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The Pakistan cricket team for next month’s tour to England will benamed on Tuesday evening, officials said, adding that the announcementof the coach will be announced later.The chairman of selectors Wasim Bari said Monday that he was informedby the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) that all the players were declaredfit by the panel of doctors and were now available for selection.Bari, however, said the team would be finalized and handed over to thePCB on Tuesday. He said he would be submitting a 16-man squad for thetwo-Test series while team for the tri-nation oneday series would benamed later.Bari indicated there was a possibility that an additional player mightbe sent to England.As things continued to remain complex and intriguing, former captainsWasim Akram and Moin Khan were left facing the axe in the backdrop ofrecent happenings.Wasim Akram, after a dismal performance in the two Tests againstEngland at home, failed to take part in the three-Test series againstNew Zealand because of inter-coastal injury. Nevertheless, sources sayskipper Waqar Younis was strongly opposing the selection of Wasimthough the vote of the chief selector was in the left-armer’s favour.Rashid Latif is being favoured over Moin because of Waqar’s firmbelief in the talent of the former who first blew the whistle ofbetting and match-fixing in Pakistan cricket.Not surprisingly injury prone and joy-rider, Shoaib Akhtar has onceagain been assured of a place in the squad after returning unfit fromthe tour to New Zealand in February. Brig Rana admitted that Shoaibneither appeared before the panel of doctors nor played in the ongoing one-dayers on the pretext that he was suffering from stomachupset.Likely 16:Waqar Younis (captain), Inzamam-ul-Haq (vice-captain), Saeed Anwar,Yousuf Youhana, Abdur Razzaq, Azhar Mahmood, Mohammad Sami, FaisalIqbal, Younis Khan, Mohammad Wasim, Imran Farhat, Rashid Latif(wicketkeeper), Shoaib Akhtar, Fazle Akbar and Mushtaq Ahmad, SaqlainMushtaq.

South African opener Gary Kirsten will have left Kingsmead in a foul mood on Friday evening after losing his wicket one ball before play was called off for bad light at the end of the first day’s play in the third and final Castle Lager/MTN Test match against Australia.Kirsten was caught off a glove down the leg side as he faced Brett Lee’s 140km/h plus thunderbolts in uncertain light. He went at 48 for one as play ran nearly an hour overtime and just one ball later, after South Africa had sent Paul Adams in as nightwatchman, umpires Dave Orchard and Srinivas Venkataraghavan, both members of the ICC’s elite umpires panel, called the players off the field.It was a poor decision to have kept the players on as the sun dropped behind Durban’s Berea and before the floodlights had taken full effect. The South Africans will not have been amused, particular after Kirsten and Herschelle Gibbs had made a solid start to their reply to Australia’s 315 all out.The loss of Kirsten aside, South African will have been relatively well pleased with their position after asking Australia to bat. Opinion at Kingsmead on Mark Boucher’s decision was divided, but many thought he had chosen to field first in order to keep his batsmen away from Australia’s bowlers.As it turned out, there were few devils in the Kingsmead pitch and more than one Australian batsman had only himself to blame for his dismisssal. There was an early breathrough for South Africa as David Terbrugge struck with the first ball of his comback Test match to remove Justin Langer at 11 for one and for once Matthew Hayden went relatively cheaply, caught at slip off Jacques Kallis for 28.But Ricky Ponting, who finished off the Newlands Test on Tuesday by hitting a six to reach his hundred, was in awesome form, middling the ball from the word go. He looked quite capable of doubling his Newlands effort as he and Mark Waugh added 108 for thje third wicket and then South Africa had one of those moments that sometimes change the directions of Test matches.Waugh pushed to cover and called for a single, Ponting went and Gibbs threw down the wicket at the striker’s end to catch Ponting short on 89. It was an unnecessary risk and Australia were quickly made to pay for it. Waugh was caught at slip off Kallis nine runs later and then Paul Adams had Steve Waugh caught at slip for just 7, the third time in as many innings that the Australian captain has got out cheaply to the left-arm spinner.Australia had slipped from 169 for two to 182 for five and South Africa were in the game. But, of course, Adam Gilchrist had still to bat.The left-hander lost Damien Martyn for 11, had some support from Shane Warne who made 26 in a 57-run stand for seventh wicket and again looked invincible as he stormed to 91. Then he hit Adams to Graeme Smith at deep square leg to be out for only the second time in the series.Gilchrist has now scored 457 in this series at an average of 228.5. Only two Australians have scored more runs than him in a three-Test series – Matthew Hayden who compiled549 at 109.8 against India last year and Mark Taylor who scored 531 at 128.25 against Pakistan in 1998/99.Australia, then, were finally all out for 315, their lowest total of the series and it would have been a very good day for South Africa, relatively speaking, had Kirsten made it through to the close.

Match facts

October 19, 2012
Start time 1730 (1530 GMT)Morne Morkel is the leader of an attack that can otherwise look weak•AFP

Big Picture

Delhi Daredevils have looked the best IPL side in the tournament, and they will be the favourites against Auckland Aces, but many a team has learned the hard way that you take Aces lightly at your own peril.If Daredevils win, though, and win it big, they will be pretty close to qualifying for the semi-finals. They have carried good net run rate from the big win against Kolkata Knight Riders, and a second win will put them in a strong position in the group. Kevin Pietersen, who had left for meetings with England team director after the win against Knight Riders, is expected to be back in time for this game, and he will be buoyed by having settled his differences with the England team.Aces, on the other hand, had their excellent run of wins rudely interrupted when they came up against group leaders Titans. They have won many a fan by winning both their qualifiers, and also their first game, but they can ill afford a defeat. Having camped in the Highveld well before the tournament, they have played there as if it’s their own backyard, but they struggled in Durban. They will hope they catch their opponents similarly unawares when Daredevils play their first game at Kingsmead.

Watch out for…

Azhar Mahmood, with 137 runs at 68.5 and 10 wickets at an economy rate of 6.57, has been Auckland’s highest wicket-taker and their highest run-getter, and easily one of the best players in the tournament. Auckland will look to him to provide inspiration against the much-fancied opposition.Daredevils’ top order has been the talk of the town, but Morne Morkel is equally important to their chances in the tournament. He leads an attack that can look weak without him, and will be pretty handy under the lights in Durban.

Stats and trivia

• This is Simon Taufel’s 92nd match as a Twenty20 umpire, more than anyone else.
• With 10 wickets, Mahmood is the leading bowler in the tournament.

Quotes

“Keep it simple, focus on our strengths and try and execute a good game plan. And results will take care of themselves. We need to focus. We are not going to win matches by just turning up, we need to keep performing, we have to be consistent and win that. So we have to try and do that.”

After the events of recent days in Kolkata, it would come as little surprise if there was a contagious fear of following on sweeping through the cricketing world at present.If there is, it struck at the beautiful winelands ground in Paarl on Friday where visitors Easterns produced a sterling bowling effort in oppressive heat and then opted not to ask Boland to bat again. By stumps, Easterns had reached 29/0 in their second innings, a lead of exactly 200.The Boland first innings batting performnce, where they could manage just169, was so poor that it might have been argued that the home side couldhave done with a bit of batting practice. Just as last week against Border,James Henderson was the only batsmen to properly take root, eventually ninthout for an extremely well compiled 86, which included nine fours.The damage was done at the top of the order, and it was done by anunlikely havoc-wreaker. Seventeen-year-old Brendan Reddy had picked up only onefirst-class victim before this game in his brief career, but the decidedlypacey youngster steamed in to take three wickets in six balls and leaveBoland in trouble at 19/3.Although Louis Koen (31) and Jonathan Trott (22) looked fluent as theymade brisk starts, they also fell at crucial moments. With both removed -Trott to a stunner of a catch by Dylan Jennings behind the stumps – GarethFlusk (3/55) dealt with the middle order and Pierre de Bruyn (4/34) wrappedup the tail.Earlier, the final two Easterns wickets had done well to stretch thefirst innings total to 340 on a pitch where the accumulation of runs isalways a methodical rather than a carefree exercise. Anthony Botha was leftstanding on 49, while Henry Williams (5-66) took the last two wickets toreturn his fourth five-wicket haul in consecutive matches.

The police are investigating a complaint of Islamophobic abuse during the ODI between England and South Africa.It is understood that teenage Muslim spectators were verbally abused by a spectator following an argument over who should be occupying a certain seat. A complaint was made at the time to stewards and later to the police. It is understood that the stewards at the time merely asked the spectators involved to return to their seats.A statement from Hampshire said: “The Ageas Bowl can confirm it is working in conjunction with Hampshire Police regarding an allegation, made to the police, of racial abuse at the ground following the NatWest Series one-day international on Tuesday 28 August 2012.”As this police investigation is ongoing, the venue cannot comment on specifics but wishes to re-iterate that it takes allegations of this nature very seriously indeed. The Ageas Bowl fully endorses the ECB’s ‘One Game’ policy and the venue’s ground regulations – which are issued along with all tickets, are visible at the point of purchase at the ground and are also available on the venue’s website – make it very clear that any racial, homophobic or discriminatory abuse, chanting or harassment is strictly forbidden and will result in ejection from the ground and/or arrest.”Anybody who was a witness to the incident or who is able to assist the police with their enquiries is being urged to contact Hampshire Constabulary by dialling 101 and leaving their details for PC 3291 Jason Steel at Hedge End Police Station quoting reference 44120337713 or emailing him directly on [email protected]”Both South Africa and England have fielded Muslim players over recent years. Indeed, the Man of the Match in Southampton was Hashim Amla, one of the Muslim players in the South Africa team, who made a polished 150.

ScorecardNeil McKenzie’s 47 proved in vain•PA Photos

Kent ended Hampshire’s year-long unbeaten record in the Friends Life t20 with a shock eight-run victory over the defending champions at the Ageas Bowl. Chasing winless Kent’s 143 for 8, Hampshire were restricted to 135 for 8 as they crashed to their first defeat in 17 matches in the competition.In a quirk of fate, their last loss also came at the hands of Kent in Southampton, when they went down by three runs in June 2012.Hampshire were behind the required run rate throughout their reply. They plundered 34 runs off two overs late in their innings to set up a run-a-ball finale, but failed to get across the line.Beaten in each of their previous five Southern Group matches, Kent freshened up their top order and handed competition debuts to Daniel Bell-Drummond and Fabian Cowdrey. The ploy paid dividends with the pair sharing a bright half-century opening partnership in seven overs before England t20 left-arm spinner Danny Briggs bowled Cowdrey and, in his next over, had Bell-drummond caught at deep midwicket.Briggs, who returned figures of 3 for 19, was the catalyst behind the demise of Kent, who fell from the promise of 55 without loss, with Darren Stevens becoming his third victim. The initial impetus gone, Kent lost wickets in clusters after that, with Alex Blake and Geraint Jones falling in quick succession to leave the visitors 94 for 5 in the 14th over.Sam Billings and Vernon Philander improved Kent’s position, but Pakistan left-arm paceman Sohail Tanvir returned for his second spell to cut through the lower order and leave Kent defending a below par total.Hampshire soon lost James Vince and later Jimmy Adams to slip to 50 for 2. Michael Carberry, with the first six of the match and four boundaries, kept the pot boiling but when he was third man out with the score on 64, Hampshire were already looking to chase a target in excess of eight runs anover.The asking rate had crept to 11 runs by the start of the 16th over when Sean Ervine launched a boundary strewn 18-run assault on Stevens. Ervine and Neil McKenzie took another 16 runs off the 17th over by Philander to lift Hampshire to 124 for 3 – and to within 20 runs of victory.But with Mitchell Claydon remaining calm, Hampshire completely lost their way – the last five wickets falling for nine runs and fell eight runs short to surrender the unbeaten run.

ScorecardShane Watson and Chris Rogers put on 170 opening the batting together for the first time•Getty Images

Australia’s last great opening pair of Justin Langer and Matthew Hayden were unearthed only when Michael Slater was dropped for a combination of poor form and wayward behaviour. Twelve years later, Shane Watson and Chris Rogers have been thrown together as the most visible on-field consequence of David Warner’s suspension and Darren Lehmann’s arrival as coach. On the evidence of their opening union at New Road, this might just become another triumph out of the chaos.Even if the modesty of Worcestershire’s attack is accounted for, Watson made batting look easy during his domineering century before lunch and Rogers provided an immediately reassuring sight at the other end. Their first stand tallied 170 in all, precisely half of the Australians’ 340 before rain brought an early conclusion to a chilly day. Fluency came less easily to Ed Cowan and the captain Michael Clarke, though both passed 50 before falling prey to run-outs.Having wrought similar destruction in his first match restored to the top of the batting order against Somerset, Watson crashed the Worcs bowlers to all parts of the ground without ever looking like he was taking undue risks. Tellingly, it was Watson’s first hundred at first-class level since his most recent Test century, against India at Mohali in October 2010. The confidence imbued by Lehmann’s decision to publicly announce him as an Ashes opener as early as last week in Taunton has returned Watson to something like his imperious best.Rogers played with far less extravagance, but appeared an ideal partner, rotating the strike and leaving the ball with precision. Their unbeaten stand meant that Cowan, made redundant as an opening batsman after 18 months in the job, remained padded up in the tourists’ viewing area for the whole of the morning.When he did appear following Watson’s exit, Cowan found the going altogether more difficult, confirming the impression that he will struggle to impose himself on a bowling attack, a skill usually expected of a No. 3. Any hard decisions about the shape of Australia’s batting line-up can be expected to be made this week. Along with Lehmann and Rod Marsh, the national selector John Inverarity is also in Worcester, ready to submit his casting vote if required.A correct call at the toss by Clarke had given the visitors first use of a friendly, even-paced surface. This allowed Rogers and Watson to commence the opening partnership identified by Clarke and Lehmann as Australia’s best means by which to blunt England’s new-ball battery next week at Nottingham and beyond.

World-leaders … in run-outs

Australia’s unwholesome penchant for run-outs was on display again against Worcestershire, maintaining perhaps the only trend in which they have been world leaders over the past four years.
Since the start of the 2009 Ashes series in England, Australia players have been run out in Tests no fewer than 25 times, the most in the world by a margin of five. While Ricky Ponting was the most frequent transgressor with five during the period, Shane Watson, Phillip Hughes and Ed Cowan have all been caught short twice.
At New Road the causes were variable, as ever. Michael Clarke was called through by Cowan for a tight single and found short by a direct hit. Cowan stumbled and fell in mid-pitch, leaving him no chance to beat a throw from cover.
Watson is no expert on successful running, but agreed such details would be critical to the outcome of the Ashes. “It’s certainly a tough enough job to bat for long periods of time let alone giving the opposition one or two wickets,” he said. “We can’t afford to have our better batsmen run out.”

Wearing the Australia coat of arms for the first time since his one Test match in 2008, Rogers began a little nervously. He was perilously close to falling lbw to Charles Morris, making his first-class debut for Worcs, and his first few runs were snicked rather than struck. But Australia have employed Rogers for his record of making consistent runs, not the manner in which they arrive, and he was soon finding his stride, scoring at a steady trot with the occasional edge here and there.Watson had not taken part in the Australians’ second innings against Somerset, following a brazen 90 on day two that expressed his joy at returning to the top of the order more succinctly than any interview could. He continued on his merry way, gliding the first ball of the match to the backward point boundary and thereafter playing his shots with complete conviction, bordering on disdain.Several of Watson’s drives scorched through fields that did not have time to move, while the left-armer Jack Shantry had one delivery deposited beyond the sight screen with rare crispness – his preference for around the wicket provided Watson with an amiable angle by which to flick through the leg side. It was with one such stroke that Watson reached three figures, drawing strong applause from a plentiful crowd and warm congratulations from his new batting partner.The afternoon did not quite find Watson in the same flowing form of the morning, and he added only another seven runs to his lunch tally before swinging an offbreak by Moeen Ali to deep-backward square leg. Rogers reached 50 and continued on with increasing certainty, making it a surprise when he popped an off-side catch from a leading edge off Shantry.Cowan clattered one six off Moeen but was otherwise circumspect, while Clarke negotiated his first ball with a thick inside edge and had trouble locating the middle of his bat for some time. Together they negotiated 38 balls without a run during the hour before tea. The sequence was broken by a fortunate Clarke boundary, edged wide of the slip cordon, but both batsmen would fall short of the substantial scores they desired.Clarke was short of his ground when the stumps were hit from square leg by Alexei Kervezee. It appeared Cowan’s call, and Clarke looked notably miffed to depart in such a manner. Cowan followed his captain to the pavilion a little more than five overs later, stumbling in mid-pitch to turn a tight-ish run into an ignominious exit.Steve Smith and Phillip Hughes did not have much time to get established before the showers arrived, but they were batting in such a comfortable scenario because Watson and Rogers had excelled in the morning. England will be taking note.

Chanaka Welegedara’s prospects of traveling to England for the Champions Trophy have improved, after a scan on his landing foot and ankle revealed no breaks or fractures. He has not been fully cleared however, and will be assessed in the next two days before a final call is made on whether he can join the touring squad, which departs on Sunday.Welegedara left the field in pain after having bowled 2.4 overs in a domestic one-day match last Saturday, and has not played or attended training since.”The scans showed that there was only inflammation around the area,” team manager Michael de Zoysa said. “He will go through some fitness tests and will be putting weight on it, so we have to wait and see.”Welegedara, 32, had been the leader of Sri Lanka’s Test-match pace attack, but has been plagued by injury in the last 12 months, in which he only completed one Test match. He strained his groin playing England in March last year, before tearing a shoulder muscle before the Pakistan series in July. He recovered in time to travel to Australia at year’s end, but tore a hamstring early in the second Test in Melbourne, and has not played any international cricket since. Largely regarded a Test specialist, Welegedara has not played limited-overs international cricket since June 2010.He is one of four specialist fast bowlers named in the 15-man squad for the Champions Trophy, with Lasith Malinga, Shaminda Eranga and Nuwan Kulasekara also picked. Farveez Maharoof, who is not in the national squad but may have been a potential replacement, was also injured during the match and will likely be unavailable for two weeks.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsHashim Amla’s 81 underpinned a total that proved well beyond Pakistan•AFP

A taxi driver in Birmingham has bought a ticket to watch Pakistan every time they played in the city for the last 30 years, except this time. He simply did not have the confidence in their batting to bother. It turns out he was right.South Africa lived to fight another day in the Champions Trophy as their bowlers, woeful against India but wolfish against an fragile line-up, defended a barely-par total. In the absence of Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel, Lonwabo Tsotsobe led the pack with maturity while debutant Chris Morris added energy and Ryan McLaren backed them up at the death.Misbah-ul-Haq was again Pakistan’s lone ranger and again he could not take them over the line. He lacked support from everyone except Nasir Jamshed. By contrast, South Africa’s anchor, Hashim Amla, enjoyed small contributions throughout the middle order.In an almost exact replica to the England-Australia match that was played here on Saturday, Amla’s 81 was as valuable as Ian Bell’s 91 but it may never have swelled to that had Pakistan held on to an early chance. Amla was on 7 when he slashed at a short, wide delivery off Mohammad Irfan and presented a tough but takeable catch to Umar Amin at point. Amin dived, got fingers to it and then he watched it slip through. It was a moment that taught him a tough lesson: don’t’ drop Amla.Over the last year, England, Australia and New Zealand have paid for that mistake. Pakistan may do so twice. They put Amla down at the Wanderers in March, he went on to score 122. Both then and now, South Africa came out winners.Conditions could not have been more different to Johannesburg than they were in Birmingham. There it was a belter of a track on which runs rained. Here it was a sluggish surface that did not facilitate a free flow. Both teams started slowly, Pakistan ended that way too.Mohammed Irfan and Junaid Khan kept South Africa to 36 runs in the first 10 overs and did not take wicket, although they could have had Amla. Morris, Tsotsobe and McLaren restricted Pakistan to 18 for 2 in the same period, which immediately made Pakistan’s task more difficult.By the 19th over, their required run rate had already ballooned to six an over and considering no one had scored at that rate at any stage of the game, it seemed unlikely Pakistan would. But Misbah marshalled proceedings in his usual, calm way. He saw off the good balls – and there were many which South Africa bowled – and waited to take advantage of anything that was occasionally tossed up or slightly wide.AB de Villiers did a fine job of rotating his bowlers and was spoilt for choice with three seamers and three spinners. He used JP Duminy before Robin Peterson and it paid off, when Shoaib Malik was bowled by a delivery that rolled back onto his stumps, and brought Tsotsobe back at exactly the right time, after a first spell of five overs for six runs.The left-armer used his variations well and bowled Jamshed an offcutter that he fed back. The tall man got down low and plucked it in his follow through. Misbah knew he had to battle on his own.After 49 boundary-less deliveries, he cleared Morris over mid-on to release pressure but he was soon stranded. McLaren removed Umar Amin when he tried to go big and was caught at cover and Kamran Akmal, who was caught at point, in the same over and Pakistan’s chase seemed over.Misbah responded with a six over long-on and then his fight was also extinguished. He picked out midwicket from a Tsotsobe slower ball and left it to the tail to have some fun at the end. Instead, it was McLaren who helped himself to four wickets for five runs to ensure South Africa rounded up a convincing win.They would not have been confident of that at the halfway stage. With 51 runs scored and six wickets falling in the last 10 overs of their innings, it seemed they had squandered the chance to build on a well-laid platform.Even though Pakistan’s three spinners cost them only 107 runs in 26 overs, Amla’s 69-run stand with Faf du Plessis and the 41 put on by de Villiers and Duminy helped negate the collapse later on. South Africa will remain concerned about the four run-outs but showed significant improvement and will eye the last four.Pakistan now look at the semi-finals from a greater distance and, although they are not out of the competition, they need West Indies to beat India on Tuesday. If Pakistan then beat India and West Indies triumph over South Africa in the final group games, three teams would have won one match and net run-rate will come into the equation.

Sachin Tendulkar stressed the importance of “situational awareness” as a key factor in succeeding in the closing stages of IPL games. Tendulkar was speaking at an event in Mumbai and was asked by an audience consisting of children, amateur and aspiring cricketers, how to score ten runs off the final over to win a T20 games. He said there could be no set formula.”Basically you have got to see what the bowler is bowling and what his strengths are, weaknesses are,” Tendulkar said. “What are the areas where you can score off that particular bowler. There are many factors like the kind of surface you are playing on, the kind of field setting.” Tendulkar said what a cricketer needed at a time like that was “awareness.” “You have got to have situational awareness. Once you have that, you respond to the situation according to the bowler and the opposition.”At a gathering of about 200 people, Tendulkar answered a range of questions: about how he related to the new Mumbai Indians’ captain Ricky Ponting, the technique behind his trademark straight drive and the formula for his success.Tendulkar said he didn’t think twice before passing on a tip to Ponting. “Because I know little bit about our cricketers, which Ricky hasn’t had the opportunity to watch them much. Also a lot of things are planned in team meetings. But there are things that spontaneously come to your mind and you share your thoughts. So it is basically about sharing our knowledge and giving some background about the bowler.”Excellence on the cricket field, he said, had to be priority for any cricketer who was trying to succeed. A young cricketer he said needed to be, “madly in love” with the sport and due to that to immerse himself in his training. “You can’t count the number of hours, the number of balls you have practised, the number of balls that you have bowled. You can’t be counting. You can’t look at your watch. You have to just practise and practise.”He gave an example from his childhood to his audience, saying that his practice began at 7:30am and ended 12 hours later. “Eventually my coach had to sort of pack my kit bag and send me off saying ‘it is too dark to play cricket and we all want to go home’. ” Tendulkar said his passion for cricket was still alive, “Boys like you or even girls now, whoever wants to become a cricketer, should be passionate about the game. Cricket should be in your heart first and then as you mature and grow, slowly you will find how to score runs and how to bowl [an] over, how to bowl spells. First cricket has to be in your heart and the rest follows.”The straight drive, his signature shot, Tendulkar said started from a correct head position and balance. “If your balance is not good then you are not going to be able to play straight, you either drag it with bottom hand to midwicket or you slice it to cover or cover point.” When the body was correctly aligned, “then you can hit bowlers straight. For batting or bowling, generally on a cricket field, you have got to have good body balance.”It was also Tendulkar also stressed on the importance of concentrating solely on the game when on the field. “I don’t think about watching movies [when I bat]. You can’t think of anything else. Your mind is full of ideas, how to score against a particular bowler.” The focus he said has to be on the ball and the bowler. “The bowler is constantly asking you a question and you are responding to that question, whatever is delivered… So I have no other thoughts on [the] mind. I am just thinking of how many runs I can score and how we can win.”