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Two-time World Cup-winning captain Ricky Ponting has backed Steve Smith to come out of his "indifferent" form as Australia gears up for the much-anticipated tour of India early next year, saying there is nothing wrong with the star batter's technique. Ponting reckons the opposition teams may have found ways to put brakes on Smith's free-flowing batting.
Pakistan at the Arena Birmingham on Friday. Unlike cricket or hockey, where the atmosphere is electric, the Indian shuttlers are expected to ease past Pakistan. While the Indian squad boasts of big names, Pakistan have struggled to field a team. It is learnt that their federation has named only a four-member squad with world No. 175 Mahoor Shehzad being their highest-ranked player, in women's singles. None of the other players figure in top-500. India should top Group 1. Pakistan, Australia and Sri Lanka are the other teams in the group.
India are still some distance away from becoming world beaters but all the players who are here for the Commonwealth Games have bought into an idea suggested by all-rounder Pooja Vastrakar during the Sri Lanka tour last month. Harmanpreet, who began her all-format captaincy stint with the Sri Lanka series, feels a ruthless approach is needed even when the chips are down. "During the Sri Lanka tour, we had a meeting with the players.
Pakistan captain Babar Azam has been in stunning form with the bat across formats, but on Thursday, he found himself involved in a horrendous mix-up that led to the run-out of teammate Fawad Alam. The incident happened on Day 5 of the second Test between Sri Lanka and Pakistan at the Galle International Stadium. Fawad Alam drove a ball towards mid-on and took off for a single, but Babar Azam at the non-striker's end was caught ball-watching, and when he realised Fawad was half-way down the pitch, he first looked to start off for the run but then sent his partner back.
Cricket South Africa (CSA) and scheduled to get underway in January next year. Around 10 cricketers from the Caribbean islands, 10 from Sri Lanka and close to a dozen names from England have come on board. Meanwhile, TOI has learnt that Cricket Australia (CA) is in the process of handing Big Bash contracts to their leading white-ball cricketers including David Warner, Steven Smith, Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Cameron Green among others.
Here are the five talking points from the Pakistan tour: 1) Skipper Babar Azam extended his prolific run of form to almost single-handedly drive the tourists in the two-match series. Azam's knocks of 119 and 55 powered the team to an opening win after they chased down a Galle record of 342. He hit 81 in Pakistan's mammoth chase of 508 in the second Test but it was a lone fight against an inspired Sri Lankan spin attack.
Jayasuriya claimed his fourth five-wicket haul in just his third Test to star in Sri Lanka's 246-run win to end the two-Test series level at 1-1 in Galle. He only made his debut, aged 30, earlier this month and the left-hander made an instant impact with a match haul of 12 wickets in a Sri Lanka victory over Australia. Jayasuriya's 29 red-ball wickets from his first three Tests is joint second in the all-time list, behind Indian leg-spinner Narendra Hirwani, who took a leading 31 in his first three Tests.
Sri Lanka spinners made up for their shortcomings in the first Test as they crushed Pakistan by 246 runs in the second Test in Galle to level the series 1-1.