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The 49-year old cites family commitments for his decision; will step away with immediate effect

ESPNcricinfo staff20-Mar-2018Richard Halsall has resigned as Bangladesh’s assistant coach because of family commitments. The 49-year old who joined as fielding coach in 2014 and later promoted as Chandika Hathurusingha’s assistant two years later, will step away with immediate effect.Halsall’s last assignment with the national team was the tour of Sri Lanka in January and February. He was granted leave for the Nidahas Trophy that concluded in Colombo on Saturday. His exit leaves BCB with another vacancy to fill.They are already without a full-time head coach since Hathurusingha took up a similar role with Sri Lanka in November. Courtney Walsh stepped in as the interim head coach for the Nidahas Trophy.”Richard [Halsall] has officially submitted his resignation,” said Nizamuddin Chowdhury, the BCB CEO. “We understand that his decision is from family considerations and he wishes to stay close to home especially to be by the side of his ailing father. The board respects his priorities and has accepted the resignation.”Richard has been an integral member of the Bangladesh team management during the last four years and part of many successes of the national team. The board would like to thank Richard for his contribution to Bangladesh cricket and wishes him the very best for his future.”Halsall, in a statement via the BCB, spoke glowingly of his time in the country. “I wish to thank the board for four brilliant years with the national team. I have worked alongside some excellent colleagues, and have had so many opportunities to grow and develop in my career.”I will always be grateful for how my family was accepted and treated and the great memories of famous victories versus England, Pakistan, India, South Africa, New Zealand, Sri Lanka and Australia will always remain with me. I will never forget my time with the Bangladesh Cricket Team and wish them every success in the future.”

Australian fast bowler Andrew Tye is returning to Gloucestershire in 2017 to play in the NatWest T20 Blast

ESPNcricinfo staff15-Dec-2016Australian fast bowler Andrew Tye is returning to Gloucestershire in 2017 to play in the NatWest T20 Blast.Tye, 30, a team-mate of Gloucestershire’s Michael Klinger and Cameron Bancroft at Perth Scorchers, who begin their Big Bash campaign on December 23, was instrumental in the county reaching the T20 Quarter-Final after finishing top of the South Group.He picked up an impressive 18 wickets in 14 matches, with a match best of 3 for 16 against Surrey in Bristol in July.

A round-up of the Regional Super50 matches

ESPNcricinfo staff22-Feb-2013
ScorecardA collapse – six wickets for 21 runs – by Windward Islands in their chase of 217, gave Trinidad and Tobago a 16-run victory in St Vincent.Windwards top order had led them to a comfortable 181 for 3, with No. 3 Andre Fletcher and Liam Sebastien scoring half-centuries. But legspinner Yannik Cariah ripped through the middle order, and the final six batsmen scored 16 runs together, with three batsmen dismissed for 0, to be bowled out for 202 in the final over. Cariah finished with 5 for 44, his best performance in his three-match List A career.T&T’s innings revolved around a solid top-order performance, led by an unbeaten half-century from Jason Mohammed. Besides Justin Guillen, who was dismissed for 2, all other batsmen scored atleast 20. Spinners Sebastien and Shane Shillingford took two wickets each.
ScorecardA balanced and collective effort by Jamaica helped them clinch the contest against Combined Campuses and Colleges by four wickets at Sabina Park, and lead the points table.Having being asked to field, Jamaica kept chipping away at their opponents, as none of the batsmen could anchor the innings. Floyd Reifer and the captain Kyle Corbin got starts, but departed after scoring 32 and 24 respectively. Spinner Nikita Miller was the chief wicket-taker, with three wickets.The home side two wickets early, with opener Jermaine Blackwood and No. 3 Nkrumah Bonner dismissed for a duck. However, Andre McCarthy (45), the captain Tamar Lambert (34) and David Bernard (28) helped them reach the target in the 46th over.

Hashim Amla did a strange thing when he reached his century at Lord’s. He dedicated the ton to the team’s video analyst, Prassan Agoram, gesturing a TV-set towards the dressing room

Firdose Moonda at Lord's19-Aug-2012The usually undemonstrative Hashim Amla did a strange thing when he reached his century at Lord’s. He demonstrated something. A television set drawn mid-air was his way of dedicating the ton to the team’s video analyst, Prassana Agoram, one of the squadron of back-room staff who have all been credited with making the South African team the strong unit they have become.”It was just an acknowledgment of the amount of work he puts in,” Amla said, when explaining his gesture. “He said something really inspirational to me before the series which is why I did it.” Amla would not reveal what Agoram had said, saying “it’s a personal thing” but his acknowledgment was a telling detail about the new culture of the South African team.Gary Kirsten has created a community, which Dale Steyn said “trusts” each other as part of the key to their success. Apart from a head coach, an assistant coach, a bowling coach and the usual medical and administrative staff – physiotherapist, media manager and logistics manager, they also have a performance director in Paddy Upton and an adventurer in Mike Horn. Both are not with the team all the time but their influence is obvious.Ever since the Switzerland bonding exercise at Horn’s home, South Africa have appeared mentally tougher than they have ever been before. They have been willing to reach deeper, pull harder, think bigger and play tougher and it is those things that have made them the better side for large chunks of the series.Amla was hesitant to say the change had been recent. “It’s been like this for quite a few years. It’s not all of a sudden,” he said. “But the way some of the lower order guys came to the party has been a hallmark for the last two Tests.”Without making the point explicitly, Amla still made it. Crucial performances have come from unlikely places and South Africa have never looked out of control. “The games have ebbed and flowed in different situations and we’ve managed to get out of bad situations at times,” Amla said.The ability to bat on even when runs are not being scored, something only Jonny Bairstow was able to muster for England, has been one of the things that set South Africa apart. At Leeds, Alviro Petersen and Jacques Rudolph battled through a tricky first hour, at Lord’s, Amla and Dale Steyn did it. “We were in a delicate position but we knew we had to hang in there for about 30 minutes and that really set up the day for us. Then Vernon and Morne showed a lot of guts as well later on,” Amla said.The ability to take wickets, even on pitches that look like batting could continue for months on, has been the other. South Africa took 20 wickets at The Oval where England could only manage two, on a surface far less helpful than the one at Lord’s. Even though a draw will still give them the series win and No.1 ranking, Amla said they have bigger targets in their sights.”We are thinking of the win. We do understand it’s going to take a lot of hard work but if we show the intensity we showed this evening, we can win.”England face the uphill battle of needing to score over 330 runs on a fifth day pitch, something Amla said is hard enough without bigger things at stake. “Any score above 300 is a very difficult ask,” he said. “I think any score above 250, especially on the last innings when the wicket is deteriorating is difficult.”Asked if South Africa will think up new ways to keep England up against it, Amla said they do not need to, because the situation is fraught enough for their opposition. “The wicket itself is good to bat on but in the last innings, there is this thing called pressure that exists. When we were batting we felt it. England have to make the play and if we hit our areas for long enough, they are going to have look to score. We are going to try and stick to our plan. That situation alone creates enough pressure.”

Cricket Australia is expected to move to a smaller board featuring some independent directors in October, despite objections from the South Australian Cricket Association

Brydon Coverdale24-Apr-2012Cricket Australia is expected to move to a smaller board featuring some independent directors in October, despite objections from the South Australian Cricket Association (SACA). A fully independent board is likely to be introduced in 2015, meaning that within three years the state associations will almost certainly have no representation at CA board level.The plan is part of CA’s response to the Crawford-Carter review into the organisation’s governance. A new financial model that would see CA take control of all internationals played in Australia has also been proposed. Board reform was one of the key recommendations from the governance review, which suggested the end to the archaic system in which some states held greater power than others.The two-stage plan, discussed at a CA board meeting in Melbourne on Tuesday, is based around introducing three independent directors to work alongside six state-appointed directors – one from each state – at the annual general meeting in October. In 2015, barring any unforeseen hurdles, the six state-appointed directors would be phased out and all nine board members would be independent of official state affiliation, although there would need to be at least one residing in each state.The existing board structure features 14 directors, all appointed by state boards, with three each from New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia, two each from Western Australia and Queensland, and one from Tasmania. CA chairman Wally Edwards said South Australia remained reluctant to give up its voice on the board, but approval from five of the six states was enough for the moves to go ahead.”We didn’t get a unanimous position because of this issue of the independent director,” Edwards said. “One state is pretty well locked in on wanting to have their own delegated director for all time. That’s the one sticking point there, from SACA.”SACA are against it, I don’t want to hide that fact. They’re very positive on everything except that the director who would be located in South Australia, they want to be able to appoint him and they want him to be on their board.”In the end, if five out of the six states agree then it moves forward and Cricket Australia’s constitution will be changed to say that directors can’t be a member of their state board… it’s an issue that SACA will have to come to grips with as well.”The move needs to be approved at a special CA meeting in July, and South Australia’s objections would not be enough to prevent it. Should the proposal succeed, a nomination committee consisting of Edwards, two state chairmen and two people who are not part of a board will choose the three independent directors who would take office in October.The new CA chairman would then be elected at the AGM from those three independent directors and the six directors nominated by the state boards. Edwards said he was confident the changes would be approved and would lead to the total overhaul of the board in 2015 – CA says the two-stage process is a legal obligation – despite the failure of several attempts in past years to revolutionise the unwieldy and inequitable board structure.”If this goes through in July, we will have achieved a lot,” Edwards said. “We will still have one more phase to go and we will still have six appointed directors, but we’ll have moved from 14 to nine, all states will be put on an equal footing… there’s been a lot of grumpiness about some states being more equal than others. This first step gets rid of all that.”Edwards also said the states had agreed to a new financial model in which each state association would give up the management of international matches in its territory, and in return would be paid a minimum guarantee grant by CA. Edwards said no state would be worse off under the new plan, which he said would “untangle a lot of the very, very complicated… ways of running our business”.

Shakib Al Hasan, Iqbal Abdulla and Yusuf Pathan tied Pune down, exploiting the generous spin available on the DY Patil Stadium surface, and Gautam Gambhir ensured that his side motored to victory in the 17th over

The Bulletin by Abhishek Purohit19-May-2011
Scorecard and ball-by-ball detailsSourav Ganguly managed just 18 against his former team•AFP

It was billed as Sourav Ganguly’s payback game against Kolkata Knight Riders. Instead, it proved to be a stern examination on a turner for the Pune Warriors batsmen, and called in to question the home side’s decision to play only one specialist spinner as Shakib Al Hasan, Iqbal Abdulla and Yusuf Pathan exploited the generous spin available to tie Pune down. Kolkata, anchored by Gautam Gambhir, and under no pressure with an asking rate of below six, motored to victory, taking a big step towards making the play-offs.Unless they lose badly to Mumbai Indians in their last league game, and Kings XI Punjab manage another big win in their last match, Kolkata should be through to the knock-outs.The comfortable victory was set up by the Kolkata spin trio, who picked up five wickets for 51 runs in 11 overs, but more than that, preyed on the minds of the Pune batsmen, who struggled to score on a pitch that would have been a good test of batsmen’s skills in a Test match against quality spin, but looked out of place in a Twenty20 game.Right from the first ball that Abdulla bowled, it was clear that the batsmen were in for a hard grind. It was flighted, drew Manish Pandey forward, and spun sharply across as he missed the ball by a long way. The third was the typical left-arm spinner’s sucker ball, making Pandey push forward outside the line for the turn and going straight on to strike him in front. This was after Jesse Ryder had targeted the second ball of spin in the game, trying to smash Yusuf Pathan for six but only finding mid-off. It was the beginning of Pune’s problems.Callum Ferguson came in ahead of Ganguly, and the relative ease with which he played during his short innings made one wonder again what he had been doing in the Pune dugout for most of the season. It was the spinners’ night though, and Ferguson was left clueless as he skipped out to Shakib, only for the ball to turn a long way past his bat for Shreevats Goswami to do the rest.There was a time when left-arm spin from both ends would never be tried against Ganguly, but that time is long gone. Ganguly led a charmed life today, almost edging the ball on to the stumps and also escaping a stumping chance. He showed one glimpse of the batsman he once was, lofting Abdulla for a very straight six, but clearly, sustained big hitting on a difficult pitch was too much to expect. He departed on another failed attempt to break free, sweeping Shakib to Yusuf at backward square leg.It was not until the 13th over that Pune’s most explosive batsmen, Robin Uthappa and Yuvraj Singh, got together. A run-rate that had remained stuck below six after the opening over forced Uthappa to go hard at Yusuf in the next over, but he swung it to deep midwicket where Lee took a sharp catch. Yuvraj was left playing the tragic hero yet again, but even he could not do much, ultimately top-edging a pull off L Balaji, who came on to bowl for the first time in the last over.Alfonso Thomas got Pune the breakthrough in the first over, getting Goswami caught behind with one that took off. That was as close as Pune came to entertaining hopes of an upset, and Kolkata’s line-up proved to be too powerful, not even requiring the services of Jacques Kallis, who had injured his finger in the field.Gambhir, as always, showed how to tackle a turning pitch, repeatedly using his feet against Pune’s spinners, Rahul Sharma and Yuvraj. He also played two delightful extra cover drives off successive deliveries against Thomas. Yusuf wasn’t far behind, making room to cut Rahul’s skiddy deliveries from off stump through short third man.That it wasn’t to be Pune’s day was evident when consecutive throws from Ferguson ran to the boundary, the latter after hitting the stumps. Not that it mattered in the end, as Kolkata were simply the superior side by a long margin.

Seamer Lee Daggett recorded his best bowling figures in a one-day match as Northamptonshire thrashed the Netherlands by 119 runs to claim their first win in this season’s Clydesdale Bank 40

31-May-2010
ScorecardDavid Sales made 62 at the top of the order for Northamptonshire•PA Photos

Seamer Lee Daggett recorded his best bowling figures in a one-day match as Northamptonshire thrashed the Netherlands by 119 runs to claim their first win in this season’s Clydesdale Bank 40. The home side made 238 for 7 from their 40 overs, with David Sales and Rob White making half-centuries after the hosts recovered from 9 for 2 after four overs.Daggett then took 4 for 17 in eight overs as the Netherlands failed to reproduce yesterday’s heroics at Derbyshire as they collapsed to 119 all out, with only ex-Sussex man Bas Zuiderent (32) providing any resistance.Northamptonshire won the toss and chose to bat but they got off to an awful start by losing two wickets in the fourth over. Mark Jonkman was the bowler and he forced Mal Loye to edge to wicketkeeper Atse Buurman before Vishal Tripathi launched him straight to Mudassar Bukhari at third man to go for a fourth-ball duck.Nicky Boje walked on 38 when he edged Michael Dighton to Buurman after adding 99 along with Sales. Sales blasted 62 from 58 balls but went when he smashed Dighton to Bukhari at mid on.White then hammered four sixes off Netherlands captain Peter Borren in the 30th over to reach 50 off 40 balls but he was bowled by Pieter Seelaar soon after. Northamptonshire captain Andrew Hall gifted Bradley Kruger his first List-A wicket by launching him to Seelaar at deep square-leg before Jonkman bowled James Middlebrook in the final overThe visitors chase got off to a bad start when Tom de Grooth flailed at a Daggett delivery in the sixth over and was caught at first slip by Hall. Daggett struck again in his next over when Eric Szwarczynski edged to wicketkeeper Murphy before Tom Cooper, who faced three balls without scoring, played on to his stumps.Dighton, who struck an unbeaten 110 at Derby on Sunday, also went for a duck when he edged Jack Brooks to Murphy. Borren made 8 before slicing Daggett to Sales at second slip and David Wigley took out Kruger’s leg stump with his first delivery of the season to leave the Netherlands on 32 for 6.Boje trapped Buurman lbw before Zuiderent went by hitting Middlebrook to Daggett at deep mid-wicket. Boje wrapped up the Northamptonshire victory by having Bukhari caught at cover by Tripathi and Jonkman stumped by Murphy, after both had made 14.

The IPL has been caught in a controversy over details of the ownership structure of the Kochi franchise being made public by Lalit Modi, the league chairman

Cricinfo staff12-Apr-2010The IPL has been caught in a controversy over details of the ownership structure of the Kochi franchise being made public by Lalit Modi, the league chairman. The franchise owners, who bought the team last month, are believed to feel this is a breach of faith and have reportedly taken up the issue with the Indian board which, Cricinfo has learnt, is also unhappy with the situation.Modi has denied any breach of confidentiality. “All team owners of the IPL have been revealed in the past,” he told . “I don’t think there is anything to hide in it. We’re a public body.” Asked whether the BCCI had been in touch with him on this, he said, “That’s an internal matter – I don’t want to reveal what we discussed at the board level.”The ownership details were posted by Modi on his Twitter feed on Sunday afternoon, in response to questions from the public. According to his posts, the Kochi consortium break-up is: Rendezvous Sports 1%, Anchor 27%, Parinee [Developers] 26%, Film Waves Combine 12%, Anand Shyam 8%, Vivek Venugopal 1% with Rendezvous having an additional 25% free equity. That equity is held by Kisan, Shailender and Pushpa Gaikwad, Sunanda Pushkar, Puja Gulathi, Jayant Kotalwar, Vishnu Prasad, Sundip Agarwal.In his Tweets Modi has also posed questions about the Kochi stake-holders. “Who are the shareholders of Rendezvous. And why have they been given this 100’s of million dollars bonanza?”, read one tweet. Another read: “25% of Kochi team is given free to Rendezvous sports for life. The same equity is non-dilutable in perpetuity.What does that mean?”Modi’s revelations have clearly hurt the owners of Kochi. “It was not expected from a body like the IPL,” a senior member of the consortium told Cricinfo. “The documents are very clear that information submitted is confidential and cannot be revealed by either side.”The franchise now wants the IPL to reveal the ownership details of the nine other franchises. “What we are trying to say is the documents we have submitted to him are supposed to be kept confidential. But if he is letting out the information on our consortium then we would like to be informed of the details of all the owners of the IPL teams, including the individual shareholders, as he has done for us,” the source said.This is not the first time Rendezvous Sports World Private Limited, which bagged the ownership of the Kochi franchise last month for a bid of US$ 333.33 million, have run into trouble with the IPL. Last week they were asked to list the names of all the owners after the IPL found out that there were a few “secret partners” in the consortium. Consequently a reviewed agreement was signed by both the parties in Bangalore on Saturday night – and it was in this context that questions were put to Modi by the public on Twitter seeking the details.The Kochi consortium has worked hard over the past month to dispel the notion that they are a disparate team of individuals; they had worked on the plan for the last six months before deciding to make the move. The seriousness of their intentions can be gauged from the fact that no one backed out of the deal despite the original tender process being cancelled and rescheduled from March 7 to 21. The face of the bid the first time around was the Jaypee Group, but two weeks later Jaypee decided to opt out, forcing the other partners to re-organise things.

Adil Rashid lost his spot as the leader in the bowling charts, while Jofra Archer dropped four places to tenth

ESPNcricinfo staff05-Feb-2025India batter Abhishek Sharma moved up a whopping 38 places to go second in the ICC rankings for men’s T20I batters after his blazing knock of 135 from just 54 balls in the fifth T20I against England in Mumbai. Abhishek’s knock saw him get to 829 rating points, as he replaced his team-mate Tilak Varma in the second spot.Abhishek had also started the series against England on a high, bashing 79 off only 34 balls to power India’s modest chase of 133 in Kolkata. Although he didn’t cross 29 in the next three innings, he lit up the stage in the fifth and final T20I. Abhishek smashed seven fours and 13 sixes during that record innings, thus setting the base for India’s 150-run victory.While Travis Head leads the T20I batting charts, Phil Salt and Suryakumar Yadav round off the top five batters in the rankings.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

Meanwhile, mystery spinner Varun Chakravarthy, who finished as the highest wicket-taker in the series against England, moved up three spots to go joint-second in the T20I bowling charts. Varun’s 14 wickets in the five games came at an average of a meagre 9.85.Varun, whose performances in the T20Is saw him added to India’s ODI squad against England as well, bagged his second T20I five-wicket haul on the way. He is now level on rating points with England’s Adil Rashid, who had shot up to the top of the rankings during the series only to lose his top spot to Akeal Hosein after returning figures of 1 for 41 in Mumbai. Both Varun and Rashid are just two points below Hosein.

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Another India spinner, Ravi Bishnoi, also took some big steps in the rankings, moving up four spots to go sixth. He got 1 for 9 from one over in Mumbai, and finished the series with five wickets. Jofra Archer, who conceded 55 runs from his four overs in the same match, dropped four spots to go tenth.

“We are incredibly proud to play at Lord’s, [but] it’s not a pinnacle event,” says Ireland performance director

Matt Roller26-May-2023When Ireland walk out at Lord’s on Thursday to play only their seventh men’s Test match, they will do so without their best bowler.
Josh Little is yet to make his Test debut but has thrived in one-day and T20 cricket, and would have been among the first names on Ireland’s teamsheet. But, to the frustration of many Ireland supporters, he is not available for selection.Little has spent most of the last two months in India, becoming the first active Ireland player to feature in the IPL. His contract with Gujarat Titans is worth INR 4.4 crore (€500,000 approx.) – around six times the value of his Ireland central contract – and he played in eight of their 14 group games, missing three to play an ODI series against Bangladesh.And while Ireland are determined to put up a good show at Lord’s, they have opted to give Little the week off in order to ensure he arrives at next month’s 50-over World Cup Qualifier in Zimbabwe – and July’s T20 World Cup Qualifier in Scotland – feeling fresh after a long winter playing franchise and international cricket around the world.Related

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“Josh asked us initially if he could have a period of rest ahead of the World Cup Qualifier,” explained Richard Holdsworth, Cricket Ireland’s performance director. “Our management team and the selectors discussed that issue in detail and were amicably in agreement that actually, that was in the best interests of Josh and the team.”We are incredibly proud to go and play against England and at Lord’s. It’s a special occasion,” Holdsworth said. “However, it’s not a pinnacle event. And where we have to put our energies and ensure we have the best team on the park is in our pinnacle events.”Going to a World Cup Qualifier where only 10 teams [two from the Qualifier] can qualify for that World Cup, that is still the biggest prize in the game as far as we’re concerned, and certainly as far as the world game is concerned.”Cricket Ireland’s decision has caused some disquiet. “I’d say there are people who are not happy with that,” Andy Balbirnie, Ireland’s captain, told ESPNcricinfo. “There’ll be a lot of people at Lord’s, and there won’t be a lot of people in Zimbabwe or Scotland [for the Qualifiers].”And Lord’s, for an Irish supporter, is fairytale stuff. People in Ireland, I think, got their love of cricket from listening to Test Match Special and watching cricket on Channel Four – like myself – in the nineties and early 2000s. It was always England Tests – and now we’re the team playing on TMS.”If you’re an Irish cricket fan, you’re like, ‘This is amazing, this is dreamland stuff.’ So naturally you’d be like, ‘Why aren’t we playing our best team when they’re not injured?’ But there’s a bigger picture: we understand that the Qualifiers are where we need to be at our best. There’s probably a few moans and groans about it but I think for us – and for Josh – it’s the best thing.”Little has already missed all three of Ireland’s Tests this year – one in Bangladesh, two in Sri Lanka – in order to fulfil his Titans commitments, but Balbirnie said that he had “no issue” with him missing international fixtures to play in the IPL if it had long-term benefits for Irish cricket.”Naturally, I would love to have him next week. I’m not saying I wouldn’t,” Balbirnie said. “But I have no issue with him playing in the IPL; if anything, I want him to be there. I want him on that stage because it’s good for Irish cricket, it’s good for our players.”In the space of a year, he’s gone from not really on the IPL radar to potentially being in the winning squad. It’s good for the people below him – the young players – because they can strive to be the next Josh Little. The knock-down effect it has is far more important than whether he plays the Test match at Lord’s.”Holdsworth added that, without any red-ball preparation behind him, Little might struggle to manage the physical demands of Test cricket: “The majority of the cricket he has been playing is T20 and bowling four overs is not good enough to prepare any cricketer to play Test cricket, where they could be bowling 20-plus overs a day and maybe for two innings.”We didn’t feel physically he was actually going to be ready for that having had no preparation for that Test match. His preparation was literally going to be coming out of the IPL and arriving a couple of days before the Test match.”Instead, Ireland will go into the Test with a depleted seam attack – with Barry McCarthy and Conor Olphert both unavailable through injury. They are preparing with a three-day, first-class warm-up match at Chelmsford, against an Essex side which features four of their own squad members.