Stats highlights from the first Test between Zimbabwe and New Zealand in Bulawayo, where Neil Wagner took a career-best six-for on the opening day

Shiva Jayaraman28-Jul-20160 Previous instances when a pace bowler has returned better figures than Neil Wagner’s 6 for 41 in a Test innings at Queen Sports Club, Bulawayo. The previous best at this venue was also by a New Zealand bowler – Shane Bond’s 6 for 51 in 2005. Wagner’s six-for was the fourth instance of a bowler taking six wickets in a Test innings at Queens.1 Number of times a New Zealand bowler has returned better figures than Wagner’s in a Test against Zimbabwe. Chris Martin took 6 for 26 in Napier in 2012. Bond’s 6 for 51 in 2005 is the only other instance of New Zealand pace bowler taking a six-for in a Test innings against Zimbabwe.6/106 Wagner’s previous innings best in Tests, against Australia in Christchurch in February this year. This is the third time Wagner has taken five or more wickets in Tests. He has taken 80 wickets at 30.51.85 The partnership between Prince Masvaure and Donald Tiripano – the second-highest stand for Zimbabwe for the ninth wicket in Tests. Paul Strang and Bryan Strang added 87 runs against Pakistan in Sheikhupura in 1996, which is the highest.3 Number of larger ninth-wicket stands than the one in Zimbabwe’s innings when a team has lost eight wickets for a score of less than 100. Tiripano joined Masvaure when Zimbabwe were 72 for 8. It is the highest such partnership since Roger Binny and Madan Lal added 117 runs against West Indies in Kanpur in 1983 after India were 90 for 8.49* Runs scored by Donald Tiripano, the highest by a Zimbabwe batsman at No. 10 or 11 in Tests. Bryan Strang’s 42 against Pakistan in Sheikhupura in 1996 was the previous best.6 Instances when Zimbabwe have been dismissed for a score lower than the 164 they made in this innings in Tests by New Zealand. Their lowest all-out total at home against New Zealand is 59, which came in Harare in 2005.4 Wickets lost by Zimbabwe on the score of 72, their worst four-wicket collapse in a Test innings. Their previous worst was also against New Zealand in Harare in 2005, when they slid from 9/0 to 11/4 in their first innings.2009 The last time two players from opposing teams made their debut as captains in the same Test, before Graeme Cremer and Kane Williamson in this Test. West Indies’ Floyd Reifer and Bangladesh’s Mashrafe Mortaza captained their respective teams for the first time in their career in St Vincent on that occasion. Overall this was the 24th such instance since (and not including) the first ever Test.126 Internationals played by Chamu Chibhabha – 96 ODIs and 30 T20Is – before making his Test debut, in this match. This is the second-most international matches played by anyone before making his Test debut. Rohit Sharma had played 144 international games before making his debut in Tests, against West Indies in Kolkata in 2013-14.

Laid low by illness and with his team deep in trouble, Sean Williams produced the innings to silence his doubters

Firdose Moonda in Bulawayo31-Jul-2016The last thing Sean Williams needed on Wednesday was to get the flu. It was the day before his Test comeback, if you can call it that given his career had only featured two Tests before this one. Perhaps it’s better to say it was the day before his restart, because that’s how Williams saw this series.It was another chance for him to prove himself after years of yo-yoing into and out of the selectors’ minds, especially for the longer format. They knew he was talented and tough enough – his performances in limited-overs cricket proved that – but they weren’t sure he was level-headed enough, mature enough, or even committed enough to don the whites.Such was their uncertainty that Williams was not under serious consideration for this series after being left out of the Zimbabwe A side to play South Africa A earlier this month. Despite being summoned to Bulawayo from a training camp in Harare specifically for the second fixture of the A series, Williams was excluded from the XI and told to work on his mindset instead if he wanted to be considered for the Tests. Then, he was left off the squad list anyway. Rumour has it that it was only on captain Graeme Cremer’s insistence that Williams was eventually included. Then the flu struck.So although Williams was coughing heavily, feverish and weak, he owed it to his captain, if no one else, to fight through it on the first day. He was needed just after an hour’s play, his team already in a precarious situation. Zimbabwe were 35 for 3 and had been stunned by a barrage of short balls from Neil Wagner, who greeted Williams with his most hostile one. It struck him on the helmet and broke the grille.Williams had barely had time to recover from that moment when Wagner did it again and hit him again. With the same result. Except that the second time, Williams had played a pull and umpire Paul Reiffel thought his bat, not his helmet, had sent the ball to midwicket. Williams was given out. He did not move. He pointed to his helmet as though to offer an explanation but only saw a raised index finger. As he walked off, Williams continued to look at and gesture to the helmet, blaming it and himself and knowing he had made the wrong impression on the powers that be, though not entirely through his own fault.If they were uncertain about his desire to play Test cricket before, what happened next would have strengthened that assumption. Williams could not be at the ground the next day. Or for most of the one after that. Racked by chills and injected with antibiotics, Williams’ best option was to stay in bed to avoid passing it on to his team-mates, some of whom had already started to show symptoms. Regis Chakabva also could not take the field for New Zealand’s innings, although he was diagnosed with tonsillitis, which is not contagious.Both men were summoned from their sick beds towards the end of day three. Even though both would only be able to bat after five wickets had fallen because of the time spent off the field, at 17 for 4 that was imminent. Not only would they have to bat, they would have to save the team from major embarrassment.

For a minute short of three-and-a-half hours, Williams repaid his captain’s faith in him and he proved to his doubters that he is capable and confident player

When the fifth wicket fell, Zimbabwe had stabilised and Cremer opted to take one for the team instead of send his ailing team-mates out. He saw the day to the close and, for the second time, he batted for Williams.That night, Williams’ wife Chantelle, who had also had the illness passed on to her, became worse. She almost fainted from the symptoms and even thought she may have had a small fit. With that on his mind, Williams travelled to Queens on Sunday morning. Chantelle, her voice rasping from coughing, her throat hoarse, was there with her sisters. The family had come to rally around their man and their team. And they were not disappointed.Williams entertained from the get-go, with shots that the rest of the line-up, barring Sikandar Raza’s carefree cameo, seemed too hesitant to play. He drove and swept and used his feet. He found gaps in the field and went both through and over it.The only moments that gave away that he may not have been feeling up to scratch came when he called for water five minutes before lunch because he simply couldn’t wait that long and when, in the drinks break in the second session, he went down on all fours in a part-stretch, part-retch with the look of a knackered man plastered across his face. For the rest of his innings, Williams was in complete control.With Cremer playing the perfect foil at the other end, Williams gave Zimbabwe hope they could make New Zealand bat again. He gave them the belief Makhaya Ntini has been trying to drill into them; the kind of belief that only comes with performance. “What they should realise is that they are better than what they think they are,” Ntini said. “They can do anything like any other team. They need to be given the space to understand that they can compete. Zimbabwe is going somewhere.”For a minute short of three-and-a-half hours, Williams was in the space where he understood that. He repaid his captain’s faith in him and he proved to his doubters within the administration that he is capable and confident player, a scrapper that they should savour having around and a talent they should not take for granted in a country where the player pool remains shallow. So even though the last thing Williams needed was to get the flu, it will be the first thing he thinks of when he looks back on how he broke through and proved that he belongs.

Almost two-thirds of Dhoni’s 9000 ODI runs have come as captain and all of them with the extra responsibility of keeping

Shiva Jayaraman23-Oct-20162 Batsmen to complete 9000 runs as wicketkeepers in ODIs before MS Dhoni. Kumar Sangakkara and Adam Gilchrist are the only others to do it. Dhoni is the fastest in terms of innings having taken 244 innings, ahead of Sangakkara’s 252 and Gilchrist’s 262.1 Dhoni is the first batsman to complete 9000 runs with an average of 50 or more. Jacques Kallis’ average of 45.68, when he got to 9000 runs, was the previous highest.5 Batsmen who have taken fewer innings than Dhoni to get to 9000 ODI runs. Dhoni is the sixth-quickest to the milestone, with 244 innings, despite playing a majority of his innings at No. 4 or lower.1 There is only batsman other than Dhoni to score at least 1000 runs as wicketkeeper and captain at the time of completing 9000 ODI runs. Sangakkara had made 1654 runs with the
dual responsibilities at the time of completing 9000 runs. Dhoni has made 6581 runs. More than a third of the 18507 runs made by keeper-captains in ODIs have come from Dhoni.10109 Deliveries played by Dhoni to complete 9000 runs – the third-fewest by a batsman. Gilchrist reached the landmark in 9328 deliveries. Sanath Jayasuriya took 15 deliveries fewer than Dhoni to get there.196 Sixes hit by Dhoni in ODIs; among batsmen with 9000 runs, only Chris Gayle (229 sixes) has hit more sixes at the end of the innings that took them to the 9000th run. Dhoni’s 196 sixes are the most by an India batsman, passing Sachin Tendulkar’s 195.6581 Runs scored by Dhoni as India’s ODI captain – the highest share as captain when reaching the 9000 landmark. Mohammad Azharuddin is the only other batsman to get at least half his 9000 runs while captaining in ODIs. Azharuddin had made 5147 runs as India captain at the end of the innings in which he completed 9000 runs.

Pat Howard, Australia’s team performance manager, talks about the challenges of shaking things up over five years of mixed results for the national side

Daniel Brettig24-Aug-2016Walking behind the scoreboard on day three of the Pallekele Test, Pat Howard crossed paths with a pair of Australian cricket followers. The tale on the other side of the board was looking increasingly sickly for Australia. One spectator said loudly to the other, “A lot of high-performance work needed here…” Without breaking stride, Howard retorted, “very funny”, and continued on his way.If the result at Pallekele was instructive as to where the Test team must improve, then the above exchange was as telling about the way Howard is still perceived by many in and around Australian cricket. October will make five years for him in the job as Cricket Australia’s executive general manager – team performance, a role sculpted specifically through the review chaired in 2011 by Don Argus.This has been a most turbulent period, and Howard’s tenure has been marked by conflict and change. He has needed plenty of resilience in seeking to implement many of Argus’ recommendations. Through that time, Howard’s instinct has been to do much as he did in response to the “high performance” jibe – keep striving forward, if offering the occasional backhander along the way.

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In August 2011, at the time the Argus review findings were announced, Howard was chief of operations for Cromwell Property Group in Brisbane, having left a high-performance role with the Australian Rugby Union in 2008.”I was assistant coach of a rugby team at Queensland University helping out a mate, and by chance John Buchanan’s son was in that team,” Howard tells ESPNcricinfo. “I was chatting to him and away it went. Five years is a long time ago, my kids were a lot younger then, I can say that.”

“I’m very much a link between the playing group and CA, between the strategy and the team. I’m well aware I want to win as much as anyone”

Through rugby, Howard had experience in just about every role around the game, from representing the Wallabies and coaching Leicester, to serving on the board of the players’ association. Being based in Brisbane meant he could work out of CA’s Centre of Excellence – later expanded and renamed the National Cricket Centre – and in being the first post-Argus appointment, he had a say in the choices of John Inverarity as selection chairman and Mickey Arthur as coach. Quickly it became apparent that while Howard was willing to learn about the game, he was an equally hawkish advocate of change.”I have to really justify every decision, and that was the really hard bit about it,” Howard says. “I got a reputation as a bit of a data guy there for a while, but that was all about trying to justify decisions and justify points. The first couple of years you have to deal with differences if you want to make change, and that can upset people at times.”Without question at times I probably went too hard for change, but to a certain extent you’re always going to have positive and negative views on things. Hindsight is brilliant, you never have it beforehand, but we’ve made some good decisions, we’ve made some decisions where you think, could I have handled it better, could I have given people more time to digest it, sometimes less time to digest it and just go through with it. That’s aiming for perfection. Overall I think we’re pretty happy but not satisfied.”Howard’s level of energy is hard to match. One colleague remarks that it is difficult to work out when he sleeps, given the varied hours of the day and night that Howard emails tend to buzz their way into CA inboxes. Customarily visible in the early days of any cricket tour, he will help out in drills occasionally, and one morning at Pallekele could be seen juggling cricket balls in a nod to a childhood job, working sideshow alley.”We’ve got the highest regard for Mickey Arthur as a person, but at the same time we felt it was the right time of change and we needed to make a change”•Getty ImagesThe juggling balls have not always gone to hand, in private or public. The years of 2012-13 were marked by numerous spot fires, whether getting into shouting matches with Channel Nine commentators over the decision to rest David Warner from ODI matches following the home Tests, or in alienating Shane Watson by declaring he was prohibited from using the external physio Victor Popov. Howard also found himself negotiating the players payment MOU with the Australian Cricketers’ Association, an arrangement that irked many, as Howard had been styled as the national team’s man in the executive rather than the bad cop at the collective bargaining table.”It was really challenging, but a role I’d done before,” Howard says. “In many roles your manager has to decide where your remuneration is but also be really positive about where you’re going to grow. I’m very much a link between the playing group and CA, between the strategy and the team. I’m well aware I want to win as much as anyone and make sure the team has the resources to win. How do we give ourselves the best chance of winning?”

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The first half of 2013 placed Howard squarely in the spotlight as what Argus had defined as “the single point of accountability for the performance of the Australian team”. When the team management on that year’s India tour, primarily the coach Arthur, the manager Gavin Dovey, and the captain Michael Clarke chose to summarily suspend Mitchell Johnson, Shane Watson, Usman Khawaja and James Pattinson in response to mounting disciplinary problems on tour, Howard found himself having to defend a decision of which he had not been initially part.At a press conference in Brisbane on March 12, Howard’s bluntness got the better of him. Responding to a question about Watson, the vice-captain, he replied: “I know Shane reasonably well, I think he acts in the best interests of the team sometimes.” That comment drew a furious response from Watson and many in Australian cricket, including the following missive from Alan Jones on radio show 2GB: “You’ve got this other nobody Pat Howard, who knows nothing, saying he’s not a team man.”

Howard’s level of energy is hard to match. One colleague remarks that it is difficult to work out when he sleeps, given the varied hours of the day and night that his emails tend to buzz their way into CA inboxes

In keeping with his reputation for endless energy, Howard had been a hard-driving manager for Arthur, pressuring the coach for success and heightening his already prevalent outsider’s anxiety. Arthur felt compelled from several directions to act in India, and was then advised when Howard arrived for the final Test of the series in Delhi that “this better work”. The reason, of course, was that Howard’s own job would be placed at risk should further issues arise. When they did during the Champions Trophy in England, Howard and the chief executive James Sutherland began secret deliberations around replacing Arthur with Darren Lehmann. It was the tensest of times.”These decisions don’t come lightly. There was a fair bit of work done there and we understood this,” Howard says. “Mickey’s with Pakistan now and he’s obviously a very good coach, but that environment wasn’t working well. We made a change. We knew how good Darren was [with Queensland], we put him in the Australia A tour, he was with Rod [Marsh], so we knew that combination was going to be there and ready to go. I think we’d all admit that worked well and it’s credit to Darren in terms of how he’s come along.”Sutherland made rare appearances around the team either side of Arthur’s firing and Lehmann’s appointment. “That was a really difficult time for everyone,” he says. “It wasn’t personal; we’ve got the highest regard for Mickey Arthur as a person and we wanted to be as sensitive about it as we possibly could, but at the same time we felt it was the right time of change and we needed to make a change. It was a difficult time and history will ultimately be the judge as to whether that decision was vindicated, but you have to make decisions from time to time and we did.”Less edifying than the sacking itself was its aftermath. Howard handed Arthur only three months’ worth of severance pay, a decision the affable South African disputed after speaking to friends back home in Perth. That led to a statement of claim being lodged with Australia’s industrial arbiter, and the airing of dirty laundry in the days before the Lord’s Test match, namely the allegation that Clarke had referred to Watson as a “cancer” on the team. Arthur finished up with a fair settlement, and has rebounded admirably to mentor Pakistan. The terms of CA contracts and their internal oversight were understandably reviewed and changed to avoid a repeat.Nevertheless, Lehmann’s appointment proved to be a circuit breaker, not only in terms of the team’s fortunes but also the definition of Howard’s role. Having chosen a coach with very strong opinions, Howard was content to take a backward step from the team, and to support whatever Lehmann and the captain, Michael Clarke, needed. That changed dynamic helped in an improving display across the Ashes tour, and ultimately the raucous 5-0 sweep of England at home. Where Howard had started 2013 highly visible, he ended it much more in the background, working on the underpinnings of national teams rather than dictating as much at what he calls “the front end”.Having appointed Darren Lehmann as coach, Howard was content to take a backward step, and to support Lehmann and Clarke•Getty ImagesVarious measures at lower levels have included an overhaul of the Sheffield Shield points system, the addition of a CA XI to the Matador Cup, and moving that tournament into a carnival-style event at the start of the season. There has also been the increasingly strategic use of substitute players in the Shield to allow CA to manage the workloads of fast bowlers in particular, and injury incidences have declined steadily.Earlier this year a Shield fixture was played in New Zealand for the first time, in the absence of a tour match before Australia’s Test series win. Howard was also an advocate for the reduction in the number of grassy strips being prepared for first-class matches in order to help batsmen build bigger innings. That diktat, and the installing of spin-friendly wickets at the NCC, are yet to reap Asian dividends.”For everything you implement, three go well and two go poorly,” Howard says. “I am happy to change things that haven’t gone well. I’m absolutely free to admit there are things we’ve tried that haven’t worked. But at the same stage there are things we’ve tried where we’re not quite sure of the end product yet. The Sheffield Shield points change, I wasn’t sure it was going to deliver what we were after, but we’ve seen a lot more spin bowling played, seen a lot of young players score centuries, and the balance between bat and ball, both anecdotally and by the stats, has been better.”There are things you try and say, ‘Gee, I hope this works well’, and for all the planning you do sometimes once you’ve had enough information you have to try it, and then adjust. That’s what we’ve done with the Shield points – we’ve put it in, it’s worked pretty well, then we’ll just tinker around the edges to get it even better.”

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The sense that Lehmann was now running the show took something of a hit in 2015, when the Ashes were given up with a pair of horrendous batting displays in Birmingham and Nottingham. Subsequent to that result, it is said that Howard took back a measure of control over proceedings, as reflected by how the support staff around Lehmann has been turned over in large measure. Howard is adamant he doesn’t mind working with others of strong opinions, highlighted by the hiring of David Saker as Lehmann’s new assistant.”We’re not after yes-men,” Howard says. “I remind Darren we had some challenges in this period [before hiring him], and David’s the same. A challenging environment helps cricket grow. So we want to stay ahead in Test cricket, and that means people challenging you. David with England won in India, he’s come in for a year of Shield and has been a head coach, so we know he can step up into that role when required and he will.”We thought Justin Langer went very, very well in the West Indies [for the triangular ODI series] with a new group. We want to keep investing in coaching and coaching depth to strengthen the whole system. Rod and I have fantastic conversations and challenges. “You can imagine how different our views are sometimes. The same with Darren, the same with David Saker, and I’d have to say the state coaches. We have them up in May all around the table. I was in the room, so was Rod, so was Darren, and we want that challenging environment where we’re all trying to improve.

“For everything you implement, three go well and two go poorly. I am happy to change things that haven’t gone well. I’m absolutely free to admit there are things we’ve tried that haven’t worked”

“Introducing people like Saker, people like Darren, that stream of professional conflict is a way of challenging how we do things. Sometimes you come out of those meetings thinking, ‘You know what, we’re doing the right thing, let’s keep going’, or ‘Why don’t we try this.’ That to me is a really good way to do things. Not throw the baby out with the bath water all the time, but continue to grow and try things as you progress.”

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Howard is presently under contract until 2017, but is yet to receive the same two-year extension granted to Lehmann. Whether it is healthy to keep Howard on for any longer than his current term is a matter for conjecture, as is the question of whether, having had a change agent in place for half a decade, it is now time for CA to choose someone else with greater cricket pedigree to re-examine the fundamentals that have gone so badly awry in Sri Lanka, the UAE and India.”[We’ve been] No. 1 in two of the three formats, there’s been a World Cup, Ashes at home was comprehensive but the two Ashes away weren’t good enough,” Howard says. “What’s most disappointing for some people is, most of us believe we had the capability to win there. Playing well in the subcontinent and improving in those conditions is obviously a huge thing for us.”As we’ve seen, playing in different countries is hard, and we’ve got to adjust and adapt, and just because you see something on a video doesn’t mean you’re going to be able to translate that on the ground straight away. But over time, with as much lead-in as you can, multiple Tests as well, how people learn. We’ve got that India tour again coming up and we’re seeing we’ve got to continue to improve. It’s hard, and we know we’ve got to continue to grow.”While Australian cricket is much better aligned in 2016 than it was in 2011, Howard’s presence will always be a source of scepticism so long as results divert from the strongest possible. No matter how long he stays, he will always be seen by some in the disparaging terms Jones offered a little more than three years ago. How justified they are remains a matter for debate; more certain is the fact that Howard will keep arguing his corner.

The schedule for Sri Lanka’s tour of South Africa should work in the tourists’ favour, with the Port Elizabeth pitch likely to serve up an even contest

Firdose Moonda22-Dec-2016If there’s one thing South Africans know how to do properly, it is host. This country has staged everything from the world’s biggest single sport event – the football World Cup – to the world’s largest individually timed cycle race (the Argus), the world’s largest open water swim (the Midmar Mile), and the world’s biggest ultra-marathon (the Comrades). And those are just the big deals.Many more come here for the natural beauty, the wildlife and the winelands. So many that the tourism authority recently revealed that there have been a million more visitors to the country this year than last, with ten days of 2016 still to go. Among them are the Sri Lanka team, who will have just as much red-carpet treatment as anyone else.Their three-Test series begins in Port Elizabeth – the place known for being slow and low (or at least slower and lower than anywhere else in the country) – then moves to Cape Town, where spinners have often have had some say, before concluding in Johannesburg. A more cynical host may have wanted to flip those venues around and make the visitors uncomfortable at altitude, where they would also have had pace and bounce to deal with.That’s how the South Africa of the last few years used to do it. India’s 2010-11 tour began in Centurion; so did Sri Lanka’s the following summer, and both ended in innings victories for the home side. In 2012-13, Pakistan started at the Wanderers and ended at SuperSport Park. They lost both matches by big margins – 211 runs and an innings and 18 runs – as well as the one in between at Newlands, albeit by just four wickets.It’s a formula that works, especially against sides from the subcontinent, so South Africa would have been forgiven for simply copying this time it but they couldn’t. They have already played this season’s Centurion Test – against New Zealand in August – and they are determined to host the Boxing Day match on the coast, even as holiday-makers continue to prefer the beach to the bleachers. With Kingsmead’s match for this summer also done and the New Year’s Test the preserve of Newlands, Port Elizabeth was the only possibility – but that’s no bad thing.Instead of following the trend, indulged the world over, of preparing pitches that are stacked in the hosts’ favour, South Africa are favouring a more even bat-ball contest. That may not always sit well with the team camp but at least it levels the playing field.”We’ve been frustrated sometimes when we’ve felt that some of our wickets suit the opposition more than it suits us,” Russell Domingo, South Africa’s coach, said. “We’ve played on some wickets in Durban that have spun square against subcontinent sides and we’re thinking, ‘Jees, that’s not what we are looking for’. This time of year in South Africa, with the heat and the wind, it’s a dry time, wickets don’t always offer what we are really looking for, which brings the opposition into the game a lot more. In that context, wickets in South Africa are probably fairer to the contest than most venues around the world.”The last year has been particularly hot and dry as the country continues to recover from its worst drought on record and that has had an effect on cricket too. There are water restrictions in place in Port Elizabeth and, even though the ground uses a borehole for irrigation, the water table remains low. Groundsman Adrian Carter has been doing what he can to keep moisture in but he can’t control the drying wind, which is set to breeze in at speeds of 80kph on Saturday. The westerly tends to make the surface flatter and Carter hopes that will be offset by Monday’s easterly, which aids swing. He remains “pretty happy with how it looks at the moment”.A fairly thick grass covering will stay on even though, as Domingo explained, “that doesn’t often mean much” because “it’s more the cloud cover and the direction of the wind that does assist the bowlers”.Keeping the grass on, according to Domingo, helps provide an extra bit of pace and bounce but he is also expecting some turn, although Carter explained it won’t be emphatic: “We don’t get that sharp, fizzing turn here, it’s more likely to be slow turn. There will be something with the new ball, it will go around a bit but if it gets to day four and five, the spinners will come into it.”Dale Steyn’s reverse swing carried the day against Australia when South Africa last won at St George’s park•Associated PressSounds like the perfect conditions for a Test, which may be why South Africa’s record at the ground is almost as even as it comes. Overall, they have played 26 Tests at St George’s Park, won 10, lost 11 and drawn five. Since readmission, success has shifted slightly in their favour: post-1991, they have won six, lost four and drawn four, including their most recent one against West Indies in 2014. That match did not even get into a second innings for either side, a full day was lost to rain and there were several other interruptions. The forecast does not indicate anything similar this time.Interestingly, West Indies got the better of South Africa at the same venue in 2007, a nightmare year for St George’s Park. In January, South Africa lost to Pakistan there; in December, to West Indies. The ground did not host a Test for five years after that. Carter said he didn’t think the results had anything to do with that but the coincidence still raises the question.During that break, Carter and his team imported bully grass from SuperSport Park, to see if they could inject some life into their surfaces, but found it didn’t make much difference. Carter has accepted that Port Elizabeth is what it is and he is proud of it. “Every ground must have its own unique characteristics,” he said. “Of course, teams have to have home ground advantage and ours is a little different.”Instead of pace and bounce, the home side can benefit from reverse swing. You need only think back to Dale Steyn’s performance against Australia in 2014 for a reminder of what Domingo is looking forward to. “The ball tends to reverse here because of the abrasiveness of the wicket, which helps our seamers,” he said.Of course, there is no Steyn this time but South Africa have other options. Kyle Abbott and local lad Wayne Parnell – who may not make the XI – will be relishing the chance to play here. The batsmen, perhaps a little less so. They will have to display temperament and technique but Domingo is confident they are up for that. “It’s a wicket where you have got to be patient. You’ve got to grind out runs and that’s the strength of our side: we are able to withstand those periods,” he said.So the series is set to start with a test of will and a fairly warm welcome to Sri Lanka. They have never played a Test at St George’s Park and even if they don’t like the surface so much, they will definitely like the atmosphere. The brass band makes it as lively as the papare ones do back home and the strong support, although partisan, enjoy making new friends. All in all, it’s the gentlest start Sri Lanka could have wanted and the most hospitable one South Africa could have given.

Suranga Lakmal took a maiden five-wicket haul, and then settled down to watch Sri Lanka bat. We put ourselves in his shoes

Andrew Fidel Fernando in Port Elizabeth27-Dec-2016Ah well, this day couldn’t really have started any better, could it? What a morning. What a place.In the fourth over, Nuwan Pradeep gets Vernon Philander out with a bouncer. Perfect. Next over, I get a wicket and complete my first ever five-wicket haul. When we play at home, people keep saying my only job is to bowl until the ball is soft enough for Rangana Herath’s little hands to hold. There are entire sessions when my main job is to run into the huddle and give the spinners some good high fives.Not here. I like this place. When we came here, we didn’t even have to suffer the normal pre-series insults we get when we tour, like when Rodney Hogg called us “the worst attack to ever tour Australia”, or the time Michael Vaughan said we were “a glorified county attack”.Superb, we’ve got them all out for 286. Where are the jokesters now? Are they watching as I lead the team off the field? I’ve been dreaming of getting five wickets for Sri Lanka my whole life. Do they have an honours board here? I should get them to put my full name as a joke: Ranasinghe Arachchige Suranga Lakmal.Why not? I deserve it. This is the life.It’s time for a shower, but when I come out, what’s this? One wicket down already? He was out playing an attacking shot, wasn’t he? These opening fellows are supposed to knuckle down and protect the middle order, but every time I walk out of the shower, we are always 5 for 1 or 10 for 2. It’s like teenagers who get sent to their rooms to study, but when their parents walk in they are on the internet, with their pants on the ground, looking at bad websites. Never mind. Still nine batsmen to go.Now Kusal Perera has gone to bat. Why is he trying to whack the ball so much? This not a polygraph test, Kusal. Your career doesn’t hinge on you smashing it. Take it easy – I have bowled 27 overs and need some time to rest, no? Bloody hell, he’s out trying to cut a ball that pitched just outside off stump. I know he has been cleared of doping and all, but do the drug tests check for amphetamines? What about crack cocaine?Kusal Mendis is walking out now. Surely he’ll do something. No, he’s out driving at the ball as well. I mean, imagine if I got to bowl at these fellows. I’d get a five-wicket haul pretty much every over. What honours board? There would be small towns bearing my name.Ah, at last, Angelo Mathews and Dinesh Chandimal – you guys are the senior batsmen. Show us how it is done. I don’t have to tell you that it is good for us to bat time, since we want the pitch to wear enough to bring Rangana into the game, right? You don’t have to be told that leaving the ball and settling down will make things easier for the tail as well? Then how come, Angelo, you’ve hung your bat out and given a nick to second slip, while Chandimal has sent an edge to the keeper (but was dropped) as well?How can we teach you guys where your off stump is? Can I draw you a picture, so you know what to look for on the field? Should we go on a team expedition to locate it? Would it help if I dropped a google pin and sent you the GPS co-ordinates?Maybe it’s my fault. Maybe I should give more money to the poor, and adopt some street animals to get good karma, because, truly, I don’t know what I did in my past life to be born a Sri Lankan fast bowler. I must have been a terrible person. Maybe I committed genocide.Oh good. Now Chandimal is out. And he’s wasted our last review on a ball that was hitting pretty much the middle of middle stump. So it’s time for me to go put on the pads again.Why? What did I do to deserve this? How is this my life?

Rachael Heyhoe-Flint was a larger-than-life personality who was never afraid to take on cricket’s male establishment

Raf Nicholson18-Jan-20171:03

Women’s pioneer Heyhoe-Flint dies aged 77

There will be a women’s World Cup final at Lord’s this year thanks to Rachael Heyhoe-Flint. The sad thing is that she will not be there to see it.It was Heyhoe-Flint who first devised the idea of a world tournament, back in 1971. She stayed with millionaire Jack Hayward at his Sussex home during a weekend of women’s cricket at Eastbourne, and the two of them remained awake into the small hours, discussing how best to advance the cause of the women’s game. At that stage still small-scale and entirely amateur, with international tours limited by the empty coffers of the associations who paid to stage them, it was a sport clearly in need of a boost.Between them they dreamt up the scheme. Heyhoe-Flint somehow convinced Hayward that he should spend £40,000 on bringing the best players from all over the globe to England. Even men’s cricket had not yet conceived of the idea. It was big, brash and bold: Rachael to a T.Two years after that initial conversation, she hit a half-century in the final, at Edgbaston against Australia, and lifted the first ever World Cup trophy. It was, she said later, “a great bonus” for the women’s game. For her personally, it was also the pinnacle of a career in which she captained England for a decade, and went undefeated in Tests for the whole of her reign.Rachael Heyhoe-Flint, with the former England captain Charlotte Edwards alongside her•Getty ImagesShe was in so many ways a pioneer, on and off the pitch. It was she who hit the first ever six in women’s Test cricket, against Australia in 1963: a favourite stroke, which she famously described as “a hoick to leg”, also fondly known as the Heyhoe Heave-Ho. In 1976 at The Oval she batted tirelessly for eight and a half hours across the third and fourth days of the last Test, saving England from sure defeat in the game and the series. For eight years prior to her final international appearance, in 1982, she juggled cricket with the demands of motherhood, returning to competitive cricket within two months of giving birth to her son Ben in the summer of 1974.Interviewing many of her team-mates decades later, I had it confirmed to me that Heyhoe-Flint was a person who “got things done”. Between 1970 and 1975, she raised over £4000 for the women’s game (a staggering amount of money at that time), through fund-raising matches against men’s teams: throughout the season, she would take an England Women’s XI, made up of the top female cricketers in the country, to play against a men’s club side, who would guarantee a certain amount of money in return. She was famously involved in the 1963 match against an Old England XI in which Len Hutton declared that “women playing cricket was like a man trying to knit”. He evidently had never seen Heyhoe-Flint bat.For those who never had the pleasure of meeting her, it would be hard to capture Heyhoe-Flint’s personality in words. The first women’s cricket celebrity, she was unique, wonderfully charismatic and humorous: forever telling those who asked (many did) that, no, women did not wear boxes when they batted, but coconut shells.Her overwhelming force of personality and her ever-increasing profile were always used for the good of the women’s game. Prior to England’s 1968-69 tour of Australia and New Zealand, she personally negotiated the biggest sponsorship deal the women’s game had ever seen, worth over £500, with Marks & Spencer, who agreed to supply the official tour uniforms. Herself a freelance journalist, on that 1968-69 tour she would dash off at the end of an exhausting day in the field to produce copy, which was sent home and published in the Daily Telegraph.Perhaps the hallmark of Heyhoe-Flint’s life was that she was never afraid to take the most important people on. She lost the England captaincy in controversial circumstances in the summer of 1977, having, in her own words, failed to “endear myself to the […] establishment of women’s cricket”. After Lord’s refused to host the final of the 1973 World Cup, she stated publicly that she was toying with the idea of hauling them before the Equal Opportunities Commission.Heyhoe-Flint and Shelly Nitschke at the ICC Awards•Getty ImagesThis never came to pass: by August 1976, Heyhoe-Flint had become the first ever Englishwoman to captain a team at the ground. In fact, her head-on collision with the men’s cricket establishment did not come until two decades later, when, in 1991, she applied for membership of the MCC – still a bastion of masculinity – sparking in the process a wider campaign to force the club to let women in.The initial vote went overwhelmingly against her, but undeterred, she continued to press her case, gaining support from famous names including Tim Rice, Dennis Amiss and Brian Johnston. By the time the final vote took place, in September 1998, 70% of the members voted in favour, won by Heyhoe-Flint’s straightforward argument, outlined to me in an interview years later: “I’ve played cricket all my life, I got to the top, and I just wanted to become a member of this club”. Two decades on, the MCC is transformed. Even that in itself would be quite some legacy. Heyhoe-Flint’s, though, are myriad.It is perhaps ironic that someone who spent so much of her career on the wrong side of the establishment ended her days as a Conservative peer in the House of Lords, but Heyhoe-Flint was, after all, one of a kind. Going to interview her two summers ago for my PhD research, I was overwhelmed by her kindness: amidst a ridiculously busy schedule, she not only agreed to meet me, but took me for tea on the terrace at the House of Lords. It was obvious that she had remained a formidable personality, telling me her intentions to thoroughly scrutinise the government’s attempts to push through this, that and the other. We barely scratched the surface of all I wanted to discuss; there was just so much to ask her.She was vivacious and witty until the end. The last contact we had was just after Christmas, via email: I was writing a piece on her innings of 179 not out at The Oval in 1976, and she told me to “research if my name is up yet on the Honours Board for century makers. And if not, why not?!”Why not, indeed.

Delray Rawlins had already been capped by Bermuda at 15 but has now set his sights on a career with England – and he made an immediate impression

Nikhil Kalro in Mumbai31-Jan-2017England’s cricket system has long benefited from an influx of overseas talent, players with roots in South Africa, New Zealand, Ireland, Zimbabwe and even West Indies. Few, however, have emerged from Britain’s Overseas Territories.Bermuda, 3400 miles from the UK, was colonised in 1610, but had not produced a cricketer to make a mark with England (although David Hemp, who had a long county career with Glamorgan, was born on the island). Delray Rawlins, a lanky, sinewy 19-year-old allrounder, may be about to change that. “I had a dream that I wanted to play for England,” Rawlins said.Two months ago, Rawlins was turning out for Bermuda in World Cricket League Division Four. On Monday, he struck a match-winning hundred on his Under-19 debut for England.His journey began, aged nine, with Warwick Workmen’s junior program in Bermuda. Not long after, Rawlins was part of the Under-11 squad, a level at which cricket was played with plastic balls. “It was immediately noticed at training that Delray was special and he never played one match in the Under-11 age group,” Bermuda assistant coach and performance analyst Lorenzo Tucker said of Rawlins’ early progress. “He was moved to the Under-14 group, which played structured cricket. He played against boys five years older than he was. He hasn’t looked back since.”Rawlins continued to play at a level higher than his age. At 15, he had been capped for Bermuda, as well as claiming figures of 5 for 51 on his Under-19 debut. Initially selected as a bowler, he developed into a genuine allrounder, capable of batting in the top six in limited-overs cricket.Such was his reputation as a youngster that he was offered a scholarship at St Bede’s School in Eastbourne, East Sussex. After two years with Sussex’s 2nd XI while completing his education, Rawlins was recently offered his first contract.”At the age of 14, I came over and managed to get through the academy ranks and get a contract,” Rawlins said. “It was quite daunting, I wanted to further myself and see how far I can go.”Rawlins’ residency in England – St Bede’s is a boarding school – meant that he was able to complete the four-year qualification period that made him eligible for selection (the relationship between Bermuda and the UK meant he was already a British passport holder). Bermuda’s status as an ICC Associate Member allowed him to continue to play for his home country before switching allegiance to England.For now, Rawlins retains his eligibility to continue representing Bermuda – although that will change if he plays for England’s U-19s at an ICC event, or wins his first full cap.Rawlins was 15 when he took 5 for 51 on debut for Bermuda U-19s in 2013•Peter Della PennaDespite the incredible success in his early years, Rawlins was left staring at a fork in the road – continue playing for Bermuda, plausibly the best in the land but with scarce opportunity, or try his luck in a country with an abundance of resources, as well as a highly competitive first-class structure. If he hadn’t decided to make himself available for England, he would have likely have been part of the ICC Americas squad for the West Indies’ Regional Super 50 competition, rather than with the Under-19s in Mumbai.What for some may have been a gamble, for Rawlins was an investment in himself. “I want to commit my future to England, I want to be an England cricketer, hopefully play in the senior team. It wasn’t a tough decision. My parents were supportive and that was massive for me,” Rawlins said.A discernible factor in Rawlins’ belligerent debut hundred was his power. He clubbed five sixes at the Wankhede Stadium, with one even clearing the second tier, and was the only player from either side to come close to displaying the brute force that modern-day limited-overs cricket necessitates. “With youth players, we’re not going to be at the [modern hitting] level yet,” England captain Matthew Fisher said during the pre-series press conference. “We’re not as strong, we’re not going to hit it as far. We can’t think we can do that straight away, that’s playing with your ego.” It wasn’t ego that Rawlins exhibited, just talent.The arrival of several Kolpak signings in county cricket has caused a great stir in recent weeks but there have always been various routes into the English game for those born overseas. In Rawlins’ case, Bermuda’s loss looks like being England’s gain.

Only Cricket South Africa knows, and it needs to time its announcement in a way that impacts the national team minimally in a season of big assignments

Firdose Moonda18-May-2017Russell Domingo and all other interested applicants will “soon” find out how to put themselves in contention to become South Africa’s national head coach. Domingo, the incumbent, is contracted until the end of the England tour in August, and has not confirmed if he will reapply for his post. Instead, he has repeatedly directed questions to CSA’s board, who he said have yet to inform him of the process of reapplying.On Wednesday an insider told ESPNcricinfo they were expecting the board to “make an announcement very soon to explain what will happen” in terms of the application process. The source said the board was “still in the process of finalising some details” and confirmed that Domingo has not been informed of any developments yet. *On Thursday, after this article was first published, CSA revealed they had nominated a five-man panel to screen and recommend a new coach but did not say whether applications had opened or detail the exact process, but the search, it seems, has begun.All indications are that irrespective of the results on the tour, Domingo will not be offered an extension, primarily because CSA are compelled to advertise the post to prevent creating an expectation of permanence, because that will put them at risk of legal action should a termination occur. Domingo has already had his contract renewed three times since he was appointed mid-2013 and good corporate governance dictates that there should not be any further rollovers. That means that even if CSA is satisfied with Domingo’s performance and want him to continue in the job, they will have to follow formalities in order to keep him.While the suits keep their cards close to their chests, the players have thrown their support behind Domingo several times. After South Africa were booted out of a tri-series in the Caribbean last June and Domingo found himself under severe pressure, ODI captain AB de Villiers said he “felt Russell’s done a fantastic job”. Then, in October after South Africa whitewashed Australia 5-0 in an ODI series at home, Test and T20 captain Faf du Plessis gave Domingo “full credit” for the team’s improvement and said he had “stepped up his game”. And this March, after South Africa completed a successful summer with four Test series wins, Dean Elgar told the media both he and other players “would like to see Russell stay on” because “he still has a hell of a lot to offer the team”.When leaving for the UK on Tuesday, du Plessis again reiterated his backing of Domingo and said he did not see the tour as a chance to send Domingo off on a high but rather as a way to get some good results, so “we can carry on business as normal”. Earlier this month du Plessis revealed in an interview with magazine that he along with some of the other senior players, is considering retirement after the 2019 World Cup, and it appears that they would like Domingo to oversee them at that tournament.

Imagine if Domingo is told he will either not be considered for the post further or will have to go through a complicated reapplication process before the Champions Trophy begins, when expectations on South Africa will be growing. Or midway through the tournament, when that pressure will mount

Ultimately the decision over the coach is not up to the players but it would seem amiss for their bosses not to take their opinions into consideration. It may also seem strange that CSA has sent Domingo on what is one of his most important assignments with so much uncertainty swirling around him. Now that the board’s announcement has been made, it does not provide Domingo with the reassurance he needs ahead of a big tour.Over the next three months, Domingo will face several uncertainties, including speculation over who his successor will be. At some point he may be told he will not be considered for the post further or that he will have to go through a complicated reapplication process. Imagine if this happens in the next two weeks, before the Champions Trophy begins, when expectations on South Africa will be growing. Or midway through the tournament, when that pressure will mount. Or after it, when Domingo might possibly have made history by winning an ICC title, in which case it would seem a no-brainer not to retain him, or he would have suffered disappointment in another major tournament, which will surely result in calls for his head.Or what if Domingo learns something of his fate before the all-important Test series against England, in which South Africa can close the gap between themselves and India? They need to be at their best for that series, especially because it comes at the end of an unprecedentedly long 12-week tour, more especially because it could be interrupted by their captain du Plessis’ departure mid-tour for the birth of his first child, and most especially because they will be without de Villiers and Dale Steyn, who are on sabbatical and surgery recovery respectively. The last thing South Africa need at the same time is the distraction of not knowing who their next coach will be.And then imagine South Africa win that series, a third successive victory in England, only to be told Domingo will not be retained. Or if they lose the series and Domingo keeps his job anyway. Or if they lose the series and have to head into a home summer of ten Tests with a new coach, who will have a new path he wants to put them on. Or if they win the series and want to carry on following Domingo’s direction but have to accept someone else’s.And then there is also the question of the support staff. Domingo assembled a crew which comprises of an assistant coach, Adi Birrell; a bowling coach, Charl Langeveldt; a batting consultant, Neil McKenzie; and a spin bowling coach, Claude Henderson. Fitness trainer Greg King and a physiotherapist, Brandon Jackson, and team manager Mohammed Moosajee were involved before Domingo, but it is known that the contract of at least one of them, Moosajee, ends with Domingo’s. The rest of them expect to go if Domingo goes, since a new coach tends to want his own aides, and there will be concerns over how much they will be missed. All have made great strides with the current crop – Langeveldt’s work with developing bowling skills has been a particularly noteworthy aspect of the latter half of Domingo’s tenure. McKenzie, who only retired recently, has played with and against the batsmen under his wing and so has first-hand knowledge of them. Birrell and Henderson have also received praise for their roles.What if all that is lost to this South African team, who have found solid ground after the uncertainty that shook them two seasons ago?As they begin a tour that will be defining in many of their careers, there are too many what-ifs. The “soon” the board promised came as soon as the next day but it has not come as clearly as Domingo or even those after his job would have liked.10:44:49 GMT, May 18, 2017: *This article was updated to reflect CSA’s announcement on May 18 that a panel had been constituted to recommend a suitable candidate for the position of South Africa head coach

An increased allocation of resources in a short format allows teams to invest heavily in impact, albeit inconsistent, players that can break T20s open

Sidharth Monga20-Apr-2017Between the CPL last year and his 38-ball 77 against Gujarat Lions in Rajkot, Chris Gayle had an extended run of ordinary T20 form. Over three different franchise tournaments, in 17 innings, he scored just 329 runs at an average of 19.35 and a strike rate of 116.25. He went through a similar phase in the last World T20 in India, leading into the previous IPL. He scored 32 runs in eight matches in that period, never once reaching double figures, and still played in 13 out of 16 matches for Royal Challengers Bangalore.Murmurs outside the franchise gained momentum with every Gayle failure. People wondered if Gayle was done, but there was no chance Royal Challengers weren’t retaining him despite the year he had had. It was unlikely they were going to bench him for too long this IPL either. It says something about the impact Gayle can have when he comes off – 70s in three innings in under 40 balls – but it says much more about the T20 format. With six to seven batsmen available over 20 overs, teams can simply afford a misfiring batsman who can have the kind of impact Gayle has when he comes off.It is not limited to batsmen. Bipul Sharma is a tall left-arm spinner. He was born in 1983 in Amritsar, played some cricket for Punjab, then moved to Himachal Pradesh, and is an IPL champions medal holder. Since April 18 last year, he has played 10 matches for Sunrisers Hyderabad, including the last year’s final, but chances are, you would not have noticed him because he has bowled just 21 overs and batted only 39 balls.However, Bipul got the wicket of AB de Villiers in last year’s final, and was taken off immediately. He has got Brendon McCullum out twice. His batting, at No. 8, is a bonus. Out of his 10 matches, two have been against Royal Challengers, three against Gujarat Lions, and two against Kolkata Knight Riders. He has been the ultimate tactical pick. Sunrisers select him for specific match-ups against certain batsmen. They are also satisfied if those batsman get out early and Bipul ends up doing nothing. Only thrice has he bowled more than two overs in an innings despite an acceptable economy rate of 8.04 over this period.Sunrisers can afford Bipul for the same reason Royal Challengers can afford a misfiring Gayle. While you still need 11 fielders in the format, the duration of a 20-over match allows teams the luxury of carrying a player or two. It is usually batsmen, but the presence of Moises Henriques – a proper allrounder – in the Sunrisers XI opens up a bowling slot too.The IPL is filled with Gayle-like sporadic match-winners. Knight Riders invest in Yusuf Pathan and Suryakumar Yadav even though they hardly bowl and get only a few chances to bat. Even when their first-choice opener Chris Lynn is injured, they don’t all move up one spot; Knight Riders want them to be the fail-safe that provides the top order the freedom. They can afford to do so because they rarely need all their batsmen to contribute.Kieron Pollard had been struggling for form, but Mumbai’s persistence paid off when he struck a 47-ball 77 against Royal Challengers Bangalore•BCCIAt arguably the most successful IPL franchise, under the watch of arguably the most successful IPL captain, S Anirudha managed to get in 25 matches to face 153 balls and not bowl a single delivery. Chennai Super Kings won 18 of those 25 matches and lost six, a much better win-loss ratio than their overall 1.593. Unlike Bipul, Anirudha wasn’t even a tactical pick. Knowing MS Dhoni, he was probably just pushing the limits of the format. And The format allowed them to.Johnson Charles is an unadulterated slogger in T20s, who has had about nine special innings in his 98 T20s. One of those was in the semi-final of the World T20 last year, in a tournament that he didn’t do much outside that innings, apart from superb ground fielding. Yet such is the nature of the format that his selection was considered a success. Consistency is not as important in this format as impact. A team of six batsmen who come off once every six innings but score at a strike rate of 175-plus is likelier to do better than a team of six consistent batsmen, who score well every second innings but at a strike rate of close to 135. Gayle has already had more impact on this tournament than, say, Shikhar Dhawan, who has had a start in five of his six innings but has a strike rate of 120.58.Especially in a long league like the IPL, expect franchises – they can be ruthless when making selections – to give players like Gayle, Kieron Pollard and Yusuf more leeway than they would get in any other format. They are not paid big bucks for consistency but for impact. For example, a higher rate of Gayle’s half-centuries results in wins than, even, Virat Kohli’s: 68% to 62%. Three out of four Pollard fifties end up in wins. The big hitters might not succeed as often, but that doesn’t bother franchises because they don’t need to succeed as often. Their failures can be accommodated because there are only 20 overs to bat and only so many batsmen can fail in a given match.Even conservatively speaking, four batsmen, four bowlers and two allrounders are plenty for a 20-over match. If an innings comprised 40 three-ball overs or 30 four-ball overs, there would be merit in playing more bowlers, but not in this format. Currently, there is at least one surplus player in every team. For some teams that player is a batting fail-safe, for some he is a big hitter, and for others he is the floating bowler. It has resulted in longer ropes for T20 superstars such as Gayle, and careers for tactical picks such as Bipul.