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Adam Gilchrist, Australia’s most successful one-day opening batsman, is expected to be demoted to No. 7 when he returns to the side from a short holiday next week. The reports Trevor Hohns’ selection panel, which wants a stable combination before next year’s World Cup, has decided on the move after Gilchrist’s disappointing returns this summer.Gilchrist was slotted in at the top of the order on a Steve Waugh hunch in 1997-98 and since then he has blasted 7147 runs in 201 matches. However, he has struggled after the three Super Series games and scored only 24 runs in his past five matches, including a first-ball duck in Sunday’s loss to South Africa. However, Hohns said on Sydney radio he had no plans to shuffle Gilchrist down the line-up, and Ricky Ponting defended his team-mate.Brad Haddin will replace the resting Gilchirst when Australia face South Africa in Melbourne on Friday and Sri Lanka in Sydney on Sunday. The paper reported the selectors were keen to ease Gilchrist’s load and ensure stronger starts from the opening pair than during the VB and Chappell-Hadlee series. The candidates for Gilchrist’s opening spot alongside Simon Katich, who will miss Friday’s game against South Africa with a groin injury, include Michael Clarke, Damien Martyn and Michael Hussey. Martyn was given the first chance to cement a spot when he was named alongside Phil Jaques for the clash at the Telstra Dome.Another opener in need of runs is Graeme Smith, the South Africa captain who has not posted an international half-century on the tour. Smith, who was unlucky to be given out lbw for 3 in Tuesday’s loss to Sri Lanka, said it was important for the senior players to make contributions after the tour-ending injuries of Kallis, Nel and Ntini.”We’ve got a lot of young guys around and the guys who have been around for a little bit need to take a lot more weight on their shoulders,” he said in . “That includes me. It’s important for me to stand up and get performances.”

Gladstone Dainty, the president of the USA Cricket Association (USACA), has denied making a number of comments attributed to him in the media about the relationship between the ICC and the USACA.Following a letter from the ICC seeking clarification from Dainty on comments attributed to him, Dainty insisted the remarks were inaccurate and did not accurately reflect his views."I would like to make it perfectly clear that USACA board of directors and its executive officers unreservedly recognise the ICC as its parent organisation," he said. "It would be extremely silly not to want to do business with the ICC especially when it is for our benefit. Every member of the USACA board and executive committee are excited and looking forward to working with the ICC. We will not be distracted by any party whose interests are questionable."Dainty denied specific comments attributed to him in the media reports. He wrote: "I am not in a position to nor did I ever characterise the ICC’s position as unreasonable. I never attributed the leaking of any documents to the ICC … as a matter of fact I contacted a private attorney to seek assistance in determining who was leaking this information."I vehemently deny any statement attributed to me that speaks of any `lynching’. I see it as being counter-productive to our efforts to move Project USA forward. If I indeed felt that way I would never consider being part of such a diverse organisation as USACA. I am absolutely disgusted that such a statement has been published as one that I made."Dainty colcluded by saying that he would address the matter directly with the journalist that wrote the original article.

Leicestershire have announced that Garnett Kruger will join Brad Hodge as their second overseas player for the 2004 season.Kruger, a 26-year-old fast bowler who plays for Gauteng, is on the verge of the South African side. He was in the squad for the first Test against West Indies at Johannesburg last week, but didn’t make the starting XI.Kruger moved from Eastern Province during the close season, and has taken 141 first-class wickets at an average of 29.90.But it wasn’t all good news for Leicestershire, as it was also revealed that Luke Wright, an England Under-19 allrounder, had decided to leave the county.

A marathon innings of 75 from 276 balls by Joseph Yovich dominated the first day’s play between Northern Districts and Central Districts at WestpacTrust Park, Hamilton.However, the loss of three wickets in the last hour left CD ahead on points on a day which never got above second gear.It finished with ND 221/6, having won the toss.The pitch offered some movement early on, but with good pace and reliable bounce it is a good batting surface on which a first innings par score should be at least 300.In their last home State Championship game, lost to Wellington by one wicket, ND surrendered so many easy wickets that a white flag could have been flown over the changing room. Hence the emphasis on survival today.James Marshall and Matthew Hart weathered the new ball well, putting on 46 for the first wicket before Hart was caught by Mathew Sinclair at third slip off Lance Hamilton for 13.The appearance of Yovich at No 3 was a surprise. He had scored only 127 runs at 18.14 in this season’s State Championship before today. A resolute 51 not out against Auckland in the last round prompted ND to give him a chance higher up the order.Yovich scored 11 fours, but needs to develop the ability to move the score along with ones and twos in order to take the initiative away from the bowlers.Late in the day, CD were convinced that Yovich had been caught behind, but umpire Peter Wright ruled that the ball had come off the pad. That was the nearest Yovich came to losing his wicket in a remarkable display of concentration that met the terms of his job description completely.With Marshall, Yovich put on 67 for the second wicket. Marshall fell lbw to give Andrew Schwass his 31st wicket of the season.Michael Parlane would have been the man to increase the tempo from the other end while Yovich dug in, but he holed out to deep mid on for 13 off Glen Sulzberger.Hamish Marshall joined Yovich for a fourth wicket partnership of 72, but took the same attritional approach to batting.The off spinners Sulzberger and Campbell Furlong bowled a long spell in tandem, conceding less than two an over without looking threatening. Neither batsmen attempted to disrupt line and length by using their feet.With less than an hour to go it seemed that a secure platform had been built, ready for acceleration tomorrow, but everything changed when Hamilton returned with the new ball.The left-armer took three wickets for 10 runs in a six-over spell, finishing the day with four for 64 from 20 overs.Hamish Marshall was first to go, caught at third slip by Ben Smith for an 83-ball 35. Scott Styris followed, caught at third slip by Sinclair for four.Furlong completed the trio of slip catches, taking Grant Bradburn at the second attempt before the batsman had scored.Hamilton swung the ball and maintained an attacking length. Michael Mason also bowled well, at least a quarter of the 33 runs scored off his 20 overs coming off the edge. He was unlucky to finish wicketless.It is vital for ND that Yovich stays there to reach his maiden first-class hundred tomorrow and that the ND tail supports him well. Durability is an asset, but not an end in itself.The day was marked by the announcement that Simon Doull will be unavailable for selection for the rest of the season. Though he has not ruled out a return to one-day cricket next season, the tone of the press release suggested that this was the end of a most distinguished career for one of ND’s most loyal and effective players.A Doull cameo with the bat would have enlivened today’s proceedings no end.

England’s middle-order mainstay, Graham Thorpe, will not return to the one-day side at least until the final NatWest Series qualifying match against Australia at The Oval on June 21.The Surrey left-hander has been ruled out for a further week after failing to recover from calf trouble.He has so far missed all three of England’s one-day defeats after sustaining the injury in the warm-up to the opening game against Pakistan at Edgbaston last Thursday.It had been hoped that Thorpe would recover in time to face Australia intomorrow’s day-night match at Old Trafford, but with half an eye on the Ashes series England will not want to take any risks with him.If England fail to win tomorrow they will already have been ruled out of the June 23 final at Lord’s.

A second Australian women’s cricketer has been caught out betting on the game this summer, with Western Australia’s Piepa Cleary suspended for six months by Cricket Australia for placing bets on the day-night Test in Adelaide last November.Cleary, 19, placed six bets totalling $15.50 on various elements of the match between Australia and New Zealand, and like the previous transgressor, Angela Reakes, has been handed a suspended two-year ban.However, in this case, the CA head of integrity Iain Roy chose to activate the first six months of that ban due to several “aggravating circumstances” including the fact that Cleary had made the bets two months after being present at a face-to-face anti-corruption training session from CA head of security Sean Carroll.”We continue to remind all elite cricketers and officials that betting on any form of cricket is strictly prohibited,” Roy said. “It is outlined in the anti-corruption education that we deliver annually, and is written into our anti-corruption code.”Piepa has heard this message many times through the anti-corruption education sessions that we deliver and accepts that in placing the bets she exercised poor judgement. Bets totalling $15.50 might seem small but it doesn’t matter.”We take a zero-tolerance approach to any form of gambling on cricket by players in order to protect the integrity of the game. It has been made very clear that if Piepa breaches the code in any way again, she will receive a significantly lengthier suspension.”Christina Matthews, chief executive of the Western Australian Cricket Association (WACA), expressed her disappointment at Cleary’s actions. “We are naturally disappointed that one of our players has been involved in an incident such as this,” she said. “Cricket in this country is held in high regard for its integrity and it is important for the future of the sport that remains the case. The WACA understands and supports the sanctions that have been handed down in this instance.”Piepa will have to work hard to regain some respect from this incident, but she remains an important member of WA cricket and has taken responsibility for her actions.”CA has 16 official betting partners, all of which have signed up to “assist CA in its ongoing management of the integrity of CA competitions, by agreeing to information sharing and other integrity requirements specified by CA”.Like Reakes, Cleary will now be compelled to form part of CA’s anti-corruption player education programmes in the future, as an example of how not to behave.

There is no good redemption
Where was Bob Marley when we needed him? It was fightback time once again and Misbah-ul-Haq could have redeemed himself after the World Twenty20 loss by seeing his side through in Mohali. He had said he wouldn’t shy away from playing the scoop over fine leg, that had led to his downfall in Johannesburg, if the opportunity presented, and he was true to his word tonight. He played it again, with 39 required off 26. He didn’t need Sreesanth for support this time, though, as he played it on to his stumps. His innings was no less crucial than the one he played in the World Twenty20 final as he, along with Younis Khan, brought Pakistan close to victory before getting out.That elusive catch
It wasn’t only Sachin Tendulkar who nearly got there. Yuvraj Singh tried to pull what would have been two blinders in the field. First running from square leg, he almost reached a skier from Younis Khan, which landed at mid-on. In hindsight he could have let the man at long-on make an attempt running in, as opposed to himself running backwards.The next one would have been the real beauty. Shahid Afridi had hit Zaheer Khan for three continuous boundaries and brought the target down to 21 off 14. Next one was a leading edge that went between the sight-screen and mid-off. Yuvraj ran from wide long-off, full throttle, launched for a full-length dive, but could only get a finger to it. Both the batsmen went on to make India suffer: Younis had scored 72 off 78 balls; he eventually got out for 117 off 110.Deceptive Shoaib
There was a time when it looked Shoaib Akhtar couldn’t bowl one ball at the stumps. In the 39th over of the Indian innings, he would have frustrated his captain the most. With Pakistan already running behind the over-rate, he bowled back-to-back wides and all of a sudden his celebrated long run-up started to seem excruciatingly long. That’s when he cut down on it, but bowled – surprise – a wide again. Yet for all the extras he bowled, he had the best figures in the match: 10-1-42-3. And the maiden came in the 47th over of the innings. The might have started late, but it did arrive, and did help Pakistan restrict India.Free hit, same difference
Relevant statistic: The free-hit rule seems to have benefitted the over-rate as since its introduction, the no-ball-per-match rate has come down considerably. Irrelevant statistic: When Sachin Tendulkar tried to make room and failed to make proper contact off a free hit, the scorer at the PCA Stadium was quick to claim this was the third free-hit opportunity Tendulkar had got and had failed to score on any of them. The scorer chose to stay silent when in the 24th over, Tendulkar brought out his trademark paddle sweep to a free hit off Shoaib Malik, getting his first runs off a free hit: four of them.

Scorecard

West Indies A tied the fourth one-day with Sri Lanka A in a dramatic last-ball affair when Russell Arnold was run out while attempting to take a run to seal victory for his side at the Beausejour Cricket Ground in St Lucia.Chasing 261 to win, Sri Lanka needed 18 runs from the last over. Two sixes from Arnold off Ryan Hinds, the left-arm spinner, eased things a bit for Sri Lanka and they needed two runs from the last ball to win the match and go 2-0 up in the series. Arnold took the first run easily but was run out when attempting to run back for the second.West Indies chose to bat after winning the toss and Travis Dowlin, the opener, along with Sylvester Joseph, the captain, added 98 runs for the third wicket. From 168 for 3 West Indies slipped to 177 for 6, Malinga Bandara, the Sri Lanka legspinner, accounting for Dowlin, Narsingh Deonarine and Patrick Browne, the wicketkeeper in the space of nine runs. But Hinds and Omari Banks added 83 for an unbeaten seventh-wicket partnership and took West Indies to a fairly safe score of 260 at the end of 50 overs. While Hinds made 55 Towlin top-scored in the West Indies innings with 75.Sri Lanka openers Avishka Gunawardene and Mahela Udawatte started out well making 77 before Darren Sammy bowled Udawatte out for 25. The second wicket fell soon enough but when Sammy caught Kaushal Lokuarachchi off Hinds’s bowling for a duck. Gunawardene and Jeewan Mendis added 50 more runs to the total score and Sri Lanka looked in no trouble chasing West Indies’ 260. But in a situation similar to the West Indies’ mid-innings collapse, Sri Lanka lost three wickets – all to Gavin Tonge – for 11 runs. Arnold rallied the tail along and added 72 along with Gayan Wijekoon and Kaushal Silva. He was batting on 79 alongside Bandara, unbeaten on 13, at the time of the nail-biting finish. Tonge ended with match figures of 3 for 40.The series is tied at 1-1 and the two teams will play the final ODI on December 17 at the Beausejour Cricket Ground.

Arjuna Ranatunga, the legendary Sri Lankan captain, has resigned from the Sri Lankan board’s high-profile cricket committee following their team’s recent dismal performance in India.Ranatunga’s decision came three days after Sri Lanka’s tour of India, where they lost the three-Test series 2-0. They had also crashed to a 6-1 defeat to India in the preceding seven-match one-day series.Ranatunga was heading a committee which involved all past captains.”As a person who loves cricket in Sri Lanka I worked hard to execute my responsibility as the chairman of the committee,” Ranatunga wrote in a letter to Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC). “It is regretful that the expected outcome was not there. Under these circumstances I am left with no alternative but to resign.”There were a few things that I wasn’t at all happy with during my association with SLC,” Ranatunga told AFP, “and I just waited till the team returned from India to hand over my resignation.”Although he didn’t outline details of what made him unhappy, it is believed that Ranatunga and his committee had differences of opinion with Jayantha Dharmadasa, the SLC Chairman. Ranatunga’s committee was responsible for appointing Tom Moody as coach of the national team in place of his compatriot John Dyson.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball details

Bangladesh achieved their first Test-series win after a tense final day in which they spurned an opportunity to go for a win, mindful of the larger objective. Chasing 374, Bangladesh’s batsmen, led by Nafis Iqbal, began the day carefully, saving wickets for a late charge that never came. They ended at 285 for 5, scoring about two per over, but this was a draw that meant more than a Test win for them.Zimbabwe bowled spiritedly, but the pitch had nothing for the bowlers. They were briefly encouraged when two wickets fell soon afer tea, but Rajin Saleh and Khaled Mashud prevented any further problems. However, as the day came to a close, Tatenda Taibu brought on Stuart Matsikenyeri, whose excessive turn had the batsmen in trouble immediately. But the discomfort came too late and, as both teams walked off amid descending gloom, one wondered if Taibu had missed a trick.There was little the bowlers could do in the morning, given Iqbal and Javed Omar’s ultra-defensive approach. They kept their bats well away as the bowlers maintained a line outside off stump, and otherwise tapped the ball to the fielders. The morning session yielded only 37 runs, and Taibu tried several bowling changes before settling on the legspin of Graeme Cremer, who induced an edge from Omar (133 for 1). He later surprised Mohammad Ashraful too with one that bounced, kissed the edge of the bat, and went to slip (153 for 3).

Iqbal’s demeanour in the morning suggested that Bangladesh wanted a draw, but after lunch he brought out drives and cuts en route to his first Test century. But with wickets falling around him regularly, Iqbal reverted to his role as stodgy defender until Saleh provided a reassuring presence. Iqbal was eventually dismissed right after tea, chasing one from Tinashe Panyangara and nicking it to the wicketkeeper. Panyangara also removed Habibul Bashar and Aftab Ahmed, to give Zimbabwe fleeting hope of the improbable.Saleh and Mashud then put on 79 as the light faded, ending their stand in a flurry of fours. While Mashud scored 28, Saleh ran up 56 – hitting three boundaries in succession to go past fifty and light up a turgid innings.The mission to win a series had finally been accomplished. And it took some doing. At several key moments in the second Test Bangladesh could so easily have thrown it away, as they have done in the past. But, to their credit, they did not let their eagerness get the better of them. Even considering the easy nature of the pitch, scoring 374 in the last innings to win was always going to be asking too much. Fortunately for Dav Whatmore Bangladesh’s batsmen stuck to the task on hand, ground out the draw, and achieved the bigger goal.