India defeated England by nine wickets at the CCC Ground in Colombo onThursday. The loss means that England, the defending champions, havebeen knocked out of the under-19 World Cup. India is now assured of aplace in the semi-final.Forced to chase a modest English total of 182 the Indian batsmenromped to victory with 7.3 overs remaining. Manish Sharma (86*) andRaneet Ricky (68) thrashed the bowling to all parts of the ground inan opening partnership of 134.Such was the ease with which they defeated England, the Indian playersfelt the need to have some extra practice after the match to brush upon some of their batting and bowling skills.Speaking afterwards to CRICINFO, the Indian coach was a very contentedman. “It turned out to be an easy one, I didn’t expect it to bethat easy. I think we batted pretty well. They didn’t try anythingstupid in the first 15 overs. Our fielding though needs to have a bitmore work as our ground fielding was a bit scratchy.”When asked if the players believed that they could win thistournament, he replied “they are starting to believe in themselvesthat they can do it, having seen most of the teams play. The next onethough is going to be a big one against Sri Lanka.”India dominated the entire match from the moment that they won thetoss and asked England to bat. Sallab Srivastava and Tripathyimmediately caused problems with their pace and prodigiousswing. However despite playing and missing on numerous occasions theEnglish batsmen did not get out to either.Mark Wallace (2) was the first to go when he was run out by a directhit from Yuvaraj Singh in the fourth over. Ian Bell and John Maunder,who was playing his first game of the tour, then battled hard tosurvive. Regularly playing and missing the pair were only parted inthe 15th over when Bell was caught behind off the medium pace ofRitender Sodhi.Michael Carberry and Maunders then put on 38 for the third wicketbefore Maunders was stumped for 32. With England precariously placedon 74-3 off 25 overs the arrival of Gary Pratt changed the tempo ofthe innings. Willing to use his feet, but also quick to cut, he wasthe only player to look comfortable against the spinners.However the 53-run partnership ended when Carberry was caught behindfor 36. The dismissal marked the beginning of the end for England, aswickets were then lost at regular intervals.When it came to England’s turn to bowl they wasted the new ball bybowling far too short on a flat wicket. Manish Sharma and Raneet Rickyplayed themselves in cautiously in the first 15 before taking theattack to the English bowlers.Their batting was a class above anything seen all day. Anything loosefrom the bowlers was punished severely. Not afraid to use their feetto the spinners and prepared to hit all the bowlers over the top theyraced to their target.England’s only consolatory wicket in the afternoon was RaneetRicky, bowled by Murtagh of his inside edge.

Pakistan’s bowlers make up for batting failurePeshawar, March 7: Pakistan rallied back in to the match through theirbowlers after some spineless batting resulted in the loss of theirlast seven wickets for 45 runs on an eventful third day of the secondcricket Test against Sri Lanka at the Arbab Niaz Stadium here onTuesday.Pakistan’s middle and lower order batting collapsed so abysmally thata promising score of 154 for three just after lunch became 199 all outin reply to Sri Lanka’s first innings 268.The fall of 14 wickets during the day’s play has made this Test evenlypoised.Waqar Younis took two for 22 and received excellent support fromShoaib Akhtar, Arshad Khan and Aamir Sohail, who picked up one wicketapiece, as the tourists finished the day at 129 for five.Sri Lanka have a cushion of 198 runs lead going into the penultimateday but Pakistan can feel satisfied with their performance in thepost-tea session in which they dismissed the five frontlinebatsmen. They just need to break the partnership between Russel Arnoldand Aravinda de Silva which will expose the lower-middle-order and anopportunity to fold the innings earlier than many would have expectedwhen Sri Lanka started their innings after an early tea.But some horrendous and reckless stroke selection by the Pakistanibatsmen nearly put the crucial match beyond their reach when they werebowled out for 199 after being 153 for three at lunch. The saddestpart is that none of the batsmen could blame either the pitch orbowling for their downfall.Saeed Anwar, who top scored with 74, laid the foundation when heshowed a rush of blood against Sanath Jayasuriya to be caught byMuttiah Muralitharan at mid-on. Two balls earlier, Saeed had hit hiscounterpart for a huge six. That shot that brought his dismissal wastotally uncalled for from someone as experienced as Saeed who is alsothe captain of the team and is supposed to lead by example.Yousuf Youhana chased an outgoing delivery to be caught by RomeshKaluwitharana. And Shahid Afridi disappointed his fans with yetanother display of immaturity and impatience to hit right into thehands of Russel Arnold at cover at a time when Pakistan had just lostYounis Khan because of an error of judgement by English umpire JohnHampshire.Younis was declared caught bat and pad after Muralitharan and close-infielders had appealed for a leg before.That decision was the turning point of the day’s play as it changedthe complexion of the game. Inzamam-ul-Haq, who was batting withYounis at that time, helplessly saw wickets fall from the other enduntil Pakistan were dismissed 29 minutes before tea.But Inzamam continued his love affair with this ground by stroking hisfourth half century in his five visits.Inzamam, who reached 90s against Sri Lanka, West Indies and Australiahere in the last five years, batted brilliantly for his 58 thatspanned over 214 minutes. He faced 163 balls and struck sevenboundaries and a sweetly time six off Pramodya Wickremasinghe off histoes.Inzamam needed the luck he required when Tillekeratne Dilshan droppeda regulation catch at cover when the strongly-built batsman was twoand Pakistan 89 for two.The later order batsmen – Abdur Razzaq, Waqar Younis and Arshad Khan -tried to use their pads more than the bat and paid the price when allof them fell to Muralitharan who finished as picked of the Sri Lankanbowlers with four for 77, including three in nine deliveries.Saeed Anwar’s irresponsible shot though took a gloss of a fineinnings, it doesn’t truly reflect the amount of hard work theleft-hander did to graft his innings. He received 191 balls in hisfour hours of batting. He clobbered nine boundaries and a six.When the stumps were drawn three over before schedule because offading light on a day which saw 14 wickets falling, Sri Lanka’s lastrecognized pair of Russel Arnold and Aravinda de Silva were at thecrease.Arnold was looking confident and as solid as a rock while scoring63. He has been batting for eight minutes over three hours duringwhich he has faced 116 balls and belted 10 excellent boundaries mostlyon the on-side.De Silva, who could only come into bat at No 7 after spending the dayin the dressing room because of a twisted ankle, was seven not out.After Waqar Younis provided Pakistan the much needed earlybreakthrough by trapping Sanath Jayasuriya in front of the wickets, hereturned for his second spell and picked up Mahela Jayawardena in asimilar fashion.Jayawardena’s dismissal saw Sri Lanka lose Tillekeratne Dilshan andRomesh Kaluwitharana in a space of five balls.Arshad Khan, who bowled too many lose deliveries, was rewarded withthe prized scalp of last innings top scorer Marvan Atapattu (29).Aamir Sohail, who had given Saeed Anwar vital breakthroughs, didn’tdisappoint his opening partner by having Dilshan caught smartly bydebutant Atiq-uz-Zaman behind the wickets.

A dead rubber never inspires much interest or enthusiasm. The finalday of the MRF Buchi Babu invitation tournament semifinal clashbetween the National Cricket Academy XI and Indian Airlines passedwithout much ado. Resuming at 350/5, the NCA boys added 88 to theirovernight score before succumbing. Skipper Reetinder Singh Sodhi whocame to this match with scores of 0, 0 and 1 in the last three inningshe played, got some much needed batting practice. The lad lookedconfident on the way to making an unbeaten 29 yesterday. Today, heextended himself further, stroking his way to 71 when he was finallydismissed. Just two runs later the NCA were all out for 438.The stars of the Indian Airlines team did not see much point in takingthe field on a hot Chennai day. With absolutely nothing to play for,VVS Laxman cooled his heels in the pavilion and let the youngsterssweat it out. Ravneet Ricky and Manish Sharma opened for Airlines,continuing an association that paid India rich dividends in theUnder-19 World Cup in Sri Lanka. Sharma however did not last long.After making just eight, he was scalped by India Under-19 mediumpacerMrithyunjay Tripathi. Ricky then took over, cutting and pulling withabandon. The wicket did nothing to assist the fast bowlers and anyattempt to bang the ball in short was treated with contempt.Ricky was also unafraid to use his feet against the spinners. Comingdown the track, he cleared the infield with consummate ease on morethan one occasion. When he finally fell, it was to a brilliant catchby substitute fielder Nikhil Doru. Stretching full length on the ropeswide of mid off, Doru plucked a ball out of the air just before itsailed over the ropes. Ricky’s entertaining 76 had ended in dramaticfashion.Shafiq Khan came in at the fall of the first wicket and hecomplemented Ricky well. If anything, he was more positive. Althoughnot as solid as the lad from Amritsar, Shafiq Khan hit the ball hard,taking a few risks too many. One such heave to the on side was snappedup by Rakesh Dhruve running in from long on. Shafiq Khan had made abrisk 63 from 55 balls.At tea, Vijay Dahiya and Arunkumar were toying with the bowling whenthe two captains agreed that enough was indeed enough. Over hot cup ofChennai `chai’ Dahiya informed the umpires that he had spoken to hisopposite number and that they had agreed to call of play. The umpireswere only too grateful and called stumps.Although there were a few muted celebrations in the NCA camp, the factthat they had advanced by virtue of first innings lead yesterdayitself rendered the whole day meaningless. In the other semifinalencounter, the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation XI managed to squeakpast the New Zealand Cricket Academy XI in a tight finish. As aresult, the NCA XI takes on ONGC XI in the three day final whichcommences on September 1 at the MA Chidambaram Stadium at Chepauk.

Considering the fact that this encounter was their 200th match in thenational competion, Kerala failed to make an impact on the opening dayof the South Zone Ranji Trophy match against Hyderabad at the NFCground in Hyderabad on Wednesday. The hosts, thanks to their top orderbeing in resonable form ran up 241 for the loss of three wickets intheir 90 overs.Opting to bat, Hyderabad openers southpaw Daniel Manohar (30) and ANanda Kishore (53) gave a solid start by adding 94 runs in 34 overs.Daniel was the first to be dismissed, caught behind by Kameruddin offTinu Yohannan. His partner Nanda Kishore departed soon after, trappedleg before by Yohannan. But the new batsmen, Anirudh Singh (47) andVanka Pratap (70) made amends to forge a 98 run third wicketpartnership in 42.3 overs.Yohannan (3 for 43) came back late in the day to dismiss Anirudh inthe 80th over. But Vanka Pratap and D Vinay Kumar (11) saw the teamthrough to stumps.

Six months ago, in Shaun Pollock’s first Test match as captain, a ragged South African side lost by an innings and 15 runs to Sri Lanka in Galle. At Newlands on Thursday the wheel turned full circle as South Africa crushed Sri Lanka by an innings and 229 runs inside three days in the second Castle Lager/MTN Test match.It was South Africa’s largest margin of victory and Pollock, named man of the match after scything through the Sri Lankan first innings with figures of six for 30, had every reason to be proud of the achievement.

“We’ve come a long since then as a team,” he said afterwards. “We’ve got a really well-balanced unit and the guys are confident and playing good cricket.”In the unenviable position of losing captain, Sanath Jayasuriya also spoke afterwards, mentioning a little bit of bad luck here and there, but he put his finger on it when he said, in so many words, that after being bowled out for 95, Sri Lanka didn’t have a prayer.He conceded that Sri Lanka’s problems started at the top of the order where he and Marvan Atapattu simply haven’t been able to get going and acknowledged that “the boys are a bit down”.Which seems fair understatement. Sri Lanka were simply blown away in this Test match with the last day no different from the first and second. South Africa batted on in the morning, reaching 504 for six as Lance Klusener crunched Russel Arnold for a straight six and promptly managed to get himself out next ball for 97.Pollock said he had been looking for a 400 lead – “It’s almost a psychological thing that’s impossible to get over” – and had left the batsmen out there for an over or two more to allow Klusener to get his hundred.With Klusener’s dismissal Pollock called the batsmen off and gave his bowlers five overs at the Sri Lankans before lunch. Mfuneko Ngam had Jayasuriya caught in the gully off the eighth ball of the innings and it was downhill for Sri Lanka from there on.Ngam nipped Kumar Sangakkara out shortly after lunch, Pollock had Atapattu trapped leg before and although there was some resistance from Mahela Jayawardene, who made a gutsy 45, and Arnold, the introduction of Nicky Boje spun out the middle order before and after tea.Chaminda Vaas biffed and banged his way to 38 off 26 balls, but the tide had already come in for Sri Lanka and Ngam, perhaps fittingly, finished it all off when Dilhara Fernando gloved a catch to Mark Boucher.It was as complete a performance as the South Africans could have hoped for, achieved on a fast, bouncy pitch of which the home team were able to fully express themselves.As well as South Africa played, though, Sri Lanka were feeble opponents in this match. After being 13 for four on the first day, they seemed to lose all self-belief and although there were occasional individual contributions here and there, collectively they were a shambles.Jayasuriya said that the four one-day internationals now coming up might allow Sri Lanka to regroup, but on the evidence of the last three days at Newlands, the stuffing has been knocked out of the tourists. Unless they are able to prove otherwise, their tour might already be over to all intents and purposes.

Glamorgan and Somerset have confirmed today the arrangements for thesale of tickets for the match between the two counties at Taunton onJuly 11th in the fourth round of the C&G Trophy.There will be no advance ticket sales, with supporters paying on thegate on the day, on a first-come first-served basis. The gates willopen at 9.00 am, so the advice is to arrive early to avoid disappointment!The ticket prices are £12 for adults, £8 for Senior Citizens and £6for juniors.Glamorgan`s Premier Members are guaranteed a complimentary ticketprovided they submit the relevant voucher to the Glamorgan office prior to Monday, 1st July. Once the deadline has passed, they too will have to pay onthe gate on the day.

The Board of Control for Cricket in India tour, programme and fixturescommittee meeting will be held at the residence of Kishore Rungta, theRajasthan Cricket Association secretary and treasurer of the BCCI, inJaipur on July 7.The meeting will take a final decision on India’s proposed tours toPakistan (for the Asian Test Championship) and Australia (for thethree match indoor series). It will also decide on the venues anddates of the Tests, one day internationals and first class matches forthe Zimbabwe tour of this country. Zimbabwe are scheduled to tourIndia early next year after England completes its tour. It is alsolearnt that Jaipur will get either a three day game or an ODI againstEngland in November this year.The committee will also have a look at the domestic calender. Theconvenor of the commitee is the BCCI secretary JY Lele. Other memberswho will participate in the deliberations include GK Kelkar, SharadDiwadkar, MP Pandove and Venkat Rao.

* Asia Cup in Pakistan from August 23 next yearThe Asia Cup featuring India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, UAE andHong Kong would be held in Pakistan from August 23 to September 7 nextyear under a new format.The official news agency, APP said that according to the rules, allthe matches would be day and night fixtures and will be played atKarachi, Lahore and Rawalpindi.The teams were divided into two pools with Pakistan, Bangladesh andUAE in pool A, while India pitted with Sri Lanka and Hong Kong is inPool B. The top two teams from each pool would move into the superleague where each team will play the four other sides. The top twoteams will play the final to be played on September 7, it said.* Kumble unlikely to be fit for Lanka tourIt now seems highly unlikely that ace Indian leg spinner Anil Kumblewill be available for selection for the tour of Sri Lanka commencinglater this month. The 30-year-old Karnataka captain, recuperating fromshoulder surgery, told a news agency in Bangalore on Monday that hehad been bowling at the nets and regularly following therehabilitation programme. But he indicated that he was not likely tobe fit for the tour of Sri Lanka."I am yet to inform the BCCI about my fitness," he said. In April,after consultations with shoulder specialist Mark Fergusson of SouthAfrica, Kumble had said that it would be a bonus if he would be fitfor the Sri Lankan tour. The team for Sri Lanka is to be selected onJuly 9, immediately after the Indians come back from their currenttour of Zimbabwe. India will play three Test matches against Sri Lankabesides taking part in a tri series involving New Zealand.However, Kumble expressed confidence of being match fit for the SouthAfrican tour which starts from the first week of October. Kumble hasbeen out of action since he was injured in the three nation tournamentat Sharjah in October last year.* Solkar offers to coach Bengal juniorsFormer Indian Test cricketer Eknath Solkar has expressed his desire tocoach the junior cricketers of Bengal. Solkar had called up the jointsecretary of the Cricket Association of Bengal, Debdas Bannerjee andhad expressed his intentions. The latter however, asked him to contactthe CAB President Jagmohan Dalmiya. After failing to contact Dalmiya,Solkar sent in his application to the CAB. Talking over the phone fromMumbai, Solkar said, "I have coached the junior teams of Orissa andAssam. So when I came to know that the CAB was looking for a coach, Iapplied for it."Solkar’s application however, may not be reviewed at the present asthe CAB has appointed MP Parmar as the coach for the juniorcricketers. Parmar was the coach of the senior team that had won theRanji Trophy in 1989-90.The CAB is also on the look out for a coach for the senior team. Thenames that have been shortlisted are those of Madanlal, Karsan Ghavriand Roger Binny. Of the three Ghavri stands the best chance of gettingthe post as the other two are busy with various assignments.* Chamundeswarnath is Andhra selection committee chairmanFormer Andhra Ranji captain V Chamundeswarnath was elected chairman ofthe senior selection committee at the executive committee meeting ofthe Andhra Cricket Association in Vijayawada on Sunday. The followingare the various selection panels for 2001-02:Senior selection committee: V Chamundeswarnath (Chairman), JugalKishore Ghia, N Bose Babu, VB Satya Prasad, Coach: Syed Abid Ali.Administrative Manager: KS Bhaskara Ramamurthy.Under-25: D Suresh Kumar (Chairman), BJJ Raju, A Sai Ram, GGowrishankar, Coach: M Chandrasekhara, Administrative Manager: KVVSatyanarayana.Under-22: D Vincent Vinay Kumar (Chairman), V Janaki Ram, GSMallikarjuna Rao, S Krishna Mohan, Coach: GVS Raju. AdministrativeManagers: K Bapiraju and MV Krishna Murthy.Under-19: KVSD Kama Raju (Chairman), Sher Singh, UM Gandhi, PR AnandaMurthy, Coach: MN Ravi Kumar, Administrative Managers: MS Reddy andKoka Ramesh.Under-16: D Nageswara Rao (Chairman), P Bhogendra Babu, VVijayasaradhi, Ch Subrahmanyam, Coach: PV Krishna Rao, AdministrativeManagers: T Mahesh and N Nirmal.Under-14: M Vasudeva Raju (Chairman), R Narayan Rao, D Vinod Kumar, MAIspaan, Coach: JKM Raju, Administrative Managers: P Seshu Babu and LNaga Bhushanam.

Australian bowler Glenn McGrath, scourge of the English batsmen so far this series, praised his English counterparts after they reduced the tourists to 105-7 at the close on the first day of the Third Test to re-ignite an Ashes contest that had looked dead earlier in the day.Having taken five for 49 himself to bowl England out for only 185 on what is normally a good batting track, McGrath admitted to the BBC that England’s fiery comeback in the field was: “a little bit of a shock. We always knew England would fight back at some stage. We never really underestimated them. Today was the day.”Earlier, any spark of English hope of reclaiming the Ashes seemed to have been firmly stamped out by McGrath and company as the home side once more failed to build a decent first innings total. The 31-year-old paceman attributed the fall of 17 wickets in a day to a combination of the pitch and overhead conditions: “Even I was swinging the ball conventionally. To take five wickets in a Test match, I’ll take that any day.”Andy Caddick, who led the England recovery with three wickets in three overs, including that of the captain Steve Waugh, told Channel 4: “I got Steve (Waugh) the way I got him three years ago. I do feel it’s a slight weakness and he knows it’s a slight weakness of his and I’ll continue to plug at that weakness. I’m just happy I got him out that way because he is a key player.”It just shows that these Australians are good players but if you get stuck into them and get on top they do what other humans would do and that is panic, and I’m sure in their dressing room they panicked a little bit.” McGrath agreed that, “it is okay to say they have the upperhand.”Caddick predicted that England would bowl Australia out early on the second day, before compiling around 550 in their second innings, to which McGrath retorted that he should come to the ground once he had woken up. At 2-0 up in the series, it has not been difficult for the tourists to retain their sense of humour, but England can continue to breathe life into the Ashes as they did yesterday evening, the joke may yet be on the mighty Australians.