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August 1, 2002
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Wisden Indian Cricketer of the Century
Former India captain Mohammad Azharuddin, one of the 16 nominees for the Wisden Indian Cricketer of the Century award, has said the organisers of the awards function asked him not to come for the function held prior to the Lord's Test, though they were regularly in touch with him in connection with the award.

"I have self-respect. I have my esteem. I wouldn't have gone anyway because I was not formally invited," said Azharuddin, who is in London to check out equipment for the state-of-the-art gymnasium he plans to set up in Hyderabad.

"It's not my loss, it's theirs. In the end, I was mentioned. They couldn't take that away from me," he says. "Kapil was a deserving winner for all that he did for Indian cricket. He created a new interest in the game as soon as he came on to the scene."

India's tour of England
Tour Match, New Road.
Worcestershire v India. No play on Wednesday due to rain.

After a heavy defeat to England in last week's first Test, India's frustration grew when the first day of their tour match against Worcestershire was ruined by rain.

The tourists had been looking to use the four-day fixture to play their batsmen back into form after the 170-run defeat at Lord's.

The top five in the batting order for that game, including Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and skipper Sourav Ganguly, have all been included in the line-up.

But torrential overnight rain never relented and left umpires George Sharp and Richard Kettleborough with no option but to call off the opening day's play at 1245BST.

The weather forecast is also unsettled for the remainder of the week in what is the only game that the Indians have before the second Test begins at Trent Bridge on 8 August.


Captain Sourav Ganguly believes his bowlers must improve their discipline if India are to win the next Test match against England at Trent Bridge.

"It was a poor Test defeat," Ganguly admitted. "England dominated all five days of the match and deserved to win.

"Nasser (Hussain) won a good toss and although we had England struggling at 78 for 3, we did not bowl well enough to create pressure on the later batsmen."

After getting of to a bad start, England managed to amass 487 in their first innings at Lord's. India could realistically only bat for a draw thereafter. When the visitors crumbled to 221 all out in their first innings, defeat stared them in the face.

"Our bowling lacked discipline, as we did not bowl to a consistent line and length. This was the difference between the England bowlers and us," Ganguly told.


India cricket legend Sunil Gavaskar believes too much one-day cricket was to blame for his country's Test defeat against England.

India were beaten by 170 runs at Lord's on Monday, their much-vaunted batting line-up failing to get to grips with an England attack missing first-choice bowlers Andy Caddick and Darren Gough.

Gavaskar said India's batting flop was due to too many players being stuck in limited overs mode and said wickets were given away cheaply by batsmen.

"... the Indian batting was still in the one-day mind-set and that's what they have to change if they want to retrieve ground in this series," Gavaskar said.

"They were dismissed playing the extravagant shots that are so much a part of one-day cricket but have to be played with a certain amount of care in the longer version of the game."


England received some welcome respite from their injury woes with the news fast bowler Alex Tudor has recovered from shin splints.

Tudor was forced to sit out of the first Test against India after suffering the injury during England's NatWest Series final defeat by India.

He made his return for Surrey last weekend with a seven-over spell against Essex at Guildford in the Norwich Union League

And he is hopeful of making the starting line-up for the C&G Trophy semi-final against Yorkshire when the rain-hit match gets underway at Headingley on Thursday.

With several bowlers troubled by injury, Tudor's availability for next week's second Test is a fillip for England as they attempt to double their series lead.


England captain Nasser Hussain has praised Test debutant Simon Jones for combining accuracy with pace, but warns that a single performance is insufficient to prove a player's class.

"He had great belief in himself," said Hussain of Jones' performance at Lord's.

"That was one of the strongest batting lineups we've come up against and Jones impressed his team-mates with everything he did."

Hussain continued, "Most importantly he put the ball in the right areas, bowled people out. It was not just short and wide, running in to bowl at 90 miles per hour.

"People usually have one or the other (pace or accuracy). He seems to have both."


He is widely regarded as the world's best batsman but after another overseas Test defeat, India is beginning to consider the hitherto unthinkable - does Sachin Tendulkar choke when it matters most?

Tendulkar was bowled through the gate for 12 attempting an uppish drive against paceman Matthew Hoggard at Lord's on Sunday, just when India were hoping he could help them save the first Test.

The problem, experts and former players say, is that it wasn't a one-off.

"One more defeat on foreign soil. One more time when Sachin Tendulkar failed to produce a quality innings in adversity," said the Hindustan Times.

"Tendulkar's greatness as a complete batsman is on test. He is prolific but not decisive."

The 29-year-old said in an interview earlier this year that he was disappointed at not winning Test matches when the team had to chase challenging fourth-innings totals.

"I have been disappointed with myself... I have to learn to finish Tests," he said.

Bangladesh in Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka win series 2-0

Sujeewa de Silva and Thilan Samaraweera took four wickets apiece as Sri Lanka won the second Test against Bangladesh in Colombo by 288 runs on the fourth day.

Bangladesh were set an ample 473 runs to win and, when they began the fourth day, had six wickets in hand.

Mohammad Ashraful was on 31 and on his way to the innings top score of 75. With him Alok Kapali had 3 behind his name. He scored another 20 runs in the best partnership of the match: 68 runs for the fifth wicket.

Thilan Samaraweera had Kapali caught by Jehan Mubarak before lunch and his dismissal sparked a lower-order collapse amongst the visitors. Within ten overs of his departure the match was over.

Although they fielded a hugely inexperienced team - three players were making their debut - Sri Lanka dominated Bangladesh. In the course of the two Test matches the visitors arguably held the advantage for two hours. The rest of the series will leave the emerging Asian team with more questions than answers.


Sri Lanka off-spinner Muttiah Muralitharan was recalled for a one-day international series against Bangladesh after being left out of the second Test.

Several other leading players including Aravinda de Silva, Mahela Jayawardene and wicketkeeper Kumar Sangakkara also rejoined the squad.

Sri Lanka fielded an inexperienced team for the second Test after winning the first Test comfortably. They also won the second match, by 288 runs.

Left-arm seamer Chaminda Vaas, meanwhile, was recalled after being dropped from the Test side following a poor tour of England.

Right-arm fast-medium bowler Chamila Gamage, one of the young players tried out in the second Test and who took a wicket with his first ball in Test cricket, was rewarded with a place for the one-dayers. The three-match series starts on Sunday.


Bangladesh's Test status is not under threat despite their struggle to compete at the top level, an official at the International Cricket Council (ICC) said on Wednesday.

Asked if the country's Test status could be reviewed, ICC corporate affairs general manager Brendan McClements told: "It's simply not on the agenda. It's not something that's being brought up at the moment."

Sri Lanka, fielding a second-string team, beat Bangladesh by 288 runs in the second Test in Colombo on Wednesday.

Bangladesh have now lost 12 of their 13 matches since being granted Test status two years ago. They were also in trouble in the other game against Zimbabwe but were saved when two days were washed out by rain.

McClements added: "We take note of their performances, of course, but that in no way suggests there's going to be any question of losing a Test playing nation.

Miscellaneous
Australia's oldest living Test cricketer, former captain Bill Brown, has used the occasion of his 90th birthday to say he dislikes the modern trend of sledging.

Brown said from his Brisbane home: "One of the key things which has crept into the game which I'm not keen about would be the sledging.

"We asked Sir Donald Bradman once about sledging and what he would do.

"He said 'I would give them one warning and if they didn't stop it they wouldn't be in the side any more' ".

An opening batsman who played alongside Bradman, Brown completed 22 Tests, scoring 1,592 runs at an average of 46.82 including four centuries.


Lord MacLaurin will not seek re-election as chairman of the England and Wales Cricket Board, he confirmed on Wednesday.

MacLaurin cited pressure from business interests - he is also chairman of NatWest and Vodaphone - as a factor in his decision to stand down after six years.

He told: "Cricket has got some very difficult times ahead of it and with the best will in the world I couldn't devote the necessary time to it.

"I have a lot of friends in cricket and I didn't want to let them down."

"I have many other interests and my work for Vodafone is increasingly time-consuming and has to take priority."

MacLaurin's decision is likely to start a battle at Lord's over the next month for one of the most powerful jobs in English cricket.

Nominations for the position close on 27 August, and a new chairman will be confirmed on 4 October.


Gary Kirsten is like one of those old-fashioned boxers, who can take hundreds of punches and just keeps coming back for more.

Such was his form last summer that the selectors dropped him, replacing him with a precocious young upstart, who duly fulfiled his promise and grabbed his chance.

"Graeme Smith came into the side to replace me and performed extremely well. As I see it, he will open with Herschelle (Gibbs)," said Kirsten.

The 34-year-old veteran of 174 one-day internationals, has not given up on playing the shorter form of the game, despite being excluded midway through the series against Australia.

"I'm still very much interested in playing both forms of the game. For anyone, it's really a dream to play a world cup."


South African cricket captain Shaun Pollock will not attend the last training camp of his team ahead of one of the longest and most gruelling seasons ever. The camp will begin in Centurion on Thursday.

A spokesperson of the United Cricket Board of South Africa said that Pollock will only return from Birmingham, where he plays for the English county Warwickshire, next week. The same goes for the all-rounder Nicky Bojé who plays for Nottinghamshire.

Allan Donald and Paul Adams returned from England in time for the four-day training camp. The 15-man touring squad will depart for Tangiers next Thursday to take part in the triangular series against Sri Lanka and Pakistan.

Pollock and Bojé, like Donald and Adams, also missed last month's first training camp in Centurion.

Design: Imran Shaikh


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