rolling the wrist. One has to fight it out in the middle."

Sourav added that he was practising a particular stroke with the help of the machine. The Australia series was in the past and the bad patch was over, he said.

Talking about trying out his luck with the cherry on foreign soil, Sourav said he would decide about it when he reached Zimbabwe and upon the prevailing circumstances.

He said he was happy with the team’s composition and there was definitely an urge among the players to perform. (UNI)

Test championship system is ‘stupid’, says Waugh

SYDNEY, May 22: The World Test Championship introduced this month is "stupid" because every test should count according to Australia’s captain Steve Waugh.

The championship, based on a model pioneered by cricket publication Wisden, was introduced this month to impose a clear league table for the sport at the top level in a bid to win back fans.

It will award two points for a series win and one point for a series draw but one-test series are ignored and a 3-2 series victory is given the same weight as a 5-0 whitewash.

"I wouldn’t think it ("dead" tests going unrewarded) would leave it open to match-fixing, but I think it’s stupid," Waugh told reporters at Sydney Airport on Tuesday.

" We pride ourselves in every test match being special and what’s the point of playing if they don’t count for anything ?

"They still count for our personal pride and the team. I must admit I haven’t looked at the championship specifically and seen how it works, but I’m surprised those test matches don’t count, they should count".

" That’s what it’s all about, that’s why you’re the number one side, because you can perform I guess when other people don’t expect you to."

Cricket Australia Waugh two Sydney

The international Cricket Council (ICC) has drawn up a starting table based on recent results rather than beginning from scratch.

Australia recently won a world record 16 consecutive tests and is ranked number one despite losing a series 2-1 in march in India.

The championship, involving the 10 test-playing nations, began with the England-Pakistan two-test series which started last week.

Waugh said the packed cricket calendar might force countries to adopt four-test series, rather than five.

"Four tests might be the most convenient number, I don’t know," Waugh said.

"With five, you definitely sort out the best team."

Australian Cricket Board (ACB) chief executive Malcolm Speed said the ACB had considered playing two five-test series against South Africa home and away, starting with five tests in Australia at the end of this year.

Speed said the workload for the players would have been too much and Waugh agreed.

"Five here and five in South Africa is pretty much ridiculous," Waugh said.

" Ten tests in a row against the same side and I think you’re on automatic pilot by about the seventh test, I don’t think too many people would be watching it, you’ve got to keep it special and not overdo it."

Waugh said if the ICC were to introduce any technological advances aimed at assisting umpires they should be trailed at lower levels of the game.

The ICC’s Cricket Committee is meeting in London this week.

Speed said the ACB supported technology provided it improved the game and introduced a level of certainty while Waugh did not want the game to become "too Americanised" with each decision referred to a video replay.

"If they’ve got the technology to show where a ball has carried for a catch then use it, but I think at the moment it’s unclear and it’s caused more controversy than the issues that it solves," Waugh said.

Meanwhile, Waugh said he would welcome the release of the ICC’s report on match-fixing, whatever its contents.

The first report by the ICC’s anti-corruption unit, who have spent six months investigating how match-fixing took hold in the sport, is due to be released on Wednesday.

"We want to know what’s going on and people want the game cleaned up," Waugh said.

"So the sooner it comes out the better."

Australia’s one-day squad will fly to England on Saturday, while other test players are due to leave in mid-June for the three-month ashes tour which ends in late August.

The five-test series starts on July 5 after a limited overs competition involving Australia, Pakistan and England.

Australia play hosts to New Zealand and South Africa for a total of six tests between November and January.

The ACB said it had agreed a new five-year sponsorship deal with Ansett Australia, the country’s second largest airline, starting from the 2001-02 season.

"The sponsorship allows Ansett Australia naming rights to each test match played in Australia during the time of the agreement, as well as branding on test match playing shirts and training apparel and other supplementary benefits including signage at venues," the board said in a statement.(REUTERS)

IMG-TWI get sponsorship rights for Indian cricket team

NEW DELHI, May 22: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) today granted sponsorship rights for the national squad to the highest bidder, Trans World International (TWI), for three years.

TWI was the highest bidder in all the three categories — trophy title sponsorship, team clothing sponsorship and logo on non-leading arm. TWI is offering 49 per cent more than the previous sponsors, ITC. It will be now up to the IMG-TWI to look for corporate houses to sponsor the Indian team.

IMG-TWI has offered Rs one crore each year for three years for trophy title sponsorship, Rs 50 lakh per test match and Rs 43 lakh per one-day international, by far the best bids received by the board. TWI’s bid for logo on non-leading arm was Rs 5.50 lakh per test match and Rs 4.50 lakh per ODI which have been accepted. (UNI)

BCCI hopeful of sending team to Pak
for Asian Test Champ

NEW DELHI, May 22: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is hopeful of sending the national squad to Pakistan for the second Asian Test Championship to be held in September this year.

"The Government has clearly stated that it has no objection to India playing against Pakistan in a multilateral tournament," Board president A C Muthiah told reporters here today.

Besides India and Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh would be the other participants in the tournament. The inaugural Asian Test Championship was held in India in 1999.

Officials from cricket boards of these countries are to meet in Lahore on Thursday to attend the Asian Cricket Council (ACC) meeting which would discuss the development of the game in the continent besides the venues of the test championship. Muthiah said he would attend the meeting.

Strained political relations between India and Pakistan after the Kargil war and in view of the ongoing cross border terrorism have impacted on the cricketing ties between the two countries. The Indian Government refused permission to the team to travel to Pakistan for a test series late last year and also banned participation in non-regular venues like Sharjah, Toronto and Singapore for three years.

After its working committee meeting here on April 24, BCCI had threatened to pull out of even the World Cup and ICC Tournament due to "lack of clear-cut guidelines" from the Government on playing against Pakistan.

Later, Sports Minister Uma Bharati said that the Government was only against planned bilateral cricket series against Pakistan. She also explained the Government decision to pick up cricket as "it has become much more than a game ... It is a national passion in the two countries". (UNI)

Semi-finals position cleared in CRPF Inter-Bn Handball

Excelsior Sports Correspondent

JAMMU, May 22: With the entry of 136, 50, and 39 Battalions in the last four stage, the semi-finals position has been cleared in the 4th CRPF Inter-Bn Jammu (Ops) Sector Handball Tournament organised by the 136 Bn at Group Centre, Bantalab grounds, here today.

The 16 Bn had already reached the semi-finals by getting highest points in its pool. Now, in the tomorrow’s semi-finals, to be played in the morning session, 136 Bn will take on 50 Bn, while 16 Bn will meet 39 Bn for the final berth. Later in the evening session, losers will take on each other for the third place.

Earlier, in the last league round, 39 Bn outplayed 21 Bn 12-6 (ht 7-6). Nirmal Singh, Dineshwar Singh and R K Jana scored five, three and two goals respectively. While, from 21 Bn P N Dwivedi scored all the six goals.

In the second match played in the morning session, 50 Bn overpowered 8 Bn in a one-sided affair 21-2 (11-1). P Kakoti and Balwan were the top scorers with seven goals each, while Gurvinder and Gyan contributed four and three goals respectively. From 8 Bn, Ranbir Singh and Ram Prakash made one goal each.

In the evening session, Group Centre, Bantalab defeated 41 Bn in a close league tie 8-6 (ht 5-4). For Group Centre, Jewan Singh scored two goals, while S P Singh netted two. From 41 Bn, Ashraf Ali put in lot of hard work to level the score on board, but could not get support from other team members and lost the match. All the four goals were scored by Ashraf.

Fourth and last league match of the day was won by 6 Bn beating 132 Bn 17-10 (ht 7-5). For the losers 132 Bn, Surinder Singh netted five goals, while Dinesh Singh and Nawal Singh contributed three and two goals respectively. Krishan Kumar netted highest four goals for the winners 6 Bn, while Satya Prakash made six goals.

The tournament is being held under the overall supervision of organising committee chairman, Mr A S Sidhu, Commandant, 136 Bn. While, Mr Pardeep Singh Kailey is organising secretary.