The fun never ends

A ban ban revoked on Sri Lanka's rebel cricketers for joining the Indian Cricket League (ICL) may again be re-imposed upon them according to Sports Minister Gamini Lokuge.

Minister Lokuge said he was left in the dark when the ban was lifted and had all the right in the world to overturn the ruling by the interim committee running Sri Lanka Cricket that was installed by him in January this year.

"I don't want our board to be against the Indian Cricket Board or the ICC (International Cricket Council). I have invited the board members for a meeting (Tuesday or Wednesday) to convince me about their decision (on revoking ban). The decision by the interim committee was not taken with my consent and I am entitled to re-impose the ban", Minister Lokuge said

The Sri Lanka Cricket interim committee president Arjuna Ranatunga, who is currently in England, refused to answer a telephone call for comment but is likely to attend the meeting called by the Sports Minister after returning to the country on Tuesday, it is learnt.

Meanwhile there is speculation that Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa who is currently in New York had spoken to Minister Lokuge and ordered him to summon cricket officials for an urgent meeting.

According to a source, either the Indian Cricket Board chief and politician Sharad Pawar or Indian Premier League (IPL) commissioner Lalit Modi, may have requested President Rajapaksa to call on Minister Lokuge to summon Sri Lankan cricket officials for their explanation on lifting the ban on the five players.

The IPL is a rival tournament to the ICL.

Minister Lokuge also reiterated his concern for an election of officer bearers to Sri Lanka Cricket. "I want to hold the election as the interim committee can't be run like this. But we also have to find a suitable date", the Minister said.

Ranatunga’s younger brother Sanjeewa is married to the sister of Marvan Atapattu who was one of the five players to have their ban lifted.

The other four players are Russel Arnold, Saman Jayantha, Upul Chandana and Avishka Gunawardena.

Arnold had however retired in 2007, a year before the ICL started.

MVP

54/207

6-1-35-1

31*/168

9-0-38-1

148/305

4-0-26-0

It will be a travesty of Yusuf Pathan doesn't front up against England later this year.

The Mumbai cap!

Sairaj Bahutule, the former India legspinner, has been named in this season's Mumbai probables. Bahutule, 35, recently returned to his native team after a three-year stint with Maharashtra.

Isnt this the same Sairaj Bahutule who left Mumbai for Maharastra in 2005

The Maharashtra Cricket Association (MCA) has finally put an end to the speculation surrounding transfer of players to their state by selecting Sairaj Bahutule, the former Indian legspinner, Nilesh Kulkarni, the former Indian left-arm spinner, and Munaf Patel, the Mumbai fast bowler, for the forthcoming season.

ostensibly because

"friction with the establishment and a greater monetary allure probably prompted his decision to end a 15-year career with Mumbai and move on to neighbouring Maharashtra. "

And isnt this the same Sairaj Bahutule who was Mumbai captain the previous season?

And isnt this the same guy who dumped Maharastra in 2006

Former Mumbai legspinner Sairaj Bahutule's decision to quit Maharashtra and return to the city of his birth has run into criticism from local cricket authorities. Ajay Shirke, the Maharashtra Cricket Association [MCA] chief, has hinted at a potential legal tussle following Bahutule's decision to quit after just one year.

and was sidelined with injury and legal troubles in 2007?

And yet, he now finds himself in the Mumbai probables.

Contrast this with the other spinner Mumbai has, another Mumbaikar with longstanding service for the great city

When they learned that Kulkarni, who is currently playing league cricket in England, had indeed been offered a contract by ICL, and was dilly-dallying over whether to sign or not, and reportedly asked for a few days time before he made up his mind, Mumbai's selectors made theirs up. They dropped Kulkarni for the Nissar Trophy match, replacing him with Mundeep Mungela, the medium-pacer.

and did not pick him till the must win game against Saurashtra last year.

And the previous year

As things panned out on the eve of the game, Kulkarni was in the XI when coach Praveen Amre and chief selector Dilip Vengsarkar finalised the squad. But minutes before the official list was handed over to the officials, Mumbai decided to play one spinner Ramesh Powar and four seamers.

So let me understand this - a long standing servant of Mumbai cricket is treated like dirt by the selectors while a turn coat finds himself in the probables list as soon as he is available?

And if the intent in sidelining Nilesh Kulkarni was to blood Iqbal Abdulla, what sense does it make to bring in a 35 year olf leg spinner battling injuries?

Is the Mumbai cap really that cheap or are the selectors trying their darndest to devalue its worth?

PS:- On the Mumbai Cricket website, it reads

As per the instructions from Mr. Dilip Vengsarkar, Chairman, Selection Committee, the following players are being included in the list of probables for practice nets for Mumbai Team.
1.	Sairaj Bahutule
2.	Nilesh Kulkarni
Hemant Waingankar Jt. Hon. Secretary & Convenor

whatever that means!

Hello Dolly!

Stanford rejects Digicel contract offer

Cricinfo staff

September 20, 2008

The row between the West Indies Cricket Board and its major sponsors, Digicel, rumbles on after demands made by Digicel in relation to the forthcoming Stanford 20/20 for 20 were rejected by the Stanford organisers.

The board has been at loggerheads with Digicel regarding branding for the Stanford tournament for some time, culminating in Digicel taking out injunctions at London's High Court.

Digicel proposed a three-point compromise to the WICB earlier this month, and on Thursday Stanford officials sent back a counter-offer stating that they would not do any deals with Digicel's competitors, would pay all Digicel's costs, and would give the company some branding rights at the 2008 event.

However, the latter point was rejected out of hand, with Digicel maintaining that it wanted the same branding on Stanford Superstars shirts as it has on the full West Indies shirts for the next five years.

The main disagreement comes over the status of the tournament. Digicel maintains it is an official WICB event with a representative national team, and as such, under the terms of its contract with the WICB, that would give it full branding rights. Stanford insists that it is an unofficial team and, as such, is outside any existing WICB-Digicel agreement.

"The Superstars team is selected solely by Stanford 20/20 and Stanford 20/20 is not willing to gift to Digicel valuable rights to which it is simply not entitled and which Stanford 20/20 intends to sell as part of a presenting sponsor package for the Stanford Super Series," a Stanford spokesman said, accusing the telecommunications giant of continuing "to insist on receiving commercial rights to the Stanford Super Series which are way in excess of its contractual entitlements".

This is how we do contrite

Not a damaging loss

It must take something special to be the first Indian team to lose the Md Nissar Trophy (that too, at home) and not offer one word of apology for the people who followed your fortunes.

Kudos Mr Chopra, you have been coached well.

Music to Ranatunga's ears

"It's a message that the game is not ruled by any single body, and nobody should try to rule the game."

The wrong fight

Duleep Mendis, the chief executive of SLC, told Cricinfo the board's interim committee took this decision at a meeting following a request from the cricketers. "The interim committee has allowed these ICL players to play in domestic cricket after they sought permission to do so. This decision refers to a specific application from a specific group of players to take part in domestic cricket," Mendis said. He refused to comment on whether similar waivers would be granted in future to cricketers who take part in subsequent editions of ICL -- the league's second season starts on October 10.

"Players will be allowed to play for their respective clubs and share their expertise, but cannot represent the country," Shane Fernando, the Sri Lanka Cricket media manager, told AFP.

Interesting choice of words by Duleep Mendis... Not a blanket amnesty for ICL affiliated players but just enough to pique the BCCI..

But, if as has been widely reported in the media subsequent to this development, that this is the first step in the SLC standing up to the BCCI, I believe the SLC has picked the wrong fight..

Not because they are taking on the BCCI, but because the cause itself is self defeating.

The SLC, like the BCCI, is a monopoly. And like all monopolies, it will walk the extra mile to preserve status quo.

Granting an one off pardon to a set of players is one thing, making it de jure, quite another. Because, just as easily as the ICL was formed, an alternate cricket structure can take shape in Sri Lanka.

One that will act as a magnet for disgruntled players.

And once that happens, the next time someone says 'Selectors are muppets headed by a joker', the SLC will be able to do exactly nothing.

The great Fall blockbuster

not the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, but this

I concur

AR: Now to the question that you have picked as the best one that has come in for you this week. Sandip from the United States wants to know: should MS Dhoni be made India's Test captain? He says that Anil Kumble has been captain of the Test side for a few months now and Dhoni has been the captain for the one-dayers and Twenty20 matches for a similar amount of time. It is very evident that Dhoni has matured tremendously in a short span of time. Is the time ripe now for the Indian selectors to politely replace Kumble with Dhoni as captain of the Indian Test team for the upcoming series against Australia?

GB: My answer to that is simple: no. There has never been a wicketkeeper-batsman who has been a successful captain in Test cricket over a period of time. Occasionally a wicketkeeper has captained an odd Test match. But to do everything, like dealing with the press, wicketkeeping, and batting day after day, match after match is too difficult.

Let me explain to you: stand in front of the mirror, go down on your haunches and come back again. That is what the wicketkeeper does, for 90 overs a day, for 540 balls, plus the throwing and the extras, and so you go up and down about 600 times a day. Most of you will be lucky if you can do that 50 times in front of the mirror. It is very tiring. On top of that, you have the mental situation of having to work out in your head between balls who is going to bowl, what will be the field positions, and still catch the ball if it comes to you.

What has happened in the past when wicketkeepers were captains is that they were concentrating too much on where the fielders should be and who is going to bowl next and so they started dropping catches. I have great respect for Dhoni and I think he has done a wonderful job in one-day cricket. He probably could captain in Tests too but it's just that his position as wicketkeeper makes it all difficult when you add it together.

In one-day cricket, you only have 20 overs or 50 overs to keep wickets - three and a half hours at most to keep wickets. Then he gets a couple of days off. In Test cricket there are no days off. It lasts for five days solid. You have done one innings and then you have to do a second innings. Then you probably get three days off before another Test match because administrators are shoving Test cricket and one-day cricket in as much as they can. Now on top of that, they are shoving in as much Twenty20 cricket as they can. So it is going to get very difficult. It is not that Dhoni can't do it mentally; it is not that he isn't up to the challenge. I think he is, he is very knowledgeable, but it is his position as wicketkeeper that makes it very difficult to encompass captaincy and keeping wickets well.

Clutching at straws...

AUSTRALIA'S hopes of inflicting early pain on India in the Border-Gavaskar series were given a major boost, with the first Test expected to be played on an upgraded fast and bouncy pitch.

News flash, Jon - Bangalore is home to Anil Kumble, captain of the Indian Test Cricket team. And Anil Kumble is a spinner. And unlike Nagpur in 2004 where Shashank Manohar was opposed to the then BCCI president Jagmohan Dalmiya, the KSCA is completely on side with Sharad Pawar..

So, expect a wicket with bounce, because that will bring our spinners to play.. But dont rule out a turner, because we are going to play up our strengths and highlight your weaknesses, not vice versa.

Thank you Delhi...

Sui Northern Gas Pipeline Limited 266 (Shehzad 66, Umar Akmal 58) beat Delhi 134 (Kohli 52, Imran Ali 6-52) and 516 for 4 (Chopra 182, Kohli 197) on first-innings lead

The two previous editions of the Mohammad Nissar Trophy, instituted in 2006, had been won by Indian teams - Uttar Pradesh in 2006 and Mumbai in 2007.

You spineless bastards!

The Champions Trophy

When initial reports came in about India not playing ball with the ICC's plan of hosting the Champions Trophy in Pakistan in October of 2009, it was played up by the media as Indian intransigence, never mind the fact that the proposed dates clashed with India's series against Australia - a series that was a part of the FTP.

David Hopps, in the Guardian, characterized it thus -

As if providing proof that cricket does not want to listen, on the very day that Trescothick's autobiography was launched, the International Cricket Council was beset by more unsustainable scheduling as India undermined the rescheduled Champions Trophy itinerary for October 2009 with grandiose plans of its own. Greed - of players and administrators - silently eats away at the health of the game and those who play it.

It is with this in mind that I read the following article on the Cricinfo website

Chances of the Champions Trophy being held in 2009 appear to be brightening with intense discussions on the issue between ICC officials and those of its member boards over the last few days opening up "2-3 options". One of those options will be finalised when the governing body's executive board meets next month, Cricinfo has learnt.

Salient amongst the points made was this

"There is no question that all the boards would like the Champions Trophy to happen," Shah told Cricinfo. "But you can't expect only India to adjust its dates for that. We are willing to look at an adjustment by a few days if everyone else involved is equally flexible."

and this

According to the governing body, the "primacy of ICC events was restated" during its board meeting in Dubai on September 11 to discuss the dates, but sources said that an interesting sidelight of the discussions was that no board appeared keen to see the Champions Twenty20 League affected to accommodate the Champions Trophy.

But what really made me sit up and take notice was this paragraph

The Indian board may be open to facilitating a window from around September 20-30 by pushing back the dates of the Champions Twenty20 League and the Australia one-day series by a few days. For that to happen, England and Australia will have to tweak the dates of their one-day series, the New Zealand-Sri Lanka engagement has to be looked at and, crucially, the ICC may have to compress the span of its tournament. But while Shah said that "even the ICC has to be flexible", there are no signs of an update from England, where the line of thought within the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) at the moment seems to be that it is a question for the ICC to answer and that "the ball appears to be with others".

First, the security excuse.. Now, not a word on rescheduling the Natwest Trophy or revisiting the itinerary. Nothing. Nada.

And they say it is India that is undermining the Champions Trophy!

No no no no no no

No!

No Peter no... You are expected to bag the opposition players, not your own.

And Malcolm, it is the opposition who has a popgun bowling attack, not your own.

This is, by far the weirdest build up to the Gavaskar-Border trophy since its inception - former Indian player bagging the opposition captain, Aussie journalists downplaying their team AND bagging their own... What next, Ishant Sharma naming his bunnies?

This is not how the script goes..

Ponting will fail: India's Borde

Isn't it the prerogative of former Australian players to make pre-series statements like these?

Favourable coverage returns...on Cricinfo

ESPN Star Sports (ESS) has bagged the ten-year rights for the Champions League Twenty20 with a bid of $900 million, making it the highest value cricket tournament on a per game basis.

DIC was next in contention with a bid of $751.3 million, marginally higher than the floor price fixed at $750 million. Abu Dhabi Sports Club's was disqualified for being a conditional one.

ESS' global rights until 2017 are all-inclusive including TV telecast, sponsorship, mobile and new media.

No more snarky quote unquotes from the "Cricinfo staff", I would assume?