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Mahmudullah on the positive side of biosecure bubbles: “You can spend more time with your team-mates, discuss plans and strategies”

ESPNcricinfo staff02-Aug-2021No Tamim Iqbal, no Liton Das and no Mushfiqur Rahim. Bangladesh’s plans of putting it past a depleted Australia side in what is the first bilateral T20I series between the two teams have been impacted by the absence of three key batters, but they are particularly unhappy about Rahim missing out, because it’s been caused by Australia’s “stringent” demands when it comes to the biosecure bubble for the series. A day after Russell Domingo, the coach, expressed his displeasure on the matter, captain Mahmudullah, too, said he was “very disappointed” but his focus was on the series and what he and the other players could control.Related

• Bangladesh unhappy as Mushfiqur is forced out

• 'We want to play on good wickets ahead of T20 WC'

“Mushfiq is definitely one of our most crucial players, and I am personally very disappointed at not having him in the side for this series,” Mahmudullah said at a press conference on the eve of the first of five T20Is. “But, look, being a player, it’s not in our hands. The aim is to play good cricket and do well in terms of the results.”We are not worrying about it too much, because it’s not an issue we can do anything about. What has happened has happened. The only objective is to start and end the series well.”What has happened is that Cricket Australia and the Bangladesh Cricket Board had agreed to include their respective biosecure bubbles in Zimbabwe and the West Indies – where they were on tour – as part of the mandatory pre-series ten-day quarantine in Dhaka. But Rahim had to leave Harare for home after both his parents contracted Covid-19. As a result, he can’t be in the Dhaka biosecure bubble now.Some team insiders were especially irked because while Rahim wasn’t allowed to join the team, the players who have returned from Zimbabwe have had to do so after going through four airports – Harare, Johannesburg, Doha and Dhaka – with potentially greater exposure to the virus.Speaking on Sunday, Domingo had said, “I can’t understand the stringent rules Australia have placed on Mushfiq’s bubble. Ten days [on re-entering the bubble after visiting family] surely would have been enough, so [it’s] very disappointing the way they went about it.”Stressing that the absence of the three regulars would not make them bring down their expectations against a team they have never beaten in the format, Mahmudullah said the while living in biosecure bubbles was not ideal, there were some positives too.”The bio-bubble system is such that you have to accept it, there is no question of stepping out of it if you want to play cricket,” he said. So yes, it is difficult, not just for me but for everyone, who have parents, partners, children… you miss them. But, having said that, we have to accept it and move forward till we don’t win the fight against Covid.”The bubble is tiring at times. But there is a positive to it too – you can spend more time with your team-mates, you can discuss plans and strategies and your games with each other a lot more. We are together all the time, so we can bring up subjects with each other that can have a positive impact on our games, and that helps the team too.”

Two major sponsors – Vivo and Paytm – have Chinese ownership or links

Nagraj Gollapudi19-Jun-2020The IPL has convened a meeting of its Governing Council next week to “review various sponsorship deals” for the tournament following tensions this week on the India-China border. The move reflects the fact that the IPL’s main sponsors, including title sponsor Vivo, have Chinese ownership or links.While there has been tension at the border in the Indian region of Leh for some days, the flashpoint was an incident on the night of June 15; though details are scarce, the Indian government has said that its army lost 20 soldiers, including one senior officer, in the incident.Vivo, a Chinese mobile handset manufacturer, first bagged the IPL title sponsorship for two years in 2015. In 2017 Vivo retained the rights signing a five-year contract, paying about USD 341 million. Soon after, IPL also roped Paytm, the mobile wallet company, as the official Umpires Partner (an on-ground sponsor) between 2018-22 for an undisclosed amount. One of the main investors in Paytm is Alibaba, a Chinese e-commerce company.Posting a late tweet on Friday, the BCCI just said it would review the IPL sponsorship deals but did not name exactly which ones. The development comes a day after BCCI treasurer Arun Dhumal said that although the board was open to reviewing any future deals (post 2022), the current contract with Vivo was not likely to be scrapped. “When you talk emotionally, you tend to leave the rationale behind,” Dhumal told on Thursday. “We have to understand the difference between supporting a Chinese company for a Chinese cause or taking help from Chinese company to support India’s cause.”When we are allowing Chinese companies to sell their products in India, whatever money they are taking from Indian consumer, they are paying part of it to the BCCI (as brand promotion) and the board is paying 42 percent tax on that money to the Indian government. So, that is supporting India’s cause and not China’s.”The BCCI had recently postponed the IPL indefinitely due to the Covid-19 pandemic. It has already been stressed about losing close to INR 4000 crore (USD 0.53 billion approximately) in case the IPL does not take place this year. The BCCI has been waiting for the ICC to make up its mind on the men’s T20 World Cup, which is scheduled for October-November, in Australia but is likely to be postponed with the Cricket Australia preferring to host the tournament in 2021.

India went down by five wickets in the second T20I after another poor performance with the bat

ESPNcricinfo staff07-Mar-20192:35

We’ve made a shift in how to play T20s – Winfield

India needed a big effort, especially with the bat, to level the three-match T20I series against England, after losing the first game comprehensively.It didn’t quite materialise, as they only put up 111 for 8 in the face of a strong bowling performance led by Katherine Brunt, before going down by five wickets with five balls to spare as Danielle Wyatt struck an unbeaten half-century.Asked to bat, India started strongly with Smriti Mandhana hitting Anya Shrubsole for two sixes in the second over, while Harleen Deol played her part too. But Mandhana fell in the third, with the team total on 24, and in no time, India were 34 for 3.ALSO READ: Anger, guts and glory – a day in the life of Katherine BruntThough Deepti Sharma and Mithali Raj tried to rebuild, the paltry total India eventually put up was unlikely to test the English much, and it didn’t, though the Indian spinners did their best to make a match of it.Wyatt dominated a 28-run opening-wicket stand with Tammy Beaumont, and remained in control even as Beaumont’s dismissal to Radha Yadav in the fifth over triggered a slide. From 28 for no loss, they were 56 for 4 in under six overs, raising hopes of a come-from-behind win for Mandhana’s team.But Wyatt was on song, and in Lauren Winfield, she had the perfect ally to chip away at the small target.Earlier, Mandhana’s twin sixes had raised hopes of a big Indian total after they managed only 119 for 6 to lose by 41 runs in the first game. But once Mandhana fell, caught behind off Brunt, India fell apart as Brunt accounted for Jemimah Rodrigues too, and Linsey Smith took out Deol.There was a fightback, a 35-run fourth-wicket stand between Raj and Deepti, and after they fell for 20 and 18 respectively, debutant Bharati Fulmali chipped in with a 20-ball 18. But with Brunt returning 3 for 17 and Smith 2 for 11 in a clinical England bowling performance, the odds were very much in England’s favour at the halfway mark.There was a period during England’s chase, when Radha, Poonam Yadav and Ekta Bisht picked up four wickets without giving too much away, but Wyatt was supreme, coming good on her pre-match promise of performing as often as possible for England. She ended unbeaten on a 55-ball 64, exploding at the top, adopting a more cautious approach when the wickets fell, and then pacing her innings well when she paired up with Winfield.Winfield was impressive too, hitting four fours to Wyatt’s six in her 23-ball 29 before falling to Deepti with the target just nine runs away. Wyatt finished it off without any fuss.

A gift of a pair of signed wicketkeeping gloves belonging to his late father has been a happier Ashes moment for Jonny Bairstow

ESPNcricinfo staff04-Dec-2017Jonny Bairstow has found release from a troubled Ashes tour thanks to a kindhearted gesture from an Australian cricket fan who won a pair of autographed wicketkeeping gloves owned by Bairstow’s father nearly 40 years ago.Andrew Johns was a small boy when he won the gloves in an Adelaide quiz because he knew that David Bairstow was England’s reserve wicketkeeper on the 1978-79 Ashes tour.Now he has presented them to Jonny as a memento of a tour in which he has followed in the footsteps of his late father.Mr Johns tracked down Bairstow on Instagram and spent half-an-hour or more chatting with him early one morning in the England team’s Adelaide hotel.Bairstow has had a tough time in Australia, still to make a major contribution with the bat and derided for his “headbutt” greeting to Cameron Bancroft in a Perth bar soon after England’s tour party touched down in Australia.He expressed delight at “a fantastic gesture” – leaving Mr Johns to tell that Bairstow, far from being a threat to life and limb, is “a ripping bloke”, and causing fans to take to Twitter to praise “a fabulous and heartwarming story”.”He was quite emotional to receive the gloves, it was really lovely,” Johns told ABC Radio. “I just lost my father this year in June — he was 83, but had a great life — and I know if someone gave something to me that belonged to my father I’d want it, and that’s what I wanted to do for Jonny.”He’s a ripping bloke. My dad used to say if you ever meet a Yorkshireman he’s as close to an Australian as you’ll get, down to earth with a laugh and a beer and tell you how it is, and he’s exactly all of those.”Meanwhile, during a series characterised by ill will, one simple gesture might be said to have discovered the true spirit of the Ashes.

The Supreme Court has adjourned the hearing of the review petition filed by the BCCI in August challenging the July 18 order that approved the recommendations of the Lodha Committee

ESPNcricinfo staff18-Oct-2016The Supreme Court has adjourned the hearing of the review petition filed by the BCCI in August challenging the July 18 order that approved the recommendations of the Lodha Committee. The court was to consider the review petition on Tuesday, but a two-judge bench comprising TS Thakur, the Chief Justice of India, and Justice SA Bobde, decided to defer their decision. The bench is likely to hear the matter in two weeks behind closed doors.In the review plea, BCCI had called the court order “unreasoned”. It also accused Chief Justice Thakur, who was part of the two-judge bench that passed the July 18 order, of having a “prejudiced” approach and said he should “recuse” himself.On Monday, a three-judge bench of the court had reserved its order on the status report filed by the Lodha Committee asking for the removal of all the BCCI office-bearers (president, secretary, joint secretary and treasurer under the board’s existing constitution).During the course of Monday’s two-hour hearing, BCCI legal counsel Kapil Sibal told the court that his client needed at least three more months to implement the reforms suggested by the Lodha Committee. Sibal also told the court that the Lodha Committee had crossed the lines of its terms as some of its actions suggested.”It is as if the Lodha Committee wants to run cricket and that is not the purpose of its formation by this court… The committee is going beyond the judgment,” Sibal was quoted as saying by . “These are our administrative issues.”Ever since the Lodha Committee released its recommendations on January 4, the BCCI has maintained that it will not adopt some of the reforms. The BCCI then dared the court by defaulting on the first deadline of September 30, set by the Lodha Committee for the board and the state association to fulfill the first set of timelines.At the October 1 SGM, and then at an emergency meeting held last Saturday, the BCCI reiterated that it could not implement the recommendations unconditionally as ordered by the court unless it gained a two-thirds majority among the 30 state associations. The BCCI has said it is totally against some of the recommendations: one-state-one-vote, which it contends would rob votes for members that belong to states that have more than one team; having an age cap of 70 for administrators; and a cooling-off period of three years between each of the three terms allowed for an administrator.On Monday, Sibal told the court that the one-state-one-vote was a “remedy” far worse than the “disease”.”One State One Vote will lead to greater corruption,” Sibal said, according to . “You have taken away the votes of some of our founding members… those who have been deeply involved in cricket from the 1930s and given it to some States which have no infrastructure to conduct cricket. You have taken away a Bombay vote and given it to Arunachal. If you distribute votes according to territory, let’s say Nagaland where nobody is willing to spend for cricket, it will not work.”I have only one request… allow cricket to expand according to its own principles… Again, I repeat, I personally feel that the remedy will be worse than the disease… this the future will show.”

Angelo Mathews has hailed man-of-the-match Milinda Siriwardana as a “great find” following Sri Lanka’s 72-run victory over West Indies which sealed a 2-0 whitewash

Andrew Fidel Fernando in Colombo26-Oct-2015Angelo Mathews has hailed man-of-the-match Milinda Siriwardana as a “great find” following Sri Lanka’s 72-run victory over West Indies which sealed a 2-0 whitewash.”Milinda is a great find for us – he has contributed with bat, ball and on the field,” Mathews said. “He’s been a brilliant player in past couple of months in ODIs, and coming into Test arena showed no nerves at all. He was just cruising through with his batting. His bowling also came in handy, we needed someone who can bowl a few. He is more than a part-timer.”Siriwardana top-scored in a low-scoring match, striking 68 from 111 balls in the first innings, and 42 off 60 in the second. His left-arm spin was also instrumental to the win, as he took two wickets in the first innings, and three in the second to finish with a match haul of 5 for 51. Each of his victims had batted in West Indies’ top seven.Good outings in his debut T20 and ODI series in July against Pakistan had helped put Siriwardana in the Test team. He will now be considered for longer stints in all three formats.Siriwardana’s inclusion had allowed Mathews to go through the series without having to bowl himself – which allowed him to continue recovering from an ankle complaint. Having claimed two wickets in the Galle Test as well, Siriwardana has seven Test scalps at an average below 18. He has 136 first-class wickets at 30.16.”We needed someone batting in the middle order to roll his arm and Milinda has improved dramatically in the past few months with his bowling,” Mathews said. “He’s worked really hard with Piyal Wijetunga, the spin-bowling coach. The effort he put in at the nets is unbelievable. He deserves what he got today. He’s had a brilliant match and I hope he will go from strength to strength.”Siriwardana was largely chosen for his batting, although, he maintains that he would like to progress in both disciplines. He had scored 1 on debut in Galle, but said he did not allow that to dent his belief in his batting.”Batsmen do fail sometimes – that’s a normal thing,” Siriwardana said. “I didn’t think of my debut as a special game – it was just one match. I had a lot of confidence coming into this match, thanks to the practice sessions.”He had earlier set himself firmly on the path to a Test debut by hitting 1144 runs at 67.29 in the 2015 Premier League Tournament. “Earlier maybe I was considered a limited-overs player,” Siriwardana said. “But in the recent domestic season, I made a few technical adjustments and showed I could do well in the longer format as well.”I had more runs than anyone else this season. I think I got the perfect opportunity at the right time. A player should get that chance when he’s scoring runs, so I got that. I’m not disappointed I didn’t play internationals earlier.”Siriwardana also broke a key partnership in West Indies’ innings, when he had Shai Hope stumped. Hope and Darren Bravo had put on 60 together, and moved West Indies to 80 for 1 in pursuit of 244. Mathews, though, said he was not overly worried by the stand.”From the very first day the pitch had started turning, so we knew that the conditions were only getting worse,” Mathews said. “We didn’t start too well today and bowled badly, but came back into the game after Milinda got a couple of wickets. (Rangana) Herath’s two wickets in one over – dismissing Bravo and Denesh Ramdin – was crucial.”

Michael Clarke and Brad Haddin will both fly home from Delhi on Saturday morning while their team-mates attempt to fight their way back into the fourth Test

Brydon Coverdale22-Mar-2013Michael Clarke and Brad Haddin will both fly home from Delhi on Saturday morning while their team-mates attempt to fight their way back into the fourth Test. Clarke will have scans on his back in Sydney after being ruled out of the Test before play on the first morning at the Feroz Shah Kotla, while Haddin has been released from the squad after arriving in India halfway through the tour as cover for the injured Matthew Wade, who missed the Mohali Test but was fit for Delhi.Australia’s medical staff wants to monitor Clarke’s back problem, which has troubled him since he was 17, and his participation for Pune Warriors in the IPL must be in doubt given Australia’s busy winter schedule with the Champions Trophy and an Ashes tour. Clarke’s absence allowed Shane Watson to become Australia’s 44th Test captain and while Clarke was not seen on the team balcony during the day, the batsman Steven Smith said he was still active around the group.”He was given until the last point to prove his fitness,” Smith said. “Shane was given a little heads-up to say ‘prepare mentally and get yourself ready, just in case I don’t come up’. He in the end was in a bit too much pain to get into this match and there’s a lot of big series coming up and he wants to get his body right and prepare well for them. They told us this morning.”He [Clarke] was grabbing a few guys’ gloves and giving them to the boys to run out. He was trying to do his part in the sheds like he always does. It’s disappointing not to have him out there in this game.”Australia certainly missed Clarke’s batting in the first innings as their top order collapsed to 129 for 6 in challenging but far from unplayable conditions. Smith was one of only two Australians to survive for 100 deliveries – the other was the No. 9 Peter Siddle – and he said the pitch was likely to be much harder to bat on as the match wore on.”That’s probably not the day-one wicket that I’m used to playing on,” Smith said. “It’s broken up a fair bit to start up with. It’s going to get tougher and tougher to bat throughout this match and 231 at the end of the day is not a bad day I don’t think. Hopefully we can grind out another 50 or so tomorrow and I think that will be quite competitive as a first-innings score on that wicket.”

Fast bowler Ishant Sharma has been ruled out the IPL after undergoing an ankle surgery earlier this month, which is likely to keep him out of action for at least six months

Nagraj Gollapudi26-Mar-2012Fast bowler Ishant Sharma has been ruled out of the IPL after undergoing an ankle surgery earlier this month, which is likely to keep him out of action for at least six months. Deccan Chargers, Ishant’s IPL franchise, confirmed the development, saying they would now be seeking permission from the IPL for a replacement player.Ishant had been delaying the surgery for nearly a year, but finally decided to take the plunge after he returned from Australia in January, where he had played the Test-leg of the tour. Though he impressed in patches, Ishant remained inconsistent and only managed five wickets at an average of 90.20 in the four-Test series.It is understood that he had considered delaying the surgery post this IPL season, but that would have ruled him out of the home series against England, starting in November. Ishant is likely to plan his rehabilitation so that he can make a return during the home series against New Zealand, also later in the year.”The wound is likely to heal in three months’ time and he is solely focussing on that,” a source close to Ishant told ESPNcricinfo.Last year, Ishant’s India team-mate Virender Sehwag was in a similar scenario with a shoulder injury but he chose to delay his surgery. After the World Cup, he played through pain at the start of the IPL but withdrew midway through the tournament. He was ruled out of the West Indies tour and missed the start of the Test series in England.Edited by Kanishkaa Balachandran

A significant performance from Sammy would go a long way in increasing West Indies’ standing

Sidharth Monga in Dhaka03-Mar-2011Darren Sammy’s Twitter page has been quiet of late. There is no flamboyance of old. He is not talking, social-networking rather, of the honey from the comb, of slippery balls, of fine legs. To be fair to Sammy, those were the days before the West Indies captaincy happened to him. Things have changed since then. His last sign of flair was on January 10 when he tweeted: “Nurses needed@ the Sir viv stadium, windwards team will be in labor,contractions from 4pm. STARS WILL BE BORN.” And this is a tamer version of the old Sammy.It is fair to say that captaincy has mellowed down the tweeter in Sammy. It is a sign of the responsibility that captaincy of a group of islands with a proud cricketing history brings. Sammy also knows that captaincy brings with itself another responsibility: that of individual performance to be able to command the respect of a disparate team, to justify his selection as a player first. While he has successfully established a measure of control on his tweeting, the same can’t be emphatically said on the performance front.In ODIs, Sammy last took a wicket against a Test-playing nation in February 2010. As captain, he averages 75.33 with the ball and 8.5 with the bat. Then again, he is not the kind of cricketer that will be done justice to by numbers alone. Sammy the cricketer is the exact opposite of Sammy the tweeter. No one expects him to set the world on fire with either his batting or bowling. What stood out before Sammy became the captain was that he was the hard-working kind, the sensible head in a team that has now earned a reputation of not always playing sensible cricket, of not always fighting till the bitter end.Darren Sammy doesn’t have the flair, but he has the passion•AFP

Sammy didn’t have the flair, but he had passion. Then again, the first question when he was named captain was, how far passion and hard work alone would carry him. Especially when bits-and-pieces players like him don’t quite have the comfort of match-winning brilliance to fall back on. The rope is usually shorter for such players. The cold fact right now remains that Sammy bats too low for a non-threatening medium-pacer as himself to be termed an allrounder. Questions will be asked when he is the captain of the side too. In fact questions are being asked.Sammy’s response is full of the positivity that perhaps was a factor when he was named captain. “As a captain, you’d want to perform,” Sammy said on the eve of the crucial match against Bangladesh in Mirpur. “For me I always feel like I am only one great performance away. I have the right mindset to lead the team, and the team is responding, and I am aware of my own personal form. The kind of person I am, the kind of mentality I have, I am only one performance away from being at my best. That’s how I see it.”To make matters worse, West Indies have lost Dwayne Bravo to injury. Sammy says they have been using the loss of Bravo as their inspiration. It should also come as an opportunity for Sammy to push himself slightly higher up in the order, and also bowl more overs and look to take wickets with the ball. West Indies have never been ranked so low going into a World Cup, in terms of ICC ratings and expectations. The opponents generally still fear one of those Chris Gayle days, but not much else, especially with Bravo out of the equation. A significant performance from Sammy would go a long way in disproving that notion. He could tweet about it then.