Tahir Khan and Rajesh Ramesh shared eight wickets between them to bowl Karachi Urban to a victory of an innings and 111 runs over Lahore Shalimar, on the third day Quaid-e-Azam Trophy Cricket Championship Gold League match, at the National Stadium in Karachi.Tahir, a right-arm offbreak bowler, took 5 for 52 and ended with eight wickets for the match. Ramesh, Karachi’s fast-medium bowler, grabbed 3 for 35 runs in ten overs as Lahore Shalimar were bowled out for 196.Karachi Urban resumed on 376 for 6 but Hasan Raza added only eight more to his overnight score before he was caught behind off Junaid Zia’s right-arm medium-fast bowling. Zia ended with 4 for 85 from 21 overs. Before Tahir got his fifth first-class five-wicket haul, he made an unbeaten 44 and along with Ramesh who made 41 got Karachi Urban to 483.With a lead of 307 Karachi Urban bowlers then set themselves to bowl out Lahore Shalimar in 51 overs. Humayun Farhat blasted 74 off just 53 balls that included 12 fours and two sixes. Mohammad Khalil was the next highest scorer with 23.Lahore Shalimar will now play Karachi Harbour at Lahore from January 24 in a fourth round match. Karachi Urban, meanwhile, have a rest until the fifth round.After gaining a first-innings lead of 78 Karachi Harbour went on to restrict Peshawar to 170 for 6 in their second innings at the Arbab Niaz Stadium in Peshawar.Uzair-ul-Haq got 4 for 26 and Anwar Ali got 2 for 43. Ali also performed with the bat in the Karachi Harbour innings making an unbeaten 31 after they had fallen to 168 for 8. Batting with Faraz Ahmed (12), his ninth-wicket stand was worth 38 runs and took Karachi Harbour beyond the 200 mark. Fazl-e-Akbar, Peshawar’s right-arm fast-medium bowler, triggered a middle-order collapse and got 4 for 57 while Riaz Afridi ended with 5 for 67 for the innings.Peshawar are now 92 runs ahead with only four wickets left.Yasir Arafat, the Pakistan allrounder, snapped up six wickets to steer Rawalpindi to a first-innings lead of 100 over defending champions Sialkot, in their third round match of the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy Cricket Championship at the Pindi Cricket Stadium in Rawalpindi.Arafat got 6 for 53 and led the charge along with Akhtar Ayub, 3 for 33, to bowl out Sialkot for 224.Shahzad Malik, 60, and Abdur Rehman, 42, added 60 for the fifth wicket for Sialkot after the first four wickets fell for 60. Imran Nazir, 24, and Asim Butt, 35, chipped in but the lead was nowhere in sight. By the close of play yesterday, Rawalpindi were 26 for no loss.Silver League
Multan extended their lead to 223 over Hyderabad after they bowled Hyderabad out for 339 and then made 140 for 5 in their Quaid-e-Azam Trophy Cricket Championship Silver League match at the Multan Cricket Stadium.Hanif Malik and Nauman Ali added 92 runs to Hyderabad’s overnight score of 201 for 5 before Malik was trapped leg-before by Mohammad Azharullah for 26. Ali meanwhile got his maiden first-class half-century, making 67 off 127 balls with ten fours and added 52 for the seventh wicket with Nasir Awais. Abdul Rauf got the wicket of Farhan Ayub for two and ended with 5 for 90 for the innings.Usman Tariq, the Multan opener, hit a 65-ball 54 with nine fours in Multan’s second innings. Kashif Naved, who had compiled a monumental 199 in the first innings, was not out at 31 when stumps were drawn.A century by Ashar Zaidi, Islamabad’s No.4 batsman, and half-centuries by Azhar Mahmood and Mohammad Fayyaz helped the side gain a massive first-innings lead of 280 over Lahore Ravi who were trailing by 191 runs at stumps on day three.Zaidi and Mahmood added 87 for the third wicket after which Zaidi and Fayyaz added 121 more. Wahab Riaz dismissed all three and returned figures of 3 for 90 from his 21 overs.Iftikhar Anjum took two wickets and Kashif Naved and Adnan Raza were batting at close as Lahore Ravi were at 89 for 3 struggling to avoid an innings defeat.Abbottabad amassed a first innings score of 413 for nine and then shot out Quetta for 228 to take a 185 runs lead at the Khan Research Laboratory Cricket Ground at Rawalpindi.Quetta were forced to follow-on and had faced a single ball before the day’s play ended.Wajid Ali finished on 100 not out, his first-class career’s maiden century, as Abbottabad declared at 413 for nine after resuming their first innings at the overnight 363 for 6. He added 127 with Riaz Kail for the seventh wicket.Sabir Hussain was the top-scorer for Quetta with 92 off 144 balls while Shoaib Khan made 37 as Abbottabad legspinner Dilawar Khan got 5 for 42. Nasir Jalil got 2 for 59 and and Sajid Shah got 2 for 52 runs.

On a day dominated by the announcement of Australia’s new coach, another coaching decision almost slipped under the radar. Greg Shipperd has benefited from Victoria’s outstanding 2006-07 season with a two-year reappointment as the Bushrangers’ coach.Victoria sit on top of the Pura Cup table and second in the Ford Ranger Cup, having last month claimed their second successive Twenty20 title. Shipperd said Victoria were well-placed heading into the last few rounds in each competition, despite the likely continued loss of their captain and vice-captain to the Australia side.Shipperd said Cameron White and Brad Hodge were key players but Victoria’s depth would mean the Bushrangers could get by without them. “There are a couple of good prospects there,” Shipperd told the .”Robert Quiney and Aiden Blizzard are probably the two we’ve looked at closely throughout this season with their second XI and Premier Cup form.” Quiney struggled in his few limited-overs outings for Victoria this season but an unbeaten 215 in Melbourne’s grade cricket on the weekend could make him the frontrunner to replace Hodge.Shipperd, who in 2003-04, his first season as coach, took Victoria to their first Pura Cup win in more than a decade, said hosting and winning the final this year was the team’s focus. “It would be foolish not to be positive about that possibility,” he said.

Ricky Ponting has conceded Australia’s injury troubles and less-than-ideal training facilities have provided a mixed start to their World Cup campaign. The defending champions will have only 12 players to choose from for their first warm-up match, against Zimbabwe on Tuesday.The teams are allowed to use 13 men for the practice games but of Australia’s 15, Andrew Symonds has an arm injury, Matthew Hayden has a broken toe and Adam Gilchrist has not yet joined the squad after the birth of his third child. Ponting said his side’s fitness and form – they lost the No. 1 ODI ranking to South Africa in February – were far from ideal.”Look, there are some concerns there, no doubt about that, ” Ponting told . “I don’t think any more than normal. It’s about all of us just looking at our own games and finding little areas that we think we can improve. If we play our best cricket, we are going to be very hard to beat.”Ponting said John Buchanan had just inspected the facilities in St Vincent, where Australia are based, and had raised some issues. “I’m not sure if we’re going to get too much good practice in over the next couple of days,” Ponting said.”If we don’t, it’s not a great concern. We just have to get out there and make the most of what we have got. We have been here to the Caribbean before and places [where] you don’t always get the practice facilities you want.”Australia are still discussing the make-up of their frontline bowling attack for the tournament and a four-man pace battery remains a possibility. Australia tested that tactic at the Champions Trophy in India and won the competition. However, their fast bowlers tailed off at the end of the CB Series and in the Chappell-Hadlee Trophy, raising questions over Australia’s ability to defend big totals.”I’m not that concerned,” Ponting said. “It was only a few weeks ago that this exact same bowling attack was bowling teams out for a hundred. We’re just going to have to pick the team that we think is going to be best suited to the conditions here. We’ve got re-laid wickets and early-morning starts here so you’ve got to take all that into account.”Buchanan said in the he had asked the advice of Andy Atkinson, the ICC’s pitch consultant, who had overseen the preparation of the grounds. “His opinion is basically the wickets will start pretty true, even pace, even bounce pretty well throughout,” Buchanan said. “There may be some change in the wickets as the tournament goes along.”

Bermuda’s coach Gus Logie has urged the island’s young cricketers to stand up and be counted as the game moves into a new era following the World Cup.Logie said playing on the biggest stage was not something the country could afford to let slip. And he added the onus was on the next generation to show that they wanted to be a part of a bright future for the sport in Bermuda. But he insisted that players had to set their goals higher than Cup Match and realize there was a big wide world’ beyond the island.He said: “Don’t settle for mediocrity, be the best you can be. There’s many people who can help you, in any field, in Bermuda. Don’t see Bermuda as the world – there is a big wide world out there. We’ve seen some young players revelling in that atmosphere. If you hit a six in the World Cup you can say you did it against the best. That has to be better than doing it against Somerset or St George’s – the whole world was watching and enjoying it.”There had been fears of a mass of retirements from the World Cup team but it now seems that only three players – Lionel Cann, Dean Minors and Saleem Mukuddem – are likely to step down. But Logie said the door would reopen to younger players and insisted “it’s time to rebuild.”He added: “There’s no reason why we can’t reach that same level (as the top Associate teams). The players know what has to be done. The onus is to rebuild, with younger players showing commitment and desire to represent their country.”There will still be room for the class of 2007 in the new-look Bermuda squad and with fixtures planned against top associates and possibly a couple of Test nations, it seems the opportunities for Bermuda to progress will be there.Logie said the World Cup needed to be a starting point. And he said the country could learn lessons from Bangladesh, which set up an academy just over a decade ago and saw its graduates progress to beat India at this tournament. “If you invest in your people there is every possibility that it will bear fruit. We are an impatient people and we want to see fruit come from the seed, but Mother Nature don’t work like that. If we are prepared to be patient we will see results. Credit to Bangladesh and their people. Now is the time for them to enjoy it.”Reproduced with permission from the Bermuda Sun

Hundreds, hundreds, hundreds. That has been England’s mantra throughout this tournament. If one of the top six reaches three figures, so their reasoning has gone, then victory will surely not be far behind. That wish was granted, as Kevin Pietersen, the world’s No. 1 one-day batsman, recorded his fourth ODI century (but his first, strangely, since that epic debut tour of South Africa two winters ago). And yet still it was not enough. Australia proved too versatile and England too brittle, as their hopes of qualification receded ever further.But at least England have a World Cup centurion at long, long last. Incredibly, this was the first by any of their batsmen since Graeme Hick plundered 104 not out against The Netherlands in 1995-96, and more extraordinarily, their first against a Test-playing nation since Graham Gooch’s legendary sweep-athon against India in the 1987 semi-final. Two barren decades later, it’s little wonder they aren’t really a side to take seriously as World Cup challengers.Even when it came, the carping couldn’t be helped. Pietersen’s innings, it has been whispered, was self-centred. “I was a bit surprised he didn’t step his innings up earlier,” Ricky Ponting said. Even Michael Vaughan, in the middle of praising his man, couldn’t help slipping in that “he wanted to get a hundred”, as if it was suddenly a crime to be cautious. And in a sense it was. So much has been invested in England’s powerhouse pairing of Pietersen and Andrew Flintoff that neither can be permitted to dawdle. Not even when, in Pietersen’s case, he didn’t really have an alternative.England’s tactic in this World Cup of building a platform then leaping gleefully into the final ten overs has been about as successful as Greg Louganis’ back-flip at the Seoul Olympics in 1988. On the one hand Pietersen has been co-opted into the sheet-anchor role that the top-order, with the exception of Ian Bell, has failed to provide; on the other, Flintoff is so hopelessly out of sorts with the bat that he would barely be worthy of a No. 9 slot in a combined World Cup XI.He’s not the only one struggling for runs, however, and Vaughan was quick to admit to his own latest failing. By the time he had inside-edged Shaun Tait on to his stumps for 5, England’s captain had mustered 83 runs in six innings in this tournament, and now averages less than 27 in his 83-match career. “It’s very frustrating,” he said. “It’s as frustrating for me as it is for everyone watching, I can tell you. It’s just not happening. That’s sometimes the way batting goes. “Comparisons with Mike Brearley’s captaincy are no longer being made in the flattering, cerebral sense. For all the nous he brings to England’s fielding effort, the burden of his failures at the top of the order are being felt all the way down, not least by Flintoff, whose grotesque innings of 4 from 19 balls ended in a neither-one-thing-nor-the-other stumping. “It can be quite tricky playing down that bottom order,” Vaughan said. “Freddie will be the first to admit he’s probably just struggling a little bit at the minute, as I am.”

The inflexibility of England’s approach was what brought them down. From 164 for 2 with 20 overs remaining, a total of 300 was not an inconceivable goal, but Ponting’s cunning use of the third Powerplay toppled them over the brink in familiar yet spectacular fashion. Having held it back until the 27th over, in came Glenn McGrath, and down fell Bell – the rock on whom Pietersen’s late assault, were it to come, had to be built.”Ian played really nicely,” Vaughan said. “That third Powerplay period is a real difficult time because you’ve got two guys in and you know they want to make the most of it. He’d hit the ball beautifully over extra-cover so I don’t begrudge him at all for trying to take that shot on. He played a tremendous knock and showed what a class player he is.”But it’s a sorry state of affairs when accidents, such as Bell’s untimely dismissal here and his unfortunate run-out against Sri Lanka, turn out to be fatal. “We are very, very close to being a real good one-day team,” Vaughan said, but his words rang a little bit hollow after the squandering of two positions from which good one-day teams would have to be dragged kicking and screaming. “I know we’ve lost two games but we’ve put two good teams under a lot of pressure.”Ponting actually agreed with that sentiment, although that probably says more about the lack of challenges his team has faced so far in this tournament than anything else. “Today’s been our biggest test, no doubt about it,” he said. “England should have made 270-280, no question, and our run-chase was big enough anyway. We did what we had to do, but we had plenty of batting to come and we could have taken risks earlier if needed. But we’d sewn things up and carried on to win the game.”Six matches, six wins, and not a close encounter among them. Australia’s juggernaut rumbles on to Barbados; England, meanwhile, face a testing encounter against Bangladesh, whose victory over South Africa provided them with today’s lifeline. They’ll need some hundreds in that game for sure.

Simon Helmot has been named the Victorian Cricket Academy coach, a newly-created position as part of the state’s revamped high-performance structure. Helmot, a former club cricketer in Melbourne and coach of the ACT Comets, will be in charge of Victoria’s male and female elite pathway squads and will coach the men’s Under-19 team.Helmot’s coaching career began when he led two Melbourne grade sides, Hawthorn-Waverley and Fitzroy Doncaster, to premierships before moving to Canberra. He was handed the reins of the Prime Minister’s XI, which crushed England by 166 runs in the lead-up to the Ashes last November.Tony Dodemaide, Cricket Victoria’s chief executive, said Helmot was the ideal candidate for the new role despite not having first-class playing experience. “Simon has an excellent record as a coach and leader,” Dodemaide said. “He has proved to be extremely talented, innovative and enthusiastic.”Helmot said he was indebted to ACT Cricket for giving him the chance to develop his coaching skills but was keen to return to Victoria.

India have agreed to tour Bangladesh for a tri-series in 2008 or 2009 with Pakistan as the third side, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) announced in Chittagong today.”We have agreed to play the tri-series in Bangladesh. I think it can be played in 2008 or 2009,” Niranjan Shah, the BCCI secretary, told PTI. “We have to make some adjustments to the ICC calendar. The BCB (Bangladesh Cricket Board) has readily agreed to all the conditions put before them.”Shah is among six BCCI officials currently in Bangladesh for the tour on invitation of the BCB and the officials held a meeting last night to discuss prospects of further tours between the two countries in the near future. Curiously, Bangladesh are yet to play a Test in India since gaining Test status in 2000, while India are already into their second Test tour. Shah said that a reciprocal tour of India is in the pipeline.”We are very willing to call them,” he added. “We want to help them. That’s the reason we have agreed to play the tri-series. Bangladesh is welcome to India.”

The security situation in Glasgow after a car crashed into the main terminal of the city’s airport on July 1 has not worried the Indian board (BCCI) or the team, Niranjan Shah, the BCCI secretary, said. India and Pakistan are to play a one-day game at Glasgow on Tuesday, the proceeds of the match going to the Prince of Wales charity trust.”We are not going to be worried by the situation in Glasgow,” Shah told . “We will leave it to the authorities over there to judge the situation and advise us.”Security is the responsibility of the home board and I’m sure they will take the necessary steps to ensure safety. The match will go on without any problem.”The Pakistan board (PCB) also confirmed that the security arrangements were satisfactory and that the match would go ahead as scheduled. “A match against India of any nature is always keenly anticipated and we are expecting a big crowd in for the match despite the security alert in Glasgow,” Zakir Khan, the PCB director of cricket operations, told cricketnext.com. “We are just keeping our fingers crossed the rains don’t hit the match.”The crash – suspected to be an attempted terrorist attack – has put Britain on its highest state of security alert and Glasgow airport remained closed overnight. But Shah said that the Indian team would fly into the city from Belfast, where they completed a series-win over South Africa on Monday, July 2.

ScorecardNetherlands were denied the chance to push for a victory when heavy rain lashed Stormont and forced the abandonment of their quadrangular series match against Scotland. Ryan ten Doeschate, the Essex allrounder, had taken three wickets in an excellent spell of seam bowling but his efforts came to nothing as the rain arrived after 22 overs.Scotland were soon left regretting their decision to bat as ten Doeschate struck early to remove yesterday’s bowling star against West Indies, Majid Haq, for 4. His swing and seam troubled the top order and he was a cut above the other bowling Netherlands have produced in this tournament.Due to Essex commitments this was the only match ten Doeschate was available for and he showed what Netherlands have been missing. He also removed Fraser Watts, then bowled Ryan Watson for 10 as Scotland slipped further into trouble.However, it wasn’t a one-man show as Hendrik-Jan Mol chipped in with a couple. He removed Navdeep Poonia, who top-scored against West Indies, and had Neil McCallam caught behind. That was the last piece of action for the day as the rain descended in bucket loads. The international matches in Ireland this season have managed to dodge the worst of the weather until now, but the umpires called off the match at 3.30.Netherlands finish without a win in the tournament and attention now turns to the main match of the week, Ireland against West Indies at Clontarf on Saturday. The series finishes with the Celtic clash between the hosts and Scotland on Sunday, weather permitting, at Stormont.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
How they were out
The Indians dominated the first two days of their warm-up match but Andy Hodd led a stubborn fightback on the third as Sussex, and rain, ensured that the chance of a result was rather unlikely. Hodd scored his maiden first-class century and led Sussex to 300 for 6 before Michael Yardy declared, giving the Indians a lead of 88. After that solid batting effort, James Kirtley and Jason Lewry rattled the Indian batsmen during a short burst before stumps and reduced them to 21 for 2.After two days of sunny weather, it began raining minutes before the scheduled start at 11.00 am and conditions did not improve through the morning. Over four hours of play were lost when the players finally took the field at 3.15pm.Sreesanth continued where he left off last evening and bowled an outstanding opening spell. He consistently hit a good length, extracted sharp bounce and got the ball to swing considerably away from the right-handers. RP Singh wasn’t as controlled though. He tried bowling to a plan, angling the ball across the right-handers from over the wicket, trying to swing it back into them to hit the pad. His execution was poor for he often strayed down leg side. However, he was difficult to play when he got it right and unsettled the batsmen with sharp in-swing and well-directed bouncers. Ranadeb Bose, playing his first game on the tour, was the least impressive of the seamers. He also found swing but his line was too wide outside the off stump to trouble the batsmen. And when he made an effort to bowl straighter, he was unable to generate as much swing.

Both Hodd and Martin-Jenkins were tested by some terrific deliveries in the afternoon but MS Dhoni had an equally torrid time behind the stumps. Sreesanth and RP Singh sent down deliveries that swung prodigiously after passing the batsmen and Dhoni frequently struggled to collect them cleanly. Sreesanth could have had a wicket early on but Dhoni was late in moving towards an outside edge from Martin-Jenkins, on 6, and dropped what would have been a comfortable catch for Yuvraj Singh at first slip.Sussex began the day trailing by 242 runs with just five wickets in hand with Hodd on 21 and Martin-Jenkins yet to score. Hodd was the more aggressive of the two, cutting and driving through cover point whenever offered width outside the off stump. A couple of his boundaries were streaky edges over slips and gully but, in all fairness, he would have had more had the wet outfield not thwarted several well-timed drives through the off side.Martin-Jenkins overcame a nervous start and grew in confidence as the session progressed. His first boundary was a crisp drive through covers off Sreesanth and by the time tea approached he was settled enough to use his feet and loft Anil Kumble over mid-on.The Indians could have had a wicket soon after tea but Kumble, running backwards to catch a top-edged pull from Martin-Jenkins off his own bowling, lost balance when he collided with the stumps at the non-striker’s end and messed up a simple catch. Martin-Jenkins went on to make 42, his highest first-class score of the season. He added 125 for the sixth wicket with Hodd before he was stumped down the leg side off Kumble.Hodd played Kumble confidently, driving him twice to the midwicket boundary. He calmly moved into the nineties before suffering several nervous moments on the verge of his century. Laxman, standing in for Rahul Dravid who was nursing a calf strain, took the second new ball with Hodd on 99 and Sreesanth backed up the decision with an outstanding maiden over, beating Hodd’s outside edge several times. Hodd played out 13 dot balls on 99 before RP Singh offered a loose delivery on the pads that he flicked to the square leg fence and raised his arms in triumph. Sussex declared shortly afterwards, and tested the Indians with a few awkward overs before stumps.Wasim Jaffer never looked comfortable and failed for the second time in the match when he was hit on the pad by one that swung back into him from Lewry. Dhoni, who also failed in the first innings, began aggressively by cutting Lewry twice through point for four. It didn’t last though and Lewry had his second wicket when Dhoni tried to pull a short ball that got big on him and top-edged it to Chris Nash at long leg. Dinesh Karthik and Yuvraj, promoted to No 3, took India through to stumps without further damage.