India in South Africa

South Africa continued to pound India into submission on the third day of the third and final Test. India appeared lackluster and uninterested given the circumstances surrounding the match. Pollock (113 not out) and Kallis (110) helped themselves to hundreds as the hosts piled up 566-8 before rain stopped play early.

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An emergency meeting of the BCCI on Monday is to decide if the BCCI will obey the ICC ruling over banned Indian batsman Virender Sehwag. The issue over whether Sehwag should play the first Test against England at Mohali beginning on December 3 will be taken at the emergency meeting today. The ECB insist Sehwag will not be eligible to play.

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Former BCCI chief Raj Singh Dungarpur today in a chat show to a television channel disclosed that the BCCI had threatened to pull out of the World Cup if the host nation did not remove Mike Denness as match referee.

Zimbabwe in Bangladesh

Zimbabwe wrapped up the 3-match one day series in Bangladesh with a convincing 42 run victory in Dhaka yesterday. The target of 309-6 was always going to be difficult for the hosts to chase, but they put up a good show to end up at 267-9 in 50 overs. The third and final one-day will be played at Dhaka today.

West Indies in Sri Lanka

Hosts Sri Lanka finally managed to exorcise the ghosts at Kandy by pulling of a thrilling 131 run victory over West Indies.
The match was a closer fought wicket than the result indicates as West Indies held on for dear life under fading light chasing 322 for an unlikely win.
With Dillon (19), Collins (0) and Sturat (0) falling to Murali the West Indies collapsed to 190 with 37 balls to spare and in fading light. Astrologers had advised against holding the second Test match after Sri Lanka lost its third concecutive match at Kandy to India earlier this year.
The table below does show Sri Lanka's poor record at this venue.

1 22nd Apr-26th Apr 1983 SL v Aus Aus won by inn & 38
2 9th Mar-14th Mar 1984 SL v NZ NZ won by 165 runs
3 14th Sep-19th Sep 1985 SL v Ind drawn
4 23rd Feb-27th Feb 1986 SL v Pak Pak won by inn & 20
5 17th Jul-22nd Jul 1993 SL v Ind drawn
6 26th Aug-28th Aug 1994 SL v Pak Pak won by inn & 52
7 7th Jan-11th Jan 1998 SL v Zim SL won by 8 wickets
8 9th Sep-11th Sep 1999 SL v Aus SL won by 6 wickets
9 28th Jun-2nd Jul 2000 SL v Pak drawn
10 30th Jul-2nd Aug 2000 SL v SA SA won by 7 runs
11 7th Mar-11th Mar 2001 SL v Eng Eng won by 3 wickets
12 22nd Aug-25th Aug 2001 SL v Ind Ind won by 7 wickets

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The West Indies team, however were an angry lot at the end of the Test following the dismissal of their star batsman Brian Lara. Lara (45) was playing confidently and was given out wrongly caught off a bumped ball at short leg immediately after tea. Coach Roger Harper said he was disappointed as Lara's was a crucial wicket.

Miscellaneous

India's veteran fast bowler Javagal Srinath has been ruled out of the entire three Test series against England beginning at Mohali on December 3.
Srinath who injured himself on his left hand while batting will require surgery and recuperation time. Srinath will stay on in South Africa until next week when the famed Johannesburg based orthopaedic surgeon Mark Ferguson will operate on him

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In the first major upset of the Indian domestic season Gujarat beat last season Ranji champions Baroda by 9 runs on the last day of their league encounter at Baroda.
For the visitors right arm pace bowler Lalit Patel claimed 6-77 and the defending champions tumbled to 227 all out in their second innings.

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The CBI has charged underworld don Babloo Srivastava for using a mobile phone from inside the jail to criminally intimidate people and extort money.
Babloo had reportedly contacted people to force them to put money on cricket matches going on. The charge sheet filed states that Babloo Srivastava threatened two persons Peer Chand and Dilip Jain and forced them to collect details of cricket matches, scores, fall of wickets etc and pass them on to the accused.

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The visiting England team management clarified that it had at no stage threatened to withdraw from the tour of India following the controversial punishments given to six Indian cricketers. The team's media manager David Clarke said that ECB chairman Lord MacLaurin had been misquoted and he had never at any stage threatened to pull out of the India tour.

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Former England skipper Michael Atherton said he felt that match referee's were totally unnecessary. He felt it would make more sense to give more powers to the on field umpire. He was quoted as telling a British newspaper "good and sensible referees were in a distinct minority. Most were petty and weak".

SCORES AT A GLANCE

India vs South Africa (3rd Test Unofficial, Day 3)
Played at Centurion
Toss: South Africa

India: 232-9 (SS Das 46, D Dasgupta 36, A Kumble 27, Harbhajan Singh 29; Hayward 4-74)
South Africa: 566-8 (H Gibbs 59, G Kirsten 90, J Kallis 110, N McKenzie 33, S Pollock 113 not out, M Ntini 34 not out; J Srinath 2-94)

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West Indies vs Sri Lanka (2nd Test, Day 5)
Played at Kandy
Toss: Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka:
288 (M Jayawardene 88, H Tillekeratne 87; S Collins 4-84, M Dillon 3-55, D Ramnaraine 3-75)
224-6 decl (M Atapattu 84, S Jayasuriya 55, K Sangakara 45; D Ramnaraine 4-66)
West Indies:
191 (C Gayle 44, B Lara 75; C Vaas 4-57, Muralitharan 4-55

190 (R Sarwan 48, B Lara 45, M Samuels 54; M Muralitharan 6-81)
Result: Sri Lanka won by 131 runs
Man of the match: M Muralitharan (SL)

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Australia vs New Zealand (2nd Test day 5)
Played at Hobart
Toss: New Zealand

Australia:
588-8 decl (J Langer 123, M Hayden 91,Ponting not out 157, A Gilchrist 39, SK Warne 70; D Vettori 5-138)
New Zealand: 243-7 (M Richardson 30, S Fleming 71, C McMillan 55; J Gillespie 3-45)
Result: Match Drawn.

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Bangaldesh vs Zimbabwe (2nd ODI)
At Dhaka
Toss: Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe:
309-6 (D Ebrahim 121, S Carlisle 44, C Wishart 68; M Mortaza 2-48)
Bangladesh: 267-9 (Habibul Bashar 66, Sanwar Hossain 52, Khaled Mahmud 50)
Result: Zimbabwe won by 42 runs
Man of the match: DD Ebrahim (Zim)

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