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The allrounder was reported after Uganda’s opening match against Denmark at Division Three, during which he took 1 for 25 in nine overs

Peter Della Penna in Oman13-Nov-2018Uganda allrounder Irfan Afridi has been suspended from bowling in international cricket with immediate effect after his bowling action was found illegal following video analysis taken at ICC WCL Division Three in Oman.An ICC press release announced the news about an hour before Uganda’s third match against Kenya on Tuesday at Division Three, and Afridi was replaced in the starting XI by offspinner Frank Nsubuga. Afridi was reported after Uganda’s opening match against Denmark at Division Three, during which he took 1 for 25 in nine overs.”Per Article 3.5 of the ICC Regulations for the Review of Bowlers Reported with Suspected Illegal Bowling Actions, video footage of Irfan’s bowling spells were provided to the Expert Panel of Mark King and Andrea Cutti, who are members of the ICC Panel of Human Movement Specialists, for their analysis and assessment,” the ICC release read. “The assessment revealed that the amount of elbow extension in Irfan’s bowling action was above the 15 degrees level of tolerance permitted under the regulations.”Uganda’s second match against USA was embroiled in controversy after umpires told Uganda captain Roger Mukasa that they would no-ball Afridi on the field if he continued to bowl. Till then, Afridi had bowled only one over in the game. With Afridi kept out of the attack, USA posted a total of 252 which was easily defended.Afridi’s suspension from bowling will remain until he submits to a further assessment of his bowling action by an Expert Panel or at an ICC approved Testing Centre and the assessment finds his bowling action legal.

Being on the lookout for wickets even when Australia tried to dominate helped India’s bowlers make significant contribution towards series win, says India vice-captain

Alagappan Muthu in Nagpur01-Oct-2017Until the last day of the five-match ODI series, India were about to win it without a single centurion. Rohit Sharma’s excellent handling of a slow, grippy pitch to score 125 at a strike-rate of 114.87 – when everyone that faced at least 20 balls had to settle for 88 runs per 100 balls or less – deserves praise. But his job was made just a touch easy by the bowlers responding well to another tough situation.Australia were 100 for 1 in the 20th over with David Warner batting on 50. But they slumped 118 for 4 by the 25th with Kedar Jadhav (1 for 48) and Axar Patel (3 for 38) doing most of the damage. Then Jasprit Bumrah and Bhuvneshwar Kumar closed out the innings so well that Australia lost five wickets for the addition of 52 in the last 10 overs. Bumrah had cost 37 runs in his first five overs but he wrapped up with 2 for 51, including a wicket maiden in the 45th.Rohit, India’s vice- captain, praised this ability of his bowlers to bounce back when the team needed it most. “To restrict Australia to 242 on this particular wicket wasn’t easy, because they are a solid batting line-up and especially with the opening partnership they got,” he said. “Even in the last game, we thought 350-360 would be on the board, but we pulled it back and that’s been the hallmark of this bowling unit throughout the tournament. We have pulled the game back at the crucial time and that has allowed our batters to go and play their game.”In Chennai, after the batting flopped, India needed a leg up from Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal. The wristspinners took 5 for 63, bowling nine out of the 21 overs in a rain-shortened game.Then in Kolkata, where apart from Virat Kohli and Ajinkya Rahane, no one was able to get into the 30s, Bhuvneshwar’s new-ball swing was so vicious that Warner, a soon-to-be 100 match veteran said they were the most difficult conditions he had faced in ODI cricket. India defended 252 with Kuldeep taking a hat-trick.Indore presented the best chance for runs but Australia won the toss and it was their opener Aaron Finch who made the first century of the series. But he fell, leaving his team at 224 for 2 in the 38th over, and soon after they were kept to a mere 294 off 50 overs.Kuldeep, having been punished for bowling too full on a tiny ground, dismissed the set batsmen Finch (124) and Smith (63). Chahal later got rid of Maxwell for a third time in three games. After that Bhuvneshwar and Bumrah showed why they are perhaps the most potent bowling combination in the world at the end of an innings.The bowlers’ success has been because they’ve stuck to their brief, of trying to attack even when Australia have been on top. “We’ve played in these conditions so many times and they understand that they need to keep sticking to their strength,” Rohit said. “One boundary here and there doesn’t make a difference. That’s been their attitude throughout the tournament and we go out in the middle to take wickets, not to look to get the strike-rate down.”All the bowlers who participated in this tournament have gone with this mindset of taking wickets. When you’re doing that you will obviously strike at some point during the game and pull the match back towards you. That is what these guys have done, all the spinners and the fast bowlers as well. All the compliments should go to them as well, the way they have bowled as a bowling unit throughout the tournament.”Rohit was also highly appreciative of Rahane’s contribution in the 4-1 series victory – four successive fifties as an opener in Shikhar Dhawan’s absence.”We have played a lot of cricket together in Mumbai and we understand each other and we know each other’s game really well,” Rohit said. “We talk a lot in the middle, about when we need to take risk and when we need not. These are the little things that really help in building a partnership. In the last three games, we’ve got hundred-run partnerships and that’s only through the communication we’ve had in the middle.”It’s important that you keep talking to your partner, making him comfortable and it goes the other way as well. And he has played really well throughout the tournament, scoring four fifties in the last four games and he’s shown a lot of maturity as well handling the new ball. Whatever conditions you play, handling the new ball is pretty important and he did that pretty well.”

Virat Kohli scored a century that looked inevitable to take India to a position from where they could dominate the Test

The Report by Sidharth Monga21-Jul-2016
Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
2:07

Manjrekar: ‘WI attack one of the weakest you’ll see’

In the lead-up to this series, India’s captain Virat Kohli arranged a meeting with Viv Richards to take his blessings, in the words of Richards. On the first day of the series, at a ground named after Richards, Kohli showed all the intent that was a hallmark of Richards. He picked five bowlers, going for specialists ahead of those who can bat; he went with Shikhar Dhawan, who brings the possibility of quicker runs than KL Rahul; and he chose to bat when the first session on this pitch was the only one expected to offer bowlers any assistance on the first three days.Most importantly, with India in a spot of bother at 74 for 2 and struggling to score freely, Kohli batted with similar intent, albeit against a limited attack that must have been close to tiring out. He scored an unbeaten 143, his 12th Test century and his first against West Indies, to put India in a position to dominate, a goal they seemed to have set themselves at the start of the series. To make it better for Kohli, his selection of Dhawan paid off. Some considered Dhawan lucky to be playing this Test, he enjoyed some luck against testing bowling at the start of the innings, but he helped India keep a disciplined West Indies attack at bay with his first half-century in eight innings. The two added 105 in 27.1 overs; the previous 74 runs had taken 27.4 overs.India would have expected to work hard for their runs on a slow pitch surrounded by a slow outfield in North Sound, but hands in front of helmets as protective action wouldn’t have been on the agenda. In their first Test under new bowling coach Roddy Estwick, the West Indies attack, thin on numbers but displaying tenacity, tested the Indian top order in the first session. Shannon Gabriel, making a Test comeback after good returns in the ODI triangular series earlier this season, rattled the openers with his pace, accounting for M Vijay with a bouncer, but Dhawan was prepared to fight before capitalising on the second string, an older ball and falling intensity.Play began along expected lines. As opposed to India’s intent, West Indies took the safer route given their limited resources: they picked the extra batsman, debutant Roston Chase, and chose Jason Holder, who on many sheets was marked as an allrounder, to share the new ball. India were expected to look for runs, and relatively quick runs, while West Indies were expected to frustrate India. On the field, it was going to be a test of execution and endurance for West Indies.The execution was near perfect before lunch. In his first spell of 4-2-6-1, Gabriel roughed up both Dhawan and Vijay. Dhawan had the worse of the exchanges, top-edging Holder before fending hopelessly four times in a row against Gabriel. Vijay edged the second bouncer he faced for Kraigg Brathwaite to juggle a catch at second slip. Holder – first spell of 5-2-10-0 – played his part in making Gabriel effective, and Carlos Brathwaite followed it up with a spell of six overs for six runs.Virat Kohli ended the first day in Antigua unbeaten on 143•Getty Images

Dhawan might have had a problem against the short ball, but his discipline outside off and his will to make the bowlers get his wicket stood out. He refused to fall for the sucker delivery after the short ones, shelving his cover drive – playing only seven of them – and indulging only in the late cut off the part-timer Chase, who bowled economical overs of offspin in the first session. Unlike Cheteshwar Pujara, who got stuck and fell for 16 off 67 after a 60-run second-wicket partnership, Dhawan kept finding a way to score. While it was the late cut at the start – 14 runs off five attempts – he began to use his feet towards the end of the first session. He went into lunch with 29 off his last 26 balls, and would come back to get himself in before opening up again.Pujara, though, fell immediately after lunch, getting a leading edge off a short legbreak from the returning Devendra Bishoo. The wicket changed the complexion of the day’s play. With Kohli came the intent to score runs. The flat and slow pitch didn’t call for a watertight technique, so Kohli could take a few liberties, but his attitude of looking to score first before falling back on other options exposed the limited West Indies attack.Until then, West Indies had kept India quiet by bowling well outside off, but Kohli began driving, a shot that can be dangerous early in the innings in some conditions, but not in Antigua. There was no seam, no unfriendly bounce, and the ball was too old to swing. As if a sign of how the West Indies concentration was being tested, Kohli’s first boundary came through a misfield, from Marlon Samuels.Dhawan began to find more authority in his cuts. He upper-cut Gabriel for a six, swept Bishoo and stopped missing chances for singles. All through, Kohli kept driving imperiously. In the 34th over, the run rate reached three for the first time since the third over. The two kept picking ones and twos effortlessly. At one point Kohli pinched a single to Gabriel at mid-off, and told his partner, “He is very tired.” Before you realised it, Kohli had followed Dhawan to a half-century, bringing it up off the 75th ball he faced. Bishoo, though, came back just before tea to trap Dhawan lbw on the sweep.Kohli added 57 with an enterprising Ajinkya Rahane, who like Pujara, saw a short legbreak, shaped to pull but didn’t manage to adjust as the ball stopped and bounced at him. In another sign of intent, India had R Ashwin batting at No. 6, ahead of Wriddhiman Saha. West Indies continued with their conservative approach, happy to slow India down, not taking the new ball and getting in some quiet overs before stumps as Kohli and Ashwin added an unbeaten 66 runs.Kohli brought up what had looked like an inevitable century. Only once was there alarm during his innings. After a mini quiet period, he drove at a wide Brathwaite delivery. The edge flew wide of gully. On this pitch, such a drive to prevent the bowlers from bowling quiet overs wide outside off was a risk worth taking. As was playing five bowlers. Kohli was prepared to take both.

Shane Watson and Mitchell Marsh will face-off once again for the allrounder’s berth in Australia’s final warm-up ahead of the first Investec Test against England in Cardiff

Daniel Brettig in Canterbury28-Jun-20151:55

‘We’re not worried about what England are doing’ – Lehmann

Shane Watson and Mitchell Marsh will face-off once again for the allrounder’s berth in Australia’s final warm-up ahead of the first Investec Test against England in Cardiff, after the coach Darren Lehmann said he expected the senior man to be bowling to a strong standard against Essex at Chelmsford in order to retain his place.Lehmann revealed the XI for Wednesday’s four-day match in the minutes after the tourists completed a 255-run defeat of a modest Kent side at Canterbury, where Shaun Marsh, Steven Smith and Mitchell Johnson could feel best pleased with their efforts.The aforementioned trio will all be rested from the team to face Essex, as Nathan Lyon, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood come in for their first competitive bowl of the tour while Adam Voges and David Warner are also included. Ryan Harris, Michael Clarke and Chris Rogers will all play again as they seek further match conditioning, but most of the interest will surround how Mitchell Marsh and Watson fare as the days tick down to the Ashes.Watson has missed four Test matches since Lehmann took over as coach, all of them because he was unfit to bowl. Lehmann stated that he needed to be sending the ball down with decent oomph to make his place safe. “Yeah, like always,” Lehmann said. “I thought he bowled really well in the West Indies, for a short amount of time so we know that’s important for us especially in England, he shapes the ball nicely so he’s going to have to bowl well.

Australia XI for Essex

Michael Clarke (capt), Chris Rogers, David Warner, Adam Voges, Shane Watson, Mitchell Marsh, Peter Nevill, Mitchell Starc, Ryan Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Nathan Lyon

“It’s going to be tight, isn’t it. I thought Marsh was exceptional in the innings as was Shane Watson to be perfectly honest. We need Watto bowling and he’ll definitely bowl in the next tour game so that’s going to be a key for us as well. So both pushed their claims really well.”Strong competition for places in the Australian XI was highlighted by the way Johnson stepped up on a flat pitch to bowl perhaps his swiftest spells since South Africa in February 2014. It was a striking display that pleased Lehmann, who has always placed a premium on high pace among his seam bowlers and has dropped numerous players in the past if he has not thought them able to provide it.Harris was somewhat patchier, and Lehmann concurred with his former South Australia’s team-mate’s view that there were no “credits” for players around the Australian side. “No credits for players as far as we’re concerned,” he said. “In the two Test matches in the West Indies the three quicks who played there got 40 wickets for us so that’s really pleasing. At the end of the day Ryan Harris has got to be fully fit and if he’s doing that then he’s a big part of our side or squad going forward.”He’s got to prove to us he can bowl 20 overs in an innings or roughly about that and make sure he’s ready to go. If he can do that he certainly comes into consideration. He’s obviously been one of our greats in these conditions and at the end of the day we’ve got to pick the best attack and if that’s with him in that’s with him in, if it’s not it’s not.”The pressure is on Shane Watson to send down some high-quality overs against Essex ahead of the first Test•Getty Images

There was also an incredulous remark or two from Lehmann about the words of Stuart Broad, who had contended that the promotion of Smith to No. 3 would leave his idiosyncratic technique vulnerable to the new Dukes ball in English conditions. Lehmann did not quite roll his eyes at the suggestion, but he was not far off doing so.”I thought this sledging stuff was supposed to stop,” he quipped. “There’s a lot of sledging going on in the media. They’re allowed to have their comments, I’m not too worried about that. I think Steven Smith’s a pretty good player – I think he got 199 at No. 3 the other week.”It’s pretty much always swung in the history of the game here in England and you’ve got to be a good player to make runs. I think Steven Smith is a good player.”As for a bus trip to Colchester while England were plotting their own plans with the new coach Trevor Bayliss at a Spanish resort, Lehmann showed precious little interest. “I don’t know, don’t want to know – I don’t care,” he said. “I only worry about us to be perfectly honest.”We’ve got to worry about how we are going to produce really good cricket in England because we haven’t won here for 14 years and that’s our focus. We are not worried too much about England. We’ve got to worry about getting it right day and day out on the training track and getting better at the game of cricket, because that’s how you improve.”

Kevin Pietersen, playing with admirable responsibility on a sub-standard Nagpur pitch, held England together on the opening day of the final Test

The Report by David Hopps13-Dec-2012
Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsKevin Pietersen was a model of decorum on a slow wicket•BCCI

India’s strategy of beating England on sharply-turning surfaces had left them 2-1 down with one to play so in Nagpur it was time to find another way. It was not pretty. Plan B was to drive England to distraction on the slowest, lowest, shabbiest pitch imaginable. It might yet work, but Test cricket, not in the best of health as it is, is a little sicker for it.That England came out evenly after the first day owed much to the self-denial of Kevin Pietersen, a quality with which he has rarely been associated, especially during a prolonged feud with England last summer which put his international career in jeopardy. But Pietersen yearns to end a largely unhappy year with a rare England Test series win in India and while others struggled he was a veritable professor of decorum. It is precisely because he had to work uncommonly hard that England will believe they are very much in the game.His 73 from 188 balls ranked among his slowest Test half-centuries but it was an innings of great purpose for all that and prevented England from becoming entirely becalmed on a tedious day when the run rate ground forward at two an over. Turgid cricket was inevitable on a sub-standard surface that demanded a defensive outlook from both sides as India sought a victory to level the series and dissipate gathering criticism of the captain, MS Dhoni and his coaching staff.Pietersen apart, England, needing to accumulate, largely gathered dust. Joe Root, a surprise debutant at No. 6, would understandably regard it as gold dust as he grafted for an unbeaten 31 in an unbroken stand of 60 with Matt Prior which stabilised England’s mood by the end of the first day. Root, a patient technician, was well suited to such denial. TV viewers in England, who had roused themselves for a 4am start, may have nodded off long before then, but crease occupation could be vital on a pitch that started dry, abrasive and heavily cracked.Pietersen fell early in the final session, flicking Ravindra Jadeja, India’s debutant, to short midwicket – an area where Ishant Sharma also twice come close to dismissing him. The wicket was the highlight of a quite unforeseen day for Jadeja, who also drifted his slow left-arm onto Jonathan Trott’s off stump when he misjudged a leave on 44, and who was generally met with such caution that he had 2 for 32 in 22 overs when Dhoni briefly honoured him with the second new ball. As the fourth-ranked spinner, he could not have expected that.Even allowing for the different characteristics of pitches worldwide, this surface was inadequate for Test cricket. For Sharma, the sole representative of that increasingly endangered species, an Indian quick bowler, to find such persistent low and uneven bounce on the first morning of a Test was a travesty; the only question was how much it was by accident or design. Praveen Hinganikar, the curator, had no reason for satisfaction.Sharma reduced England to 16 for 2 by taking the wickets of Nick Compton and Alastair Cook in his new-ball spell. It was vagaries in bounce that accounted for Compton, Sharma managing to get a short one chest high and drawing Compton into a defensive edge to the wicketkeeper. It was the vagaries of umpiring (mediocre throughout the series) that did for Cook as Sharma’s hint of inswing was enough to win an lbw decision from umpire Kumar Dharmasena even though the ball was clearly missing off stump. Sharma had come close to an lbw decision against Trott in his previous over and that might have helped.For England to find that they must repel India’s challenge in the absence of Cook, their ultra-dependable captain, must have come as quite a shock. In the first three Tests he had batted 1,565 minutes, 1,164 balls and scored 548 runs. He did not adorn those figures very much at all, managing a single off 28 balls. His departure brought India hope.The two wickets lost by England in the afternoon session were more self-inflicted, brought about by the pressure applied by India’s quartet of spinners on a ponderous surface that allowed minimal first-day turn. Dhoni was left to play a waiting game, dispensing with slip or men around the bat for most of the day, and arresting the run rate with ring fields until gifts fell into his lap.On several occasions, Trott and Pietersen, raised up on quick, bouncy South African pitches, made as if to pull a short ball before playing defensively on the crouch as the ball ambled towards them whenever it chose. Their third-wicket stand of 86 with Pietersen provided England’s only concerted response, but after Trott allowed himself to be bowled, Ian Bell’s unimpressive record in Asia continued as he punched a near half-volley from the legspinner, Piyish Chawla, to short extra cover.On a pitch where the ball repeatedly died on pitching, lbw is in play for any bowler maintaining a strict wicket-to-wicket line. Even as they strangled England’s innings, India must have seen enough to rue selecting four spinners instead of providing some fast-bowling support for Sharma. Steve Finn, omitted because of disc trouble in his back, was the type of tall, hit-the-deck bowler who might have been particularly effective and England could rue his absence.Although Trott occasionally swept India’s spinners to good effect and Pietersen, who was anxious to play positively against the spinners, muscled one or two shots down the ground, it was grim fare. Only a few thousand had turned out to watch it – this modern stadium on the edge of town echoing to the smallest crowd of the series. Those who stayed away were fortunate. Yawns all round.

The BCCI has been served with 19 show-cause notices by India’s Directorate of Enforcement for alleged violations of the country’s Foreign Exchange Management Act

ESPNcricinfo staff29-Nov-2011The BCCI has been served with 19 show-cause notices by India’s Directorate of Enforcement for alleged violations of the country’s Foreign Exchange Management Act [FEMA] totaling approximately Rs 1077.43 crores (US$ 207.52 million), according to a government report investigating the board and its management of the IPL.The BCCI’s alleged violations of the FEMA regulations are believed to have occurred when the BCCI moved the Twenty20 tournament to South Africa in 2009 amid security concerns caused by the holding of India’ s national elections at the same time as the IPL.Speaking in Parliament earlier on Tuesday, Ajay Maken, India’s sports minister, said that various government agencies have conducted inquiries into the allegations of irregularities by the BCCI.These include the FEMA violations totalling Rs 1077.43 crores, Income Tax assessments of Rs.118.04 crores and Rs.257.12 crores for 2007-08 and 2008-09 respectively (total Rs 375.16 crores) as well as the Service Tax department’s show cause notices involving an amount of Rs 159.12 crores to various service providers/ stakeholders in relation to the IPL for the recovery of service tax.The total payments being sought from the BCCI and its stakeholders amounts to more than Rs 1600 crores.The report states that the Income Tax department has withdrawn the tax exempt status of the board, and claimed back taxes amounting to Rs.118.04 crores and Rs.257.12 crores for the years 2007-08 and 2008-09 respectively. The tax exempt status had been removed because the BCCI had “amended its objects” – that is changed the basic definition of its functioning from June 1, 2006, an act which had required a fresh registration. The change had been noticed only when the BCCI’s tax assessment proceedings were being carried out for the year 2007-08. Given that there had been no fresh registration done since the changes, the government had stated that the BCCI’s old registration did not survive and neither could its tax exempt status.Government investigations are also being conducted into “the source of foreign investments in individual teams is being investigated and references through the Foreign Tax Division.” The report also stated that “preliminary investigations have shown prima facie evidence of monopolistic nature of working of BCCI and the companies involved” in awarding media rights for the IPL. The Ministry of Corporate Affairs has therefore been instructed to investigate these issues under the provisions of the Competition Act, 2002.