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A big Newcastle United transfer claim has emerged on Renan Lodi heading into the summer transfer window…

What’s the talk?

Journalist Jacque Talbot has revealed that the Premier League side will not have to pay €40m (£34m) in one go to sign the Brazilian full-back ahead of the 2022/23 campaign.

He Tweeted: “Was told before €40million was the figure but that Newcastle’s bid for Lodi could be structured in a way that meant it wouldn’t have to be entirely the full amount up front. In January heard there was nothing in Yannick Carrasco but interesting his name keeps coming up.”

This was in response to a Tweet from Atletico Universe on the defender’s price tag: “Atlético Madrid would be willing to let Renan Lodi leave as long as the offer is not less than €40m. As for Yannick Carrasco: release clause (€70m) or nothing. €70m is an amount that is perfectly acceptable for Newcastle. [@JaviGomara @mundodeportivo]”

PIF will be delighted

PIF will be delighted with this claim as it means that they can spread the cost of the deal over the course of a number of windows.

Instead of needing to pay all of the £34m up front and taking a large chunk of their budget away, they can pay it in instalments to lower the initial cost. This could then allow them to use the money they save in this window on other targets in order to avoid going over any FFP limits.

Whilst £34m may seem like a huge signing on paper it may not be the case on the books if they are able to make several payments over time. This would be a cost-effective way of completing the deal for PIF and allow them to do more business in other areas of the squad.

Lodi would be an excellent addition to Newcastle’s team as he has an attacking threat from left-back that can make him an exciting player for the fans to watch.

In Europe’s top five leagues and European competitions over the last year, the full-back ranks in the 94th percentile for non-penalty goals per 90 and the 91st percentile for assists per 90 in his position. This shows that he excels at bursting forward from the back and is capable of both scoring and assisting goals.

Supporters can, therefore, look forward to seeing him race up and down the left flank if PIF can strike a deal for the defender.

AND in other news, Newcastle now plotting bid to sign maestro with 128 PL apps, just imagine him & Bruno…

West Ham United are ‘definitely’ eyeing a marquee Premier League star who manager David Moyes personally wants, according to talkSPORT journalist Alex Crook.

The Lowdown: Moyes eyeing fresh faces…

The Scotsman, aiming to maintain his side’s quite remarkable rise since nearly being relegated two years ago, quite simply must strengthen his West Ham squad for the 2022/2023 season.

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A striker, centre-half and midfielder are reportedly on the agenda in east London and the Hammers apparently have their eye on a marquee addition for the latter position.

The Sun believe Moyes personally ‘wants’ Leeds United star Kalvin Phillips but his club could demand as much as £60 million to let him go.

The Latest: Crook makes definitive West Ham claim…

Speaking to GiveMeSport, talkSPORT reporter Crook says that the Irons are ‘definitely’ eyeing a move this summer.

He explains:

“Kalvin Phillips, I think, has a decision to make. He might go either way and West Ham are definitely keen on him.

“It would offer him the chance to play in European football alongside Declan Rice and really cement that relationship ahead of maybe replicating it at the World Cup.”

The Verdict: Make a move…

The England international would be a more-than ideal fit to upgrade Moyes’ options in the middle.

Lauded as a would-be ‘perfect’ signing by former West Ham favourite Frank McAvennie, Phillips has been a pivotal figure for Leeds when available.

He’s averaged the joint-second most tackles per 90 for the Elland Road side over 2021/2022 whilst also completing the third-most dribbles, backing just how composed and assured he can be in midfield (WhoScored).

While £60m could be a hefty price to pay, it would certainly display real intent on behalf of West Ham and GSB.

In other news: ‘Discussions will start’ – West Ham insider shares major update as GSB eye plan fresh talks, find out more here.

The Australian fast bowler is happy to use the lack of game time to fine tune his skills and focus on staying fit

Varun Shetty in Hyderabad19-Apr-2019Billy Stanlake should be restless. He was not a part of Australia’s World Cup 15 announced earlier this week. He has lost his annual contract with Cricket Australia and, currently with Sunrisers Hyderabad, who recruited him last year, Stanlake has played just four IPL matches – none of them this season.But the six-foot-eight Queenslander, who former Australian captain Ricky Ponting has lavishly praised for having the ability to finish among all-time great fast bowlers, is anything but restless. Instead, he is happy to keep himself motivated by doing his gym routines and bowling in the nets.Stanlake came to the fore with his performances in the Big Bash League for Adelaide Strikers, for whom he took 19 wickets in 17 matches through his first three seasons, a period during which he was picked in the Australian ODI squad.

“Once I wasn’t a part of the Australian squad that toured over here [India] a couple of months ago, I sort of knew that I was probably out of contention for the World Cup.”Billy Stanlake

However, he hasn’t had an ideal last 12 months or so, with ODI chances drying up, a difficult BBL season, where he took 11 wickets at an economy rate of 9.07, and, most recently, the loss of his central contract.It hasn’t helped that batsmen might have figured out how to deal with his unique trajectory.”Yeah, obviously they probably know I’m coming to bowl that hard length at good pace. It’s something over the last 12 months that I’ve worked on, is my change-ups. Put a lot of work into it and it’s starting to come out quite well now,” Stanlake told ESPNcricinfo in Hyderabad. “Some of them I’ve used in international cricket last year, which I seemed to have success with. I think it’s about staying ahead. It’s about being able to use it every now and then and keep the batsmen guessing.”A dimension of having his unusual release points and trajectory is that the change-ups can also be different from those who bowl conventional lengths. Almost every fast bowler in the Sunrisers camp has a knuckle ball, something Stanlake confessed to not having figured out. The change-ups, in his case, have been more old-fashioned and understated.”It’s just a subtle change of pace. It doesn’t need to be too drastic,” he explained. “Just whether it be a legcutter to a right-handed batsman so you get the ball going away, of the offcutter to a left-handed batsman. I have tried to take the ball away from the batsman.”But having access to someone like Bhuvneshwar Kumar, who has built his limited-overs reputation on being effective both with the new ball and at the death, has had some benefits for Stanlake. Having rediscovered his aggressive streak while on tour in Zimbabwe last year, Stanlake has learnt about the mental aspect of sustaining that aggression through the game from Bhuvneshwar.Billy Stanlake bowls against Pakistan•AFP”I think Bhuvi is sort of a great example for someone who hits his length in the Powerplay. He’s really one of the best going around at hitting his good length,” Stanlake said. “Sometimes you can fall into the trap bowling with the new ball – if you’re hit for a boundary – of going away and getting too defensive and trying to hit that yorker. That’s when you start to lose your rhythm and start leaking runs.”It’s definitely happened [to me] before. Sometimes you can get defensive too quickly, which sometimes is the best thing for the batter. It’s about realising whether it was a good ball or a bad ball. If you get hit for a boundary off a good ball, you can accept that. It’s about going back to the mark and executing the good ball again, because most times if you’re executing good balls and they’re taking the risk to hit that good ball for a boundary, you’re going to create opportunities. So it’s about summing up whether it was a good ball or bad ball quickly, and not getting too defensive early.”A persistent attacking length is something Stanlake has been able to work on recently, having played in two – of his four – Shield games for Queensland in March. Having made his first-class debut in 2015, the going has been somewhat slow on that front for Stanlake, whose budding career has been stop-start so far with injuries.Stanlake said that he hadn’t expected a World Cup call-up anyway, and having reconciled with that, is now back on track for his biggest long-term goal: staying fit.”Look, no, I wasn’t surprised,” Stanlake said of the World Cup selection. “I saw it coming. Once I wasn’t a part of the Australian squad that toured over here [India] a couple of months ago, I sort of knew that I was probably out of contention for the World Cup. Obviously it was disappointing, I would have loved to be part of the World Cup squad. Just got to get back to being better, there isn’t much I can do.”Always a goal in mind is to stay fit. [I] just sort of got back to playing a bit of red-ball cricket back home, so hopefully this year I can play more of that again. And obviously I’d love to get back into that Australian side.”

Vijay Shankar has had to deal with several injuries, a surgery and months of recovery, but is fresh and ready to tackle the rest of the season

Arun Venugopal24-Feb-2017If you were to graphically illustrate Vijay Shankar’s career over the last seven months, it would take the form of an N – a sharp surge followed by a steep fall before another surge. Between the two ebbs that saw him go from being in top form – a breakout Ranji Trophy season in 2014-15 was followed by solid performances for India A – to being regarded as one of the country’s leading all-rounders and Tamil Nadu’s limited-overs captain, he went through what he called the most difficult phase of his life.A knee surgery to repair a meniscus tear and a grade-four patella injury rendered him unfit for India A’s tour of Australia in August last year and kept him out of the game for nearly three and a half months. During that period, he watched Hardik Pandya, who replaced him in the India A squad, resurrect his career in Australia and find a place in India’s ODI and Test squads. What hurt Vijay most was that for close to two months, all he could do was watch.It hadn’t been a straightforward decision to get operated upon in the first place. Vijay’s left knee had troubled him for a while, but he got through the IPL with cortisone injections in the hope of playing a few games. But, Sunrisers Hyderabad’s successful march to the title meant there weren’t too many changes to the first XI, and consequently Vijay had to play a part as a substitute fielder. After being picked for the India A team, Vijay thought he could play through pain but discovered it was harder than he had imagined.”Right after the IPL, we played a lot of cricket in Chennai. The effect of the cortisone wore off – once it goes away, you start feeling the pain,” he told ESPNcricinfo. “That was when we had a week-long training camp in Bangalore ahead of the A tour. I found that I couldn’t do anything. I went for another MRI and they said I have to go for a surgery so that I would be better at least during the middle of the Ranji Trophy.”It was very disappointing, but I would have found it difficult to give my best on the tour. Obviously if I am playing with pain, it will be at the back of my mind and affect my game. I spoke to a few people – my parents, physios and [India A coach] Rahul Dravid – and was really confused whether to take another injection and go and play in Australia, or get the surgery done as early as possible. It was a difficult call, but everyone suggested that I go for a surgery which was a long-term relief.”Vijay underwent surgery on July 18 and after a month’s rest, reported to the NCA in Bangalore for rehabilitation. With so much cricketing action around him, he felt miserable he wasn’t part of it. It was Rajinikanth, the trainer at NCA, who helped him lighten up.”The two months that I was at the NCA was the most difficult thing,” Vijay said. “It was very difficult for me to watch a cricket match on TV, especially as there was a persistent feeling of missing something. But cricket was everywhere: there was some Test match in the morning, the Duleep Trophy and the Tamil Nadu Premier League – I missed the whole tournament for Lyca Kovai Kings – in the evening. So anytime you change the channel, you would end up watching cricket.”What I missed more at the time was the experience of playing in Australia. But, being with Rajinikanth helped take my mind off from all these things. Whenever he would see me get a little uncomfortable watching cricket, he would say: “Kavala padadha da thambi. Namma nalla train panni we will get better (don’t worry, brother. We will train hard and get better) and immediately take me out to take my mind off cricket. In fact, I have spent a lot of time with physios and trainers over the last few months. I have been lucky to have trainers Rajamani, Rajinikanth and Ramji Srinivasan and physios Kannan and Thulasi; they have given me so much time.”Vijay Shankar only played a part as a substitute fielder in Sunrisers Hyderabad’s successful 2016 IPL campaign•BCCIVijay admitted he had let negative thoughts creep into his mind in the past and he didn’t want to repeat the same mistakes. His only recourse, therefore, was to train hard. The desire to return to the Tamil Nadu fold for the 2016-17 Ranji Trophy season drove him to push the limits. He would even go to Chennai during the weekends and spend time with his personal coach S Balaji and the Lyca Kovai Kings franchise. “During the 2014-15 season when TN reached the Ranji final, I had a fractured finger and other problems after the first few games,” he said. “Despite having a decent first-class average, I was still in and out of the side. So, obviously there was the fear that if I didn’t score in a game I wouldn’t play the next game and so I was restricting myself and not playing my natural game.”I then decided that I should not think about what would happen if I didn’t perform. The only way to get out of the negativity is to train hard. When you are tired after training, you don’t have any energy to think; you just want to sleep.”Vijay could only pack in only ten batting sessions before the start of the Ranji Trophy. He missed the first three games, but was ready for the Madhya Pradesh game, where he scored a run-a-ball 41. But, his misfortune with injuries continued as he hurt his knee while fielding against Baroda. He missed the next game, but returned to play the remaining games to finish with 312 runs from seven innings, including a century and a fifty, at an average of 52. Vijay also smashed an unbeaten 103 off 81 balls against Bangladesh in a tour game.Such exertions came with a price as Vijay had to live with a few niggles. While he couldn’t bend his leg on the morning of the Punjab match, he retired hurt during his innings against Gujarat before returning to complete his hundred. “They say it is quite normal to get niggles after surgery,” he said. “No matter how much I strengthen the surrounding muscles around the knee, if I am going to play a four-day match after a long time there would obviously be some impact. I needed to do some glute-activation work and pressure-release work to ensure there was no stiffness. I had to keep working on strengthening surrounding muscles and getting it better.”The upshot of the rehabilitation process was that Vijay developed a greater understanding of his body. “In the past, whenever I had a niggle, I would ignore it and let it heal on its own. Now, I tell the physio that I am facing some difficulty,” he said. “In the past, I would train full throttle. Now, after the surgery, I have realised that it is important to give my body sufficient rest.”It is understood that the selectors rate Vijay as one of the top four or five all-rounders in the country. They also expect him to bowl a lot more. Vijay finished with seven wickets in the Ranji Trophy, including an impressive spell of 4-59 against Mumbai in the semi-finals.”Obviously if I start bowling more, I will get better. To bowl more, I must be effective whenever I get to bowl – it doesn’t matter if it is the 40th or the 100th over,” he said. “I should start bowling more not just in the Ranji Trophy, but also in the TNCA league. Obviously this year has been a little difficult with the injuries; I have lost my run-up and my stride has become longer. I am working on those aspects. From that perspective, I am happy I did well in the semi-finals.”His hundred against the touring Bangladesh side earned him the praise of MSK Prasad, the chairman of the selection committee, but Vijay didn’t want to get carried away. “During the Bangladesh game, I went in to bat at No.8. I never thought I will get to bat because I was slotted in at No.8 and other batsmen were already scoring big runs. But I got a chance and made use of it.”The good thing about me over the last few days is I am not putting any pressure on myself. I don’t wait for someone to appreciate me for what I am doing. I don’t know how I have got this habit, but I try to play one match and give it my best – it doesn’t matter which level of cricket I am playing in. It gives me satisfaction that I am not thinking about others, not competing with others. I am just trying to do well and get better as a cricketer everyday.”Having led Tamil Nadu to four wins in five games in the inter-state T20 tournament, Vijay said he enjoyed the challenges of captaincy and was looking forward to finishing games for the team. “Only when you start winning finals will people realise that players from Tamil Nadu are doing well,” he said. “In the last two years, I played for India A because I did well in the knockouts. Only when we get into the knockouts do people start watching. That’s how we get better as a team and better as individuals.”

Batsmen from both sides made a turning Mohali surface look worse than it actually was, but the cricket it produced was one-dimensional. A series of this stature deserves a greater variety of skills to be on display

Sidharth Monga09-Nov-2015No India player wants anybody to talk about the pitch in Mohali, but there will be talk when a match finishes in three days. There was talk about Old Trafford (India 152 and 161 against England’s 367) too, but it was just a quick surface with good bounce. There was talk about The Oval too, but on the same seaming pitch on which India failed to score a total of 250 in two innings, their bowlers allowed England to get 486. The sheer volume of voices and scrutiny when India are playing at home can be huge and perhaps suffocating for the players, but there is a hint of a victim mentality that India need to get out of, that when they do badly overseas nobody analyses the pitch.There is a reason pitches are not always analysed when India lose. In 2012, just before England came to India, Virat Kohli, the captain now, asked for turning tracks for the series, and spoke of the “green tops” India had played on during their tours of Australia and England. What India actually got in Australia in 2011-12 were traditional Australian pitches: slow with slight seam in Melbourne, slightly green with spin later in Sydney, fast and bouncy in Perth and flat in Adelaide. Australia scored 333, 659 for 4 declared, 369 and 604 for 7 declared in those Tests. In fact India’s two Test wins outside Asia in the last six years have come on green tops: Lord’s last year and Durban 2010-11.The surface in Mohali wasn’t what you would call a hopelessly bad pitch where batting was impossible. It was perhaps not a fair contest between bat and ball, but it is okay to let it side with the bowlers once in a while. The Indian team, from what they have been saying in the press, didn’t read the pitch as a turner raging enough to allow them to play just four bowlers. They felt it wouldn’t be as easy to take the 20 wickets as it turned out.On official parameters, the pitch answered in the negative to all the questions you ask of a bad pitch, or a pitch reportable to the ICC. Did it pose a physical threat to the batsmen? No. In fact the ball only stayed low. Did you still get out if you played good defensive shots? No. All six India specialist batsmen that fell to spin got out because they were too far from the pitch of the ball. A bad pitch is one where you get reasonably close to the pitch of the ball, and it still jumps up and hits your glove or flies up for a bat-pad catch, or stays low from a similar spot.Of course a turning pitch plays on your mind and suddenly you are not so sure while leaving the crease to get to the pitch of the ball, but still the batting in the match didn’t do the assessment of the pitch any favours. South Africa carried the threat too far, and batted as if it was impossible to survive on it. Had India scored 350 or upwards – and the India of the 2000s probably would have – there wouldn’t have been much fuss over the pitch anyway.Daljit Singh, the head groundsman in Mohali, also said this was a 23-year-old pitch, a tired pitch. The square has not been relaid since the ground was built in 1992. There is every chance, if there was less turn, for the pitch to have veered to the other extreme. If this match ended two days too soon on a turner, we might have needed two extra days for a result on a non-turner. A Test match that is close until the early exchanges of the fourth innings, even if it ends in three days, is better than a boring draw. Also, as MS Dhoni used to point out, such a pitch, turning from day one, almost takes the toss out of the equation.There are two minor issues, though. Home advantage is good, but not always do visiting teams face home advantage to an extent that the pitch is a combination of almost two different surfaces. The middle of the pitch was absolutely flat and devoid of any bounce. The good-length areas were rough, offering turn. One hopes there was no Ranji Trophy-like foul-play to it, where different areas are rolled differently depending on the opposition’s strengths and weaknesses.The other, slightly bigger, issue is purely from a spectator’s point of view. You go to a Test match expecting proper ebbs and flows, periods where batsmen have to work hard to survive, periods where bowlers have to work hard to take wickets, of waiting for a new ball, of waiting for a ball to lose its shine, of waiting for a pitch to break up. The time it takes for the drama to unfold is what makes Test cricket perhaps the closest thing in sport to life. The match that we saw in Mohali was disappointingly one-dimensional. Again the batsmen should take part of the blame for it.R Ashwin is in the form of his life. The ball is coming out beautifully from his hand. It is dipping and drifting late. He is beating batsmen in the air often. He says he doesn’t need any pitch to help him turn the ball. He says this might border on arrogance, but really it doesn’t. He doesn’t need this pitch to help him take wickets. It does him disfavours that his ball to Hashim Amla in the first innings – which dipped alarmingly on him as he left the crease – might end up being just one of the 35 wickets all and sundry spinners took in three days.There was a tiring sameness to what happened. One such Test in a while can be thrilling to watch, but a series full of these will not offer any great joy. This was a series, as Ravi Shastri said, to be looked forward to. It should not end up being one-dimensional like the one India played in New Zealand in 2002-03. Hopefully the batsmen and the groundsmen will lift their game.

Having slipped off the rails, Liam Plunkett found the simple philosophy he needed at Yorkshire and is now set for a menacing role in England’s attack

David Hopps11-Jun-2014Yorkshire have handed a rejuvenated Liam Plunkett to England with a heartfelt message. Please keep it simple. He is the fastest bowler in England this season: let him show it. He needs to attack: let him do that, too. And please, no messing with his technique or his mind.The days when England bowling coaches could barely look at a quick bowler without wanting to dismantle an action have long gone. David Saker, the current incumbent, prefers to concentrate on tactical approaches rather than intricate analysis of actions – and his problems trying to solve the quandary of Steven Finn in Australia should only have hardened him in that view.That conservative approach should leave Yorkshire and Plunkett confident that England will leave well alone. Their appeal has common sense behind it. Memories of Plunkett at the lowest point of his career are of a bowler beset by technical doubts, anxiously re-enacting his delivery position as he walked back to his mark: wrist cocked, arm pushed through, thoughts troubled. It virtually forced him into premature retirement.As his career went off the rails, so too did his personal life as he suffered two convictions for drink driving – the second of which, reduced to 30 months on appeal – will leave him off the road until early next year.Plunkett’s gratitude to the faith shown by Yorkshire’s caches runs deep. Martyn Moxon, who had seen his potential close hand when director of cricket at Durham, brought him to Yorkshire when the message from some Durham coaches, Alan Walker foremost among them, was that his best days were behind him. Jason Gillespie, a former Australia fast bowler, then arrived at Headingley and the uncluttered philosophy that Plunkett needed was established.”The coaching staff have given me a simple clear vision, which is to run in and bowl fast,” Plunkett told Yorkshire’s website after learning of his selection while returning from a golf day for Tim Bresnan’s benefit year.”I’m not over complicating things. I’m just concentrating on generating as much pace as possible and being as aggressive as I can be in the middle. It is working and is really benefiting my game. I hope that I can reproduce that for England this summer.”I have to thank the coaches and the players at Yorkshire for having faith in me as a cricketer. Before joining Yorkshire, I was going nowhere and coming to Headingley gave me a new lease of life. I have benefited from a change of scenery and from a coaching team that has put faith in my ability. They gave me the confidence to believe in my ability and to go out and perform. I owe it to them for this return to the Test team.”Plunkett is the England bowler expected to rough up Sri Lanka, to bowl at 90mph and make things happen. He will leak runs, just as Finn did, and England’s seeming willingness to accept that fact suggests a slight shift of emphasis from the attritional seam bowling championed under the previous coach, Andy Flower. There again, Flower had Graeme Swann as an attacking force.Making things happen at Lord’s is not always easy. Plunkett has painful personal experience of that. Three of the nine Tests of his youth have been at Lord’s and brought him five wickets at 82 runs each. Eight years ago, Sri Lanka saved a draw by scoring 537 for 9 in their fourth innings with the ninth-wicket pair Chaminda Vaas and Nuwan Kulusekara putting on a century stand.

The endless weights sessions that used to take his mind away from his problems, now supply the strength that has made him the fastest bowler in England.

Seven years on from his last Test, Plunkett – and the England selectors – will draw sustenance from his hostile bowling at Lord’s in Yorkshire’s Championship match against Middlesex. As he cranked it up beyond 90mph, it was then that England’s enthusiasm for recalling him took shape. Nothing has been easy for Plunkett at Lord’s though: Middlesex made their highest successful run chase in the fourth innings – 472 for 3 with Chris Rogers striking a double hundred and Plunkett unrewarded as, oddly, he bowled only bowling 13 of the 101 overs. He says he likes Lord’s, but Lord’s has not often returned the favour.Only two years have passed since Plunkett was relegated to Durham’s 2nd XI. Control had deserted him and so had his pace. But the decline had set in much earlier. David Graveney, the former chairman of selectors, was a great fan and on one occasion late in his term of office looked around the Chester-le-Street press box for support for his conviction that Plunkett remained an unfulfilled talent. The next ball flew miles down the leg side for four wides. Graveney left the box to light-hearted derision.”We thought Liam still had something to offer otherwise we wouldn’t have signed him,” Moxon said. “But his re-emergence has been quicker than anyone would have expected. It just shows that when someone with natural ability is confident and relaxed in his game, that is when you get the best out of them. It’s a lesson for everyone that they try to create that state of mind.”Our message to Liam from day one has been to run in and bowl fast. Once he starts thinking about technique and line and length he puts it there. And once he just puts it there he loses pace and rhythm and flow. There are many bowlers whose actions might not be technically perfect but who succeed because they feel strong and natural.”That spell at Lord’s attracted a lot of attention, but he has maintained that hostility all summer. It was no flash in the pan. He did well last year, but this year he has really unsettled batsmen.”The endless gymnasium weights sessions that during his lowest periods seemed to bring him comfort, to take his mind away from his problems, now have a purpose, supplying the strength that this season has made him the fastest bowler in England.”Liam will benefit from the encouragement of being able to run in, bowl fast and hit the track hard and be really positive with the bat in hand as well,” Gillespie told . “I’ve told Liam he’s not going to get it right and land the ball on a shoebox every time you bowl. You’re going to have an off one and batters are allowed to play good shots and they’re allowed to score runs – that’s what the game is all about.”I think the key if Liam plays is how he’s used. If he’s used as a line-and-length bowler who doesn’t go for too many runs then you’re not going to get the best out of him. If they tell him to run in, bowl fast and back him 100 per cent then that’s the best way to go.”

Neatly-arranged kit bags. Clean-shaven players with neat hair. These might have little to do with winning games, but they offer an insight into what sort of a regimen South Africa’s Under-19 cricketers follow

George Binoy in Townsville19-Aug-2012On the eve of the quarterfinal in Townsville, South Africa coach Ray Jennings predicted his team would score 240 and then dismiss England for 180. It was a bold prophecy to make because apart from backing his batsmen and bowlers to do significantly better than England’s, at a venue South Africa had never played at, he was also forecasting who would bat first.As it transpired, South Africa made 244 and then bowled England out for 141. For a team that arrived in Townsville only on Friday after playing their group games in Brisbane, and practised on Saturday after which they spent a few minutes assessing the pitch, South Africa were clinical in the execution of their skills.After taking a look at the wicket at Tony Ireland Stadium, South Africa’s captain Chad Bowes had said it was more South African than English, but he still had to bat on it when conditions were most difficult – early in the morning against the new ball. And apart from opener Quinton de Kock, who drove at a wide delivery without moving towards it, the other top-order batsmen were disciplined in their shot selection until they ensured South Africa had survived the opening hour without much damage.Discipline. This South Africa squad has that quality. Before leaving for practice on Saturday, they had arranged their kit bags in incredibly orderly fashion in the lobby of their service apartments. Those bags were in order while at the nets as well, which hasn’t been the case with some of the other teams. The South African players are almost always clean-shaven and tidy, with neat hair. Unusual behavior for teenagers. These off-field habits might have little to do with winning games of cricket, but they offer an insight into what sort of a regimen South Africa’s Under-19 cricketers follow. It has Jennings’ stamp on it.”He [Jennings] has his set of values and disciplines and if we go out of line, we get nailed,” Bowes said. “It’s important for us to stay with him during the process. The more we do that the better it is for us growing into our cricket careers.”For most part of their innings against England, South Africa batted with a calm other sides have not when sent in at Tony Ireland Stadium. Theunis de Bruyn and Murray Coetzee, who both played for Northern Under-19s before making the step up to the national side, in particular were responsible for South Africa getting as far as they did. That they didn’t go farther was down to a couple of moments of indiscretion – de Bruyn getting bowled to a poor shot and Shaylin Pillay attempting a scoop that landed in the wicketkeeper’s gloves.”Batting today under those conditions, the guys were able to do that,” Jennings said. “We came through the tough period. I think there were one or two really poor shots, or we could have got 270 to 290. But I suppose that happens with the 19-year olds.”[The performance] is pleasing but again, if we don’t continue to play good cricket, we’re going to get disappointed along the way. We’ve worked hard on certain consistent skills and the guys did deliver today on the skills we worked on. But I look ahead and look what happens on Tuesday.”South Africa did not have it easy after scoring 244. After losing Daniel-Bell Drummond early, England had a 100-run partnership for the second wicket, during which Alex Davies and Ben Foakes knocked it around and built a platform from which to accelerate from. South Africa’s bowlers, however, did not let them score quickly.”I went in with an open mind and a plan to build up dot balls,” said offspinner Prenelen Subrayen, who began bowling after Davies and Foakes were well set and conceded only five runs in his first four overs. “If a wicket came it was a bonus for me.”The wicket came in his fifth. Foakes had hit a six and a four off Pillay but when he tried to steer Subrayen, he edged behind. It was the opening South Africa needed and Subrayen said they “used that to kill them [England] off.” Nine wickets fell for 39 runs.Tim Boon, the England coach, said they had enough batting options after Foakes to see the chase through and credited South Africa for their performance in a pressure situation. “We were a little bit behind the run-rate but with wickets in hand, you always know you can catch up. But when you lose wickets in quick succession the pressure builds up. They bowled very straight, extracted some bounce, they made us work very hard and they built the pressure on us. Today we didn’t hold our nerve under pressure.”Jennings said the bowlers had shown maturity in not losing their plans while England were going well. “We worked quite a lot on handling pressure and not panicking,” he said. “With England having a good start, I think they lost about seven wickets for 25-26 runs. That shows we did have the patience and we stuck to our game plans.”Having qualified from perhaps the toughest group in the league stage – Group D also had Sri Lanka and Bangladesh – and beating England in the first knockout, South Africa will play Australia in the semifinal. Their skills and disciplines will be tested all over again.

So the home side lost, but the fans at Centurion weren’t complaining – too much

Guy Snelling23-Sep-2009Choice of game
South Africa were playing and the opening match of any tournament is always worth watching. If I were a gambling man, my money would have been on South Africa, and indeed I still had hope for them until Jacques Kallis lost his wicket.Team supported
I’m a Protea supporter and I still believe that we can win this tournament. The team will learn from the mistakes made today and will work to move forward.Key performer
Tillakaratne Dilshan. He outplayed the South African opening bowlers, Wayne Parnell in particular, and his 106 off 92 balls was well deserved.One thing I would have changed about the match
I would have had South Africa play a few warm-up matches before the tournament. They hadn’t played for a few months and the practice could only have helped.Wow moment
Dale Steyn’s wicket of Dilshan, caught by Albie Morkel when Steyn was re-introduced at the Hennops River End was a turning point, as were Parnell’s consecutive wickets of Mahela Jayawardene and Thilan Samaraweera.Player watch
We were sitting in the stadium in the area of long leg to a left-hand batsman and the players near us were the fast bowlers of both sides. Due to the “moat” at Centurion, it is impossible to get autographs, but the partisan crowd applauded both Steyn and Johan Botha. Lasith Malinga managed to avoid any heckling until his “wide” bouncer to Botha. After that the crowd set up a chant against him.Shot of the day
Kallis’ high four on 15, immediately followed by Graeme Smith’s low flying rocket to the boundary on 17 really got the crowd going and were probably the best shots of the South African innings.Crowd meter
It was a weekday match and the stadium started off only about half full, but it filled up slowly as spectators got off from work. By that time, though, Sri Lanka were well up on their score, so the crowd was very subdued. There was the occasional Mexican wave and isolated pockets of cheering and singing that kept the buzz going and most people had a good time. It was a partisan crowd but there were a number of Sri Lankan flags flying nevertheless, and all the spectators applauded the good Sri Lankan shots and fielding.I saw a few people in green-and-yellow body paint and a couple of topless guys running round in skirts.There was a group of four- or five-year-old girls smartly dressed in pink and white, dancing and waving their South Africa flags and 4/6 cards whenever they got the opportunity, much to the delight of the nearby spectators.Entertainment
There are going to be a number of competitions running during this tournament during the innings breaks. We were entertained with the Reebok “Hit the Stumps” competition, where lucky spectators can win cash prizes of up to R 100,000 for hitting the stumps from the boundary. There was also a Dress Like a Champion” competition, where the winner got to take home a Honda motorcycle.Unlike the cheerleaders of the Twenty20 competitions, we had African dancing and drums for each wicket and six. A nice idea, but I thought it was somehow out of place in the environment of a cricket stadium.ODI v Twenty20
I think that South Africa has been spoilt by the amount of Twenty20 that we’ve been exposed to this year. This was my first live ODI in a long time and it did seem to drag at some stages. It obviously lacks the speed of Twenty20, but the match did get exciting, and I look forward to the rest of the tournament.Dale Steyn provided some relief•Getty ImagesEnhanced viewing
I didn’t take too much with me in the way of food, but I did have field glasses to view the action and the crowd, and also my cellphone, with which I logged on to Cricinfo to get clarification on scores and plays.Marks out of 10
On a scale of 1 to 10, where the South Africa v Australia 438 match was a 12, I would rate this one 7. There was some excellent cricket played by both sides, but the domination by Sri Lanka put a dampener on the local crowd.Outplay of the day
It seemed to me Sri Lanka beat South Africa by their bowlers’ ability to bowl to their field. Sri Lanka were able to easily score boundaries during their opening Powerplay, but when it was their turn to bowl, they stacked the field on one side and the bowlers bowled to that side. Consequently South Africa found it hard to find the gaps, and even when they did, the sweeper was perfectly positioned to prevent a boundary.

At one stage, UP Warriorz needed 32 from 24 balls, and then 11 from nine, but fell short by two eventually

S Sudarshanan24-Feb-20243:06

Five-star Asha too good for UP’s inexperienced batting

Five needed from one ball – that was the requirement on the opening night of WPL 2024, and it was the same on the second. While Delhi Capitals could not defend that, Royal Challengers Bangalore did, and got their campaign off to a winning start in the backdrop of a ballistic home crowd at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium.Once again, it was an unheralded Indian player who shone the brightest – Sobhana Asha’s five-wicket haul derailed UP Warriorz’s chase of 158 to help RCB defend a total for the first time. They had never managed to do so in four attempts in the first season.At one point, Grace Harris, who scored 38 off 23 balls, threatened to take Warriorz home but Asha’s spell had them falling short by two runs.Asha, the hopeHer Twitter handle is ashathehopejoy; Asha translates to hope. She was a figure of hope and excitement in Bengaluru, changing the game twice. After Sophie Molineux dismissed Alyssa Healy with a peach, Vrinda Dinesh and Tahlia McGrath added 38 off 41 balls. When the pair tried to break free, Asha had Vrinda stumped for 18 off 28. A couple of balls later, she castled McGrath who tried to sweep a ball that was too full.Harris and Shweta Sehrawat put the chase back on track by adding 77 in just 46 balls. With 32 required from four overs, Smriti Mandhana turned to Asha again. She delivered a triple-wicket over, dismissing Sehrawat, Harris and Kiran Navgire to complete her five-for and send the jitters in the opposition camp.Sobhana Asha is pumped up after dismissing Tahlia McGrath•BCCIThe Harris-Sehrawat showSehrawat is coming on the back of a successful domestic season where she was Delhi’s leading run-getter in the Senior Women’s T20 Trophy while striking at 122.45. Warriorz were 49 for 3 in the ninth over when she joined Harris in the middle. While Sehrawat took her time on a used pitch, Harris kept the scoreboard ticking.Harris hit legspinner Georgia Wareham for back-to-back fours in the tenth over before smashing Asha for a six in the next. She managed to find the boundary regularly before Sehrawat attacked Ellyse Perry. A couple of balls after slapping one through cover-point, she deposited a back-of-a-length ball over deep midwicket. Harris then sent Molineux into the deep-midwicket stands to end the 15th over. All that sequence meant Warriorz scored 30 in two overs.Meghana steadies RCBThe decibel levels soared when Mandhana hit a six and a four off successive balls in the second over after RCB were sent in. But they soon lost Sophie Devine lbw to Grace Harris, who opened the bowling, for 1.From there on, S Meghana took over. Her intentions of taking the aerial route with the field up were clear from the moment she walked in. Once she got her timing right, she hit Harris for three fours in the fifth over. She had luck on her side as well – Sehrawat could not grasp the ball after a diving effort at deep midwicket when Meghana was on 16, and McGrath shelled one in the seventh over when the batter was on 22.Richa Ghosh bludgeoned her way to a 31-ball half-century•BCCIMeghana showed why she is regarded highly with her footwork, especially against the left-arm spin of Rajeshwari Gayakwad. She hit her only six off Gayakwad – a loft over extra cover – before completing a 40-ball half-century. But in the 17th over, she gave Gayakwad the charge and was stumped.Ghosh ups the tempoDespite losing their third wicket in the eighth over, RCB did not hold Richa Ghosh back. Curbing her aggression, she focused on rotating the strike and her first couple of fours were more touch than power. She moved steadily to a run-a-ball 16 before WPL debutant Saima Thakor’s second over helped her cut loose.Ghosh pummelled the seamer for four fours in the 14th over to send the ball to different parts of the ground – through backward point, over mid-off, between long-on and deep midwicket and through square leg, respectively. A little later, she hit five fours across two overs from McGrath on her way to a 31-ball half-century.Despite that, Warriorz gave away only 32 in the last four overs, and if not for Ghosh’s blitz, RCB might have ended well below 150.

Rohit Sharma has warned India against rushing Jasprit Bumrah back into action and hopes the fast bowler will recover sufficiently from injury to be available for the last two Tests against Australia in March.Bumrah was on his way back to the ODI side for the home series against Sri Lanka earlier this month, having recovered from the back injury he suffered prior to the 2022 T20 World Cup, when he sustained a new glute injury and was withdrawn from the squad. India’s team management is being particularly cautious about Bumrah’s fitness in the lead-up to the ODI World Cup in India in October-November later this year.Related

• Bumrah undergoes back surgery in New Zealand

• Bumrah set to miss IPL 2023

• New-age Rohit tears up old ODI template

• Rohit and Gill outdo Conway as India go No. 1 with 3-0 win

• Stats – Rohit equals Ponting, Gill equals Babar

“About Bumrah, I’m not too sure at the moment, of course for the first two Test matches he’s not going to be available,” Rohit said after India swept New Zealand 3-0 in the ODI series. “I’m expecting that; not expecting but hoping he plays the next two Test matches but again we don’t want to take any risk with him. The back injuries are always critical. We have got lot of cricket coming up after that as well, we will see, and we will monitor. We are in constant touch with doctors and physios at NCA and we are constantly hearing from them.”Bumrah has been on the sidelines since September last year because of a stress reaction in his back and was rehabilitating at the BCCI’s National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bengaluru. He had been advised rehab for a minimum of six weeks and was making gradual progress; he resumed training on November 25 and bowling on December 16 at the NCA. But the emergence of a new injury set him back further, putting him in doubt for Border-Gavaskar series as well.

Rohit shrugs off rhetoric around recent ODI form

Rohit has expressed his displeasure at the rhetoric around his recent form – or the lack thereof – in ODI cricket. In the third ODI against New Zealand in Indore, Rohit scored 101 off 85 balls, his first ODI hundred since January 2020, to set India up for a 3-0 series win. When asked about the three-year gap between ODI hundreds, Rohit explained that he had played fewer ODIs in the last three years, with T20 World Cups in 2021 and 2022 taking top priority during that period.

• Replay of the third India vs New Zealand ODI is available on ESPN Player in the UK, and on ESPN+ in the USA in both English and Hindi.

“I have played only 12 ODIs in three years,” Rohit said. “Three years sounds a lot, but in that three years I have played only 12 or 13 [17] ODIs, if am not wrong. I know it was shown on the broadcast, sometimes we need to show the right things also. Last entire year we didn’t play ODI cricket, we were focussing on T20 cricket a lot. [We should pay attention to such things, the broadcaster, too, needs to check these things].”? [I don’t understand what you mean by my return]. You are saying three years, out of which eight months we all were completely home due to Covid-19. Where were the matches happening? And in the last year we have just played T20 cricket. In T20 cricket at the moment, other than Suryakumar Yadav anyone else is batting better; he has hit two [T20I] centuries, I don’t think anyone else has scored a century. In Test cricket, I have played just two matches against Sri Lanka. Otherwise, I was injured in between. Please check all that and after that you can ask me [about my form].”Rohit Sharma has been batting more aggressively in the powerplay•BCCI

While Rohit hasn’t been scoring big hundreds of late in ODI cricket, he has gone harder and faster in the powerplay, which has allowed his partners to ease themselves in. India’s head coach Rahul Dravid, who has tracked Rohit’s career from his Under-19 days, had praised about Rohit’s evolution as an ODI batter on the eve of the third ODI.”He has been a phenomenal cricketer, and I think he obviously started off as this really precocious talent,” Dravid said. “I remember seeing him for the first time when he was 17 or 18 – [he] just came out of Under-19s – and you could see that you’re looking at something slightly different here. And he has gone on to prove that. You look at a lot of kids who look different at 19 but not all of them go onto actually achieve their potential. What Rohit has done over the last 15 years I think now has actually changed his potential and he’s been a great servant for Indian cricket and has done really well.”Maybe, like you said, the turning point was when ten years ago he got the opportunity to finally open. And really his hallmark has obviously been his performances in ICC tournaments, like we said in 2019, but also his ability to score big runs when he gets going. Someone who has got three double-hundreds in this format is an absolutely phenomenal achievement.”