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Late batter and coach was early champion and mentor who pushed for Root’s Test elevation

Matt Roller29-Aug-2024Joe Root dedicated his record-equalling 33rd Test hundred to Graham Thorpe, his long-term batting mentor who died this month aged 55. Root pointed to the skies after reaching three figures and paid tribute to Thorpe’s influence on his batting, saying he “definitely wouldn’t be where I am now” without him.”I’ve been very lucky to work with a lot of people, whether it be senior players, coaches, mentors, and Thorpey was one of those people that offered me so much,” Root said, after his 143 helped England pile on 358 for 7 against Sri Lanka at Lord’s.”It was nice to be able to think of him in that moment. He’s someone that I’m going to sorely miss. He put a lot into my game, into my career, and without his help I definitely wouldn’t be where I am now.”Thorpe, widely regarded as one of England’s best batters, took his own life earlier this month after what his family described as a battle with “major depression and anxiety”. He spent most of his post-playing career involved in the England set-up and was a prominent advocate for Root’s early elevation into the Test team, at the age of 21.”The first time I came across him was a second-team game at Stamford Bridge for Yorkshire against Surrey [in 2010],” Root recalled. “The following year, I made my way into the County Championship team and he was involved with the England Lions. Before I’d even made a hundred at first-class level, he picked me for a Lions game against Sri Lanka at Scarborough.Related

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“He saw something with me, and pushed hard for me to go away that winter and worked with him. We worked tirelessly on my game against spin – being able to get close to the ball, get away from it, utilising different sweeps – and also against pace… working very hard to make sure that those areas of the game which are different to county cricket, you are up to speed with.”Thorpe encouraged Root’s selection for England’s tour to India in 2012, where he made his debut in the drawn fourth Test in Nagpur which secured a 2-1 win. “From that point onwards, we worked together,” Root said. “He became England’s white-ball batting coach, and then obviously in the Test team as well. I worked so hard at a number of different things.”You’re always having to evolve as a player, and you need people that you can bounce ideas off, people that can take pressure off you in different ways, and know how to talk to you when things aren’t going well – and also when they are going well. I was very lucky to have someone like him… he was the one guy that was constant throughout that 10, 11, 12-year period.”I could go to him under pressure, and I have a really good understanding of my own game and it evolved into more: I became good friends, and I really enjoyed spending a lot of time with him. It was nice to pay a small tribute. It’s nothing, but he means a lot to me – and that was a small thank you.”

Smith felt like his dismissal was a turning point but believes Australia’s batters can adapt to the conditions in the upcoming games

Deivarayan Muthu09-Oct-2023Steven Smith has suggested that his dismissal, which triggered a collapse, denied Australia the chance to post a competitive total in their World Cup opener against India on a sharp turner at Chepauk on Sunday.Smith top-scored for Australia with 46 off 71 balls before Ravindra Jadeja landed one on middle and got it to rip away to hit the top of off stump. Australia went from 110 for 2 in 27 overs to 199 all out in 49.3 overs.”Yeah, perhaps [my dismissal was the turning point],” Smith said after Australia lost by six wickets. “I mean you never want to get out. We were trying to take it a little bit deeper, and it was obviously very challenging [on this pitch]. And it was going to be challenging for the guy coming in…We were just trying to take it a little bit deeper and unfortunately felt like I got a pretty good ball from Jadeja. Felt like I was back playing Test cricket. But to lose those wickets in a row probably cost us getting up to around 250.”Related

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Until he was knocked over by Jadeja, Smith felt that he was in good rhythm with the bat. After Smith had walked out to bat in the third over, following Mitchell Marsh’s dismissal for a duck, he accumulated steadily with David Warner in a 69-run second-wicket partnership in Chennai’s inhospitable heat.”I thought I was playing quite nicely,” Smith said. “It wasn’t a wicket where you can just go out and muscle it and have a high strike rate I suppose. We had to work our way through that scenario, and it was challenging. Felt like I was moving into the ball nicely and played a few nice drives off the fast bowlers and was working spin around. So, [I] felt good and unfortunately couldn’t go on to make a bigger one.”Smith scored five boundaries – all against pace – and trusted his defence against Jadeja, Kuldeep Yadav and R Ashwin in spin-friendly Chepauk. Hitting good-length balls against the turn was fraught with risk and loose balls never arrived. India’s spin trio had combined figures of 30-3-104-6.”From my point of view, it’s just [about] hitting the men in the deep as much as possible and get down to the other end, rotate the strike, and wait for loose balls and then try to put those away,” Smith said. “With those three quality bowlers, there wasn’t a great deal of loose balls coming, so yeah it was challenging. So, I was just looking to rotate the strike as much as possible around that middle period and that’s essentially it.”Australia are set to play their next eight group games in seven different venues, starting with back-to-back matches against South Africa and Sri Lanka in Lucknow. They had struggled to adapt to the conditions in Chepauk, but Smith is hopeful of Australia faring better on other pitches and peaking at the right time in the tournament.”I think we can learn a bit from this game, definitely,” Smith said. “We’ve talked as a group [about] playing according to the surface and maybe a nice partnership at that stage would’ve been good. If we were able to extend it a little bit longer and had one more partnership we could’ve posted a total that could’ve been defendable on that wicket if all things stayed the same, I suppose.”And then we might go to the next place [where] it might be flat and we might score 350 and play according to what that surface is. I think that’s the most important thing to do playing in these conditions. In tournament play, you don’t want to be peaking too early. You obviously got to do enough to make your way to the finals, but you want to play your best cricket in the end. So, hopefully we can turn it around and beat South Africa in a few days’ time.”

India fast bowler has been missing in action since the final of the ODI World Cup in November 2023

Nagraj Gollapudi23-Feb-2024India fast bowler Mohammed Shami is a doubtful starter for Gujarat Titans in IPL 2024. ESPNcricinfo has learnt that Shami is likely to undergo ankle surgery, potentially just before the tournament, which would rule him out of most if not all of it. The IPL will be played between March 22 and May 26 this year.Shami has not played any cricket since India’s defeat in the World Cup final against Australia on November 19. He had been nursing his ankle throughout that tournament, but still finished as its highest wicket-taker with 24 strikes.Should he be ruled out for any length of time, Titans will be going into the new campaign without two key players, having already seen Hardik Pandya move to Mumbai Indians. Shami was their highest wicket-taker in their title winning 2022 season, with 20 strikes in 16 matches, and he was the overall highest wicket-taker last year with 28 strikes in 17 matches.Shami had been taking injections to treat his ankle during the World Cup and continued to do so even after the tournament. While he was not named in India’s white-ball squads for the tour of South Africa that followed, Shami was expected to return for the two-match Test series. But, on December 16, in the only medical update provided on the senior fast bowler, the BCCI said Shami’s “participation” in the South Africa Test series had been “subject to fitness” and since he “has not been cleared” by the BCCI medical staff, he was ruled out of contention.Early in January, Shami said he had “stiffness” in the ankle but he was hoping he would be ready for selection for the home Tests against England. “My rehabilitation is well on track and the medical experts at NCA are happy with my progress,” he told the . “There is slight stiffness in my ankle but that’s fine. I have started my training sessions and I believe I will be able to make a comeback in the England series.”However, Shami did not feature in either of the India squads put out by the Ajit Agarkar-led panel, initially for the first two Tests against England and recently for the final three Tests of the series.On January 22, Shami was in Hyderabad at the BCCI awards following which he reportedly travelled overseas to consult specialists about his ankle. It is understood that he will be visiting a surgeon next week before taking a final call on the matter.While the BCCI’s medical team has been monitoring Shami, he has not been at the National Cricket Academy in Bengaluru, which is where contracted cricketers normally do their rehab. It could not be confirmed whether the BCCI or Shami had kept Titans in the loop on his recovery timeline. Neither the BCCI nor Titans have made any public statements about him recently.

“They are allowed to have some bad games here and there,” the India captain said of the two spinners

Deivarayan Muthu26-Oct-20241:51

How did Santner succeed when Jadeja struggled?

India are unfazed by the recent form of their senior spinners R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja, their captain Rohit Sharma has said. On a slow, dry Pune pitch, India’s spin trio, which included Washington Sundar, was outbowled by New Zealand’s as India suffered their first Test series defeat at home since 2012.”I mean, see look, there is too much expectation on those two guys,” Rohit said of Ashwin and Jadeja. “Every game they play, they are expected to take wickets, they are expected to run through the team, and they are expected to win Test matches for us. I don’t think that’s fair, it’s the responsibility of all of us to make sure that we get Test match wins, not just the two guys.”After having conceded 94 runs in 16 overs for just one wicket in the second innings in Bengaluru – his worst figures, in terms of economy rate, in a Test innings where he has bowled at least ten overs – Ashwin went at almost four runs an over in the third innings in Pune. He had started well in the second Test by turning his fifth ball and having Tom Latham lbw for 15 in the eighth over. However, when the New Zealand batters brought out a variety of sweeps, Ashwin struggled to provide India with the control that he is usually known for, especially in these conditions.Related

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Jadeja also struggled to counter New Zealand’s aggressive approach. Despite India posting a short third and deep point, Devon Conway, for instance, kept sweeping and reverse-sweeping with attacking enterprise. Such shots not only messed with the lines and lengths of the senior spinners but also the fields that Rohit had set.At various stages, the India captain was forced into having extra protection on the boundary. Jadeja ended up with just three wickets in 37.4 overs across both innings – two fewer than Ashwin’s match haul of five wickets. In contrast, Mitchell Santner, the New Zealand left-arm fingerspinner, came away with 13 for 157, the third-best figures by any visiting bowler in India.Rohit refused to read too much into these numbers and said it was natural for even Ashwin and Jadeja to have off days.”Of course, by their standards, they know where they stand and what they haven’t been able to do or what they haven’t done really well,” Rohit said. “But again, both of them have played so much cricket here and have such huge contributions to our success of having that home streak of 18 series [wins]. These two have played a major role in that. A couple of series, I am not going to look into too much, especially with those two guys.Ravindra Jadeja took three wickets in the second Test•AFP/Getty Images

“They know exactly what happens and sometimes they are allowed to have some bad games here and there and not go by that expectation that this is the opportunity for me to take wickets and run through the opposition. That’s not going to happen every time. So you got to be ready with the other guys also to step in.”Rohit was also against putting too much pressure on Ashwin and Jadeja and called for the responsibility to be shared among the other spinners.”Like we keep talking about with the batters it is not the responsibility of a few individuals, it is the collective batting unit that needs to come together,” Rohit said. “So it’s the same with the bowling unit as well. If Ash doesn’t do well, it’s Jadeja who needs to come to the party or Washy [Washington Sundar] or Kuldeep [Yadav] or Axar [Patel], those guys.”Washington did step up in the first innings in Pune, marking a serendipitous return to Test cricket after three-and-a-half years with career-best figures of 7 for 59. He took four more wickets in the third innings, which perhaps influenced his selection for the upcoming Test series in Australia.”Washy had a great game, I am really proud of that,” Rohit said. “He is proud of that and we are happy with his performance. He bowled so well.”

Pakistan will now play Sri Lanka on October 10 instead of October 12, to have enough of a gap before the match against India

ESPNcricinfo staff02-Aug-2023The India-Pakistan game at the 2023 ODI World Cup will now be played on October 14 rather than the scheduled date of October 15 as released in the original ICC schedule. Though the ICC is yet to release a revised schedule, which is expected by the end of this week, ESPNcricinfo understands the PCB has agreed to the change. The match will still be played in Ahmedabad.The date change for the World Cup’s biggest clash has an impact on Pakistan’s preceding fixture, against Sri Lanka in Hyderabad. The venue remains the same but the game will now be played on October 10 instead of October 12, allowing Pakistan a sufficient gap between the two matches.The need for a change in the schedule reportedly arose because the original date for the India-Pakistan fixture was also the first day of the Hindu festival of Navaratri and local police were concerned that it would be difficult to provide adequate security on the day. The ICC wrote to the PCB a few days ago about the changes and the PCB agreed.Related

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BCCI secretary Jay Shah, however, had said the clash with Navaratri wasn’t the reason for the change. He said last week that several Full Member countries had requested changes to the World Cup schedule and that several tweaks would be made.The change of the India-Pakistan date will almost certainly have an impact on other games and teams. October 14 is already a double-header, featuring games between Bangladesh and New Zealand in Chennai and Afghanistan and England in Delhi. The latter game is likely to be affected, potentially played a day earlier (October 13).The changes to the schedule, two months away from the ODI World Cup, come after the original schedule was already extremely delayed. It was finally released by the BCCI and the ICC at the end of June just 100 days before the start of the tournament. In comparison, the fixtures for the 2019 World Cup in England and Wales and the 2015 World Cup in Australia and New Zealand were released more than 12 months in advance.The tournament is scheduled to begin on October 5, with reigning champions England taking on New Zealand in Ahmedabad, but the ICC and the BCCI have also not yet announced when match tickets will go on sale.

Highlights from Day 3 of the sixth round of Ranji Trophy matches

Shashank Kishore25-Jan-2025J&K beat Mumbai after 11 years
Eleven years after they first beat them in the Ranji Trophy, Jammu & Kashmir pulled off another heist against Mumbai to strengthen their knockouts hope. Chasing 205, they wobbled at different times with Shams Mulani picking up four wickets, but starts from each of the top five helped J&K win by five wickets. Opener Shubham Khajuria top-scored with 45, while Abid Mushtaq, who had minimal contribution with the ball, hitting a crucial 32 not out to seal victory.Gill century in vain as Karnataka stay aliveShubman Gill struck a combative 102, but couldn’t prevent Karnataka from running through Punjab for a second time in three days. After being bowled out for 55, Punjab batted out a little more time in the second dig to make 213, but still went down by an innings and 207 runs. Outside of Gill’s innings, the second highest from the top seven was Anmolpreet Singh’s 14. The bulk of the damage was done by young seam-bowling allrounder Yashovardhan Parantap, who picked up 3 for 37.Related

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• Rahane lauds J&K seamers, admits he misread the conditions

Patidar, Venkatesh Iyer put Madhya Pradesh on topHaving conceded the first-innings lead, Madhya Pradesh responded strongly in the second innings, declaring on 369 for 8 to set Kerala a target of 363. Rajat Patidar top scored with 92, while Venkatesh Iyer hit an unbeaten 70-ball 80 at No. 8 as MP recovered from 247 for 6. MP picked up one wicket by stumps to keep themselves in line for an outright win.Vijay Shankar scored a century•PTI

Vijay Shankar century powers Tamil NaduIn Salem, Vijay Shankar’s 14th first-class century, his second of the season, helped Tamil Nadu put themselves in line for six points against Chandigarh. Having taken a 97-run lead, Vijay Shankar helped extend TN’s lead with an unbeaten 150 after N Jagadeesan set the foundation of the innings with 89. By stumps, Chandigarh had slumped to 113 for 5, still needing 290 with the left-arm spinning duo of S Ajith Ram and R Sai Kishore picking up two apiece.Gaikwad among the runsBatting at No. 4 with an eye on being a top-order batter, instead of just playing a specialist opener, Maharashtra captain Ruturaj Gaikwad hit 89 in a marathon Maharashtra innings – they were 464 for 7 in the second innings, extending their lead to 616 by stumps against Group C toppers Baroda. This is only the third game Gaikwad has featured in this season, as he was away during the first half of the tournament to play for India A in Australia. With them out of knockouts contention, it remains to be seen if Maharashtra declare overnight and try for an outright.Wadkar leads Vidarbha’s fightVidarbha captain Akshay Wadkar hit an unbeaten 102 to revive a floundering innings. Vidarbha, who conceded a lead of 100, went to stumps with a lead of 258 with three wickets still remaining. At one stage, they had effectively been reduced to 44 for 5, before Wadkar stood tall to play a typically gritty knock to help last year’s runners-up take the fight into the final day. Vidarbha are currently Group B toppers and are primed to Mae the knockouts.Haryana through to knockoutsA game that was fought on an even keel in the first innings turned decisively in Haryana’s favour thanks to a massive second-innings batting effort, led by half-centuries from Himanshu Rana and Nishant Sindhu as they opened up a 32-run lead into a 369-run target. Bengal, sans the injured Abhimanyu Easwaran, were bowled out for 85 in 21.4 overs, with Wriddhiman Saha, playing in his penultimate first-class match, unbeaten on 25. Anshul Kamboj, who earlier in the season picked up a perfect ten, finished with four wickets./

Pakistan were hurt by dot balls while batting and in managing the fifth-bowling options while bowling

Danyal Rasool10-Aug-2025West Indies overcame Pakistan’s spinners as well as the weather to power home by five wickets to level the ODI series 1-1. In a chase which ebbed and flowed, a blitz from Sherfane Rutherford and a controlled innings at the death by Roston Chase saw them home with ten balls to spare.Their task was made significantly harder than it might have been when Jayden Seales’ standout fast-bowling performance had restricted Pakistan to 171 for 7 in 37 overs. The target was slightly upwards (181 in 35 overs) of what was scored owing to multiple rain delays in the first innings.Pakistan were put in to bat first and played stodgy cricket inconsistent with the decade they were playing in. Abdullah Shafique and Saim Ayub found the occasional powerplay boundary but interspersed it with strings of dot deliveries; the first ten overs had just five singles taken. When Seales’ extra pace and Shai Hope’s canny field placement extracted an outside edge from Ayub in the ninth over, it was the ninth successive ball the left-hand batter had faced that had not produced a run.Mohammad Rizwan couldn’t make up for a slow start•AFP/Getty Images

Three balls later, Babar Azam was cleaned up by a Seales special that burst through the gate and made a mess of his stumps, and put West Indies firmly on top.It brought Mohammad Rizwan out, but he appeared to have left positivity behind in the dressing room – he scored just 4 off his first 23 deliveries. A shower that delayed play by 90 minutes did not help Pakistan find their rhythm. Jediah Blades took his maiden ODI wicket by drawing an edge from Shafique that ended his battle of an innings the over after play resumed.As run-scoring increasingly became a struggle, West Indies’ bowlers – spinners and seamers alike – kept making inroads. Gudakesh Motie trapped the Pakistan captain in front. Chase got a ball to keep low and produce an under edge off Hussain Talat’s bat to conclude his comparatively brighter innings. Salman Agha struggled to see any scoring area beside the little dab to deep third, and when Shamar Joseph surprised him with the straighter bouncer, a top edge sent him packing.Multiple rain breaks curtailed Pakistan’s innings•AFP/Getty Images

A further rain delay truncated the game to Pakistan’s benefit with the innings winding down, allowing Hasan Nawaz to go for broke in what became seven death overs. Cruelly for Pakistan, though, that stubborn cloud unloaded its contents upon the Brian Lara Stadium once more just as he had begun to get going. That little passage of play saw 32 scored in 3.1 overs, but Pakistan were denied a big finish with their final three overs wiped out.West Indies were set an entirely manageable target, though Hasan Ali’s opening salvo soon cast that expectation into jeopardy. Wickets in each of his first two overs sent the openers back, and the hosts found themselves stuck in the same mire that had dogged Pakistan. Rizwan, sensing an opportunity to strangle, brought the spinners on after six overs, with Mohammad Nawaz and Abrar Ahmed producing the desired results.The scoring rate briefly slowed to a trickle, particularly as far as Keacy Carty was concerned. His first 26 balls produced just three singles, piling the pressure on his captain at the other end. An intriguing plot point concerned Pakistan’s fifth bowling option; the one over Ayub had bowled leaked 10, and another from Salman shed another 11.Sherfane Rutherford took Shaheen Afridi down in the 17th over•AFP/Getty Images

With a newly arrived Rutherford at the crease and the asking rate over six, Rizwan made the fateful decision of turning to Shaheen Afridi, and the batter picked his moment. Two fours and a six saw him plunder 17 that over, and with Rizwan turning immediately to the part-timer Salman, another 20 were lopped off the target.It bought West Indies the cushion to see off the primary spinners Abrar and Mohammad Nawaz more respectfully, but the pair wasn’t content with containment. Nawaz found extra turn to have Hope stumped before, in what felt like a game-turning moment, he induced Rutherford into a smear that found square leg. It was part of an eight-over period that saw just 17 scored, but just as significantly, Pakistan had bowled out Nawaz.Chase slapped a couple of sixes the following Ayub over to wrench the asking rate below six once more, and it was there that it would stay for the rest of the game.The returning fast bowlers never packed the same threat, and West Indies began to milk them in addition to finding the odd boundary that took the game further out of the visitors’ reach. Justin Greaves had looked uncertain against the turn, but was impressively assured now, a wristy flick over mid-on for six off Hasan perhaps the shot of the innings. By now, the equation was purely mathematical, With Chase’s crisp drive through the off side sealing a topsy-turvy win on a day that promised each outcome at certain points, before settling on the one the Trinidad crowd had come to witness.

Aryansh’s 60 off 43 kept UAE in the hunt before they lost five wickets for 21 runs and fell short

Deivarayan Muthu17-Aug-2023
Tim Seifert’s explosive fifty and Tim Southee’s crafty five-wicket haul helped New Zealand scrap to victory in the T20I series opener against UAE in Dubai. Cameos from Rachin Ravindra and Cole McConchie were also vital to New Zealand’s win on a tricky, two-paced track.Returning to the scene of the T20 World Cup final in 2021, when Seifert filled in for the injured Devon Conway, Seifert staked his claim for regular selection with a 30-ball half-century. UAE’s offspin-bowling allrounders Basil Hameed and Mohammed Faraazuddin then triggered a middle-overs meltdown, but late blows from Ravindra and McConchie hauled New Zealand past 150.Eighteen-year-old Aryansh Sharma marked his T20I debut with a sparkling half-century and kept UAE in the hunt until Jimmy Neesham had him holing out in the 15th over. His dismissal left UAE needing 41 off 30 balls with four wickets in hand. But Southee and co put it beyond their reach and bowled them out for 136.

Seifert goes bam

Seifert’s ability to club the ball had earned him a nickname – Bam Bam – inspired, of all things, . Seifert has drifted away from New Zealand’s first-choice XI in the recent past, but he has now put himself back in the spotlight with runs around the world.Last month, he finished the Zim Afro T10 league as the tournament’s second-highest scorer. He then hit three fifties in the LPL and added another to his CV in Dubai on Thursday. He was responsible for 47 of the 51 runs New Zealand had scored in the powerplay on a challenging pitch.He pumped Junaid Siddique and Aayan Khan over mid-off and then whipped Ali Naseer over square leg. UAE’s bowlers kept bowling slower balls into the pitch, but Seifert kept manufacturing enough pace for himself. Hameed cut his innings short at 55 when he had him splicing a reverse-sweep to point. He then cleaned up Mitchell Santner in the same over to drag UAE back into the game.

McConchie, Ravindra put NZ back on track

After the powerplay, New Zealand went seven overs without a boundary. Neesham then struck back-to-back fours against Hameed and when he went for another one against Siddique, he was caught at deep square leg.McConchie and Ravindra then forged an unbroken 46-run seven-wicket partnership off just 28 balls to give the innings a leg-up. Ravindra lined up Zahoor, taking him for 11 off six balls, including a drilled four down the ground. Hitting across the line was particularly difficult on this track, so the pair focussed on finding boundaries in the ‘V’.Aryansh Sharma score 60 off 43 balls•Emirates Cricket Board

Aryansh shows promise

That UAE made a decent fist of the chase was down to Aryansh’s knock. He scored ten boundaries during his 60 off 43 balls. Overall, New Zealand had scored only ten boundaries during their entire innings, but they still found a way to win.Until recently Aryansh was only Vriitya Aravind’s understudy, but in the first T20I against New Zealand, he was their main man, punching and driving with panache. He smashed left-arm quick Ben Lister for three successive fours before treating Kyle Jamieson in similar fashion. Neesham then snagged him to wrestle back the momentum for New Zealand.

Santner and Southee stifle UAE

Santner had given up ten runs in his first over in the powerplay, but he bounced back to concede only 12 from his remaining three while also picking up the wickets of Asif Khan and Ali Naseer.When Asif lobbed one in the air, it seemed destined to fall safely until Santner threw himself to his right and pulled off a stunning one-handed catch, in front of the non-striker. Then, in the 17th over, he trapped Naseer in front to hasten New Zealand’s victory.After making early inroads with the new ball, Southee was just as effective with the old, regularly digging cutters into the pitch. He took care of the UAE lower order along with Santner and Jamieson. Southee is now just two wickets away from surpassing Shakib Al Hasan as the highest wicket-taker in T20Is.

The former batting star’s role with the state had been announced before the season

AAP and ESPNcricinfo staff03-Nov-2023Australian ODI great Michael Bevan’s appointment as a coaching consultant for struggling New South Wales is over before it began.The former Blues great revealed he is yet to be brought into the state set-up this season as their winless Sheffield Shield streak extended to 15 with a thumping defeat to Victoria last Sunday.”It was announced pre season that I would be working with @CricketNSW as a batting consultant  – to date, this hasn’t happened,” Bevan posted on X, formerly Twitter, on Thursday.Related

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“Given the timing, I feel it is important that the current coaches are afforded every opportunity to stamp their quality and be allowed to guide cricket nsw back to a position of strength within @CricketAus.”Unfortunately this means, this year they won’t be receiving the magical bevo “finishing” methodolgy (sic). Maybe next year.”Cricket NSW trumpeted Bevan’s position in September following the embarrassment of the state’s first winless Sheffield Shield season since 1938-39.

New South Wales’ struggles

Victoria, MCG: lost by 205 runs
South Australia, Adelaide Oval: lost by 186 runs
Queensland, Cricket Central: match drawn
South Australia, Karen Rolton Oval: match drawn
Victoria, Albury: lost by 10 wickets
Queensland, Gabba: lost by five wickets
Tasmania, SCG: match drawn
Victoria, Junction Oval: lost by 69 runs
Western Australia, SCG: lost by 133 runs
Tasmania, Hobart: match drawn
South Australia, Wollongong: match drawn
Queensland, Drummoyne Oval: match drawn
Western Australia, WACA: lost by eight wickets
South Australia, Adelaide Oval: lost by five wickets
Western Australia, Bankstown: match drawn

The 53-year-old, and fellow Australia white-ball great Shane Watson, were announced as consultants to coach Greg Shipperd, who himself was rushed into the top job midway through last summer after the axing of Phil Jaques.Bevan was supposed to be acting as a batting coach, while Watson, who has been commentating in India during the World Cup, was given the role of mentoring and mindset coaching for players.In a statement, Cricket NSW said: “Earlier this year, Cricket NSW announced that former great Michael Bevan would begin work as a consultant, working as a batting coach with the NSW Blues squad.”Unfortunately, Cricket NSW and Bevan were unable to come to a timely agreement on commencing work with the Blues. Cricket NSW values and acknowledges the experience and skillset that Michael Bevan can bring and look forward to the potential of working with him in the future.”During a 50-over career for Australia spanning 10 years, Bevan averaged 53.58 – the seventh-highest ODI average in history – across 232 games. He scored 19,147 first-class runs, the majority of them for NSW.

Zimbabwe determined to turn around heartbreak of previous Qualifier

Firdose Moonda24-Apr-2024Josephine Nkomo arrived at the crease with Zimbabwe’s hopes in her hands.It was the 16th over of their 2023 T20 World Cup Qualifier semi-final against Ireland. Zimbabwe were chasing 138 and were 99 for 4. Needing 39 runs in 29 balls, the pressure was building.They lost two wickets in the next 14 balls and only scored nine runs. If they were going to get over the line, Nkomo would have to take them there.She took two runs off the next ball and hit the one after that for four which made the equation 24 from 12 balls. Tough but not impossible. Nkomo found another four off the last ball of the 19th over which meant they needed 15 runs off the final six balls and she was not on strike. Her partner, Precious Marange, scored seven off the first four balls before Nkomo watched a wide and snuck one, leaving Marange to hit six off the last ball to secure victory.It didn’t happen.Zimbabwe missed out on a first World Cup appearance by a margin of only four runs.”What I remember is terrible, absolute loss,” Nkomo told ESPNcricinfo’s Powerplay podcast. “I really thought we could get over the line. It was heartbreaking. I remember watching from the other end and there was nothing that I could do at that time. I was heartbroken. I was just shattered. And I also thought for my team-mates after all the effort, getting so close and not getting over the line. I felt that maybe if you don’t even get to the semi-finals, the heartbreak is much better than when you’re so close but you don’t get over the line. So I wouldn’t want to experience that again.”