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Kepler Wessels, the coach of the Chennai Super Kings who helped guide the team to the final of the inaugural IPL, has said he has not yet decided on committing to another season with the franchise. Wessels said the stress and intensity of the 45-day tournament, during which his team played 16 Twenty20 matches across India, had prompted second thoughts about a second stint.”They [the franchise] are satisfied with what we accomplished in the series but I have asked for a month’s grace before I decide on the next tournament,” Wessels told , an Afrikaans weekend paper. “The IPL was very stressful and I want to wait for the dust to settle before I commit myself to another series.”Wessels is in charge of the South African second-string team for the Emerging Players tournament in Australia in July, also featuring squads from India, Australia and New Zealand. South Africa, led by Ahmed Amla, have won the title the past two seasons.Wessels will be up against three players he coached in the IPL – Parthiv Patel, Manpreet Gony and S Badrinath – and acknowledged the threat they would pose to his young side. Gony’s call-up to the Indian one-day squad for the ongoing tri-series in Bangladesh was a direct fallout of his performance in the IPL, which he ended the fourth-highest wicket-taker.”I am worried about the number of experienced players taking part from the other countries this year, as a lot of them have national or A team experience,” Wessels said. “Cricket South Africa has decided to send a youthful team while three of the Indian players that played under me are already established players.”The tournament, which runs from July 14 to 26, will be held in different venues in Brisbane.South African Emerging Players squad: Ahmed Amla (capt), Yusuf Abdullah, Werner Coetsee, Henry Davids, CJ de Villiers, Dean Elgar, Imraan Khan, Wayne Parnell, Daryn Smit, Blake Snijman, Thandi Tshabalala, Lonwabo Tsotsobe, Vaughan van Jaarsveld.

Essex County Cricket Club has decided to reduce the number of festivals it stages from 3 to 2. The decision was taken by the Club Executive Committee at a meeting held last night. Colchester will retain its festival, and a decision on whether Southend or Ilford will be staged in 2003 will need to be taken after further discussion with the Councils and Clubs in those areas.Chief Executive David East explained the background to the decision.East continued

Atlantis Cricket Club – New York is set to honour former Guyana and West Indies spin-bowler Lance Gibbs on Saturday, November 9th, 2002.The 309 Test wicket-taker Gibbs will be accorded honorary life membership of the New York-based club captained by former West Indies all-rounder Clayton Lambert. The club previously accorded honorary life memberships to Clive Lloyd (1999), Andy Roberts (2000) and Alvin Kallicharran (2001). The honour will be bestowed upon the lanky former spinner at a gala black-tie dinner at the Chateau Royale in Queens, New York.Atlantis Cricket Club – New York are the 2002 Caribbean Festival of Sixes Six-A-Side champions, having defeated Malteenoes Sports Club of Guyana in a thrilling final last May in Bridgetown, Barbados. The 36 year-old New York club, in recent times, has had several former Guyana national and West Indian players on its roster. Players such as Carlyle Miller, Bill White, Keith Cameron, Winston English, Vincent Mayers, Keith Aaron, Gavin Nedd, Lennox Bouyea, Alvin Lloyd, Stephen Bamfield, Sylvester Albert, Bryan Joseph and Herbert Newton. In addition, Antigua & Barbuda’s Prime Minister Lester Bird has also played for Atlantis.This year the club will also honor Roland "Royco" Featherstone, former Demerara Cricket Club opener, at the annual awards dinner and dance, expected to be attended by some 300 specially invited guests, including some well-known New York politicians.

Dean Park:
Dorset 339 & 101 (S Rintoul 57, C Shreck 5 for 60)
Cornwall 300 (G Edwards 63, B Price 65) & 4-0South Wilts
Devon 368-8 & 173-6
Wilts 228-8d (MJ Glassman 54)Luctonians:
Herefordshire 291-9
Cheshire 264-8Grantham:
Lincs 375-7d
Buckinghamshire 165 & 41-2Welwyn Garden City:
Cambridgeshire 297 & 76-3
Hertfordshire 247-9 (SG Cordingley 60, P Such 6-75)Lamphey:
Minor Counties Wales 273 (NA Denning 8-66)
Berkshire 13-1Tamworth:
Bedfordshire 364-5 (Shankar 104, D J Roberts 80, J A Knott 62)
Staffordshire 172-8 (M W Patterson 5-41)

After the demoralising Test defeat at Lord’s, I expected India tocome out fighting at Trent Bridge. Regaining lost pride issomething that Sourav Ganguly must have deeply desired. Butdespite rain washing out almost a day’s play, India almost contrivedto lose the match.

Ganguly’s decision to bat first in conditions favouring swingbowling showed the amount of trust he has in the inexperiencedIndian seam attack.Matthew Hoggard relishes bowling in such circumstances and he was soon making the Indian batsmen dance to his tunes. The prodigious movement that heextracted from the pitch and those wonderful outswingers provedwhy he has strong claims to being the best swing bowler in worldcricket today.Moving on, the manner in which Wasim Jaffer got out, playing awayfrom the body to drag the ball back onto the stumps, is preciselywhat every opening batsman must avoid. Granted that Jaffer’stechnique has a major flaw but even more annoying is his lack ofwill to survive. In comparison, a great opening batsman likeSunil Gavaskar always had both the technique and will to survive. simply hated to lose, and it is precisely this attitude thatthe present cricket team should try to acquire – the sooner, thebetter.One other Indian cricketer whose name and deeds should beremembered by every Indian player is Mohinder Amarnath. was a born fighter; his performances during the greattours of Pakistan and West Indies while making a comeback to thenational side are now part of our cricketing folklore. I do notknow how many people remember the fact that he was the Man of theMatch of the World Cup final in 1983. But, before that famousWorld Cup, amassed runs in Tests against Pakistan and WestIndies – against what should only be called as top-class bowling.Imran Khan was in his prime and so were the Windies pace battery.Why I am mentioning these heroes of yesteryears is because Iwould like the current crop of players to look back andunderstand the legacy these great players left behind. It hurt those great men to lose a Test match – it hurt their pride and they foughthard. I expect our current players too to show the same fierce desire to do well everytime they step out on to the field.Returning to the match, the Indian batsmen, after their dismalperformance at Lord’s, showed greater commitment at Trent Bridge.To score 350-odd runs in the first innings in not-so-suitablebatting conditions is indeed an achievement. The resolve theyshowed in the second innings to save the Test match wasparticularly laudable. I am glad that Sourav Ganguly, RahulDravid and Sachin Tendulkar fought hard to avoid defeat. A drawis far worthier than meek surrender. Now that they have survived,India can plan and play for a win.The Achilles heel of all touring Indian sides up to now has been theirfragile batting against the opposing pace attacks. AtTrent Bridge, however, the willow-wielders were not to be blamed. If there was any let down in the second Test, it came in the failure of the pace bowling attack of Nehra, Zaheer Khan and Agarkar. They were most disappointing in favourable conditions.It shocks me that someone like Agarkar who has the ability to swing the ball couldn’t do anything at Trent Bridge. The two left-arm bowlers were also a big let down, bowling too short and never at full pace. It is not the kind of effort that you expect to see from an Indian player; you need guys who are willing to give more than 100%. It is appalling that they allowed Craig White and Hoggard to add 103 runs for the ninth wicket.

Harbhajan Singh, for his part, had an opportunity to prove that he is the numberone spin bowler in the country. His line and length, though, wasa huge disappointment. I would be surprised if he is played aheadof Anil Kumble in the next Test match – that is if indeed Indiadecide to play a spinner at Headingley.I still have hope for this Indian team. Look at the spirit ofsomeone as young as Parthiv Patel. The kid has loads of talentand I hope that the team management persists with him. He has alsoshown enough skill with the gloves to prove that he is worthy ofhis place in the team. And if there was any doubt about hisbatting skills, watching the last one-hour of the Test match wassimply good enough. Now, if only the bowlers showed the samelevel of application and commitment.

Tony Middleton will be strapping on his pads for the first time in almost five years when he leads the new Hampshire Academy XI into Southern Electric Premier League action against Division 2 rivals Sparsholt on the Rose Bowl Nursery ground on Saturday, 1pm.But Middleton, who scored over 5,000 First Class runs for Hampshire prior to his retirement in 1995, plans to bat well down the order and allow his young, relatively inexperienced charges do the hard work.Ian Brunnschweiler, James Schofield and off-spinner Irfan Shah are the three full-time professionals in Middleton’s team, which has seven teenagers, including 15-year old Peter Hammond, from Sarisbury Athletic.Ironically Middleton’s rival captain will be his old adversary, Rob Savage, who is to take charge of Sparsholt this summer.”Rob and I go back a long way – to the days when we both played in the Southern League’s Under-25 side – but it’s ages since we played against each other,” Middleton chuckled.Former Hambledon batsman Archie Norris makes his debut for newly promoted Winchester KS, who face a tough opener against United Services at Burnaby Road. But Sussex pace bowler Billy Taylor, on current duty in the Benson & Hedges Cup zonal matches, is not expected to play against a reshaped US side.Lymington’s Western Australian all-round import Aaron Heal plays under new skipper Danny Peacock in the demanding visit to Hungerford, who were relegated last season.Hampshire’s Jason Laney will open for Hungerford, who have also snapped up former Sussex wicketkeeper Nick Wilton. Also playing for the former Southern League champions will be ex-Bournemouth seam bowler Paul Warren and left-hander Steve Wyatt, who has returned to the Berskhire club after a short stay at nearby Falkland.It’s very much as you were for Old Tauntonians & Romsey, whose 2002 make-up shows little change, except as skipper Stuart Tulk puts it : “We’re all another year older.”OTs host newly promoted Rowledge, who grabbed the Division 3 runners-up spot behind Winchester last season after ten straight wins.But skipper Dave Booton is worried that university commitments may seriously weaken an initial Rowledge challenge at the higher level.”We’ve got five or six lads away for the college term and they won’t be back until mid-June,” he explained.Trojans go into the potentially ‘spikey’ clash with Easton & Martyr Worthy minus knee injury victim Giles Lancaster, whose run contribution will be sorely missed this summer. But Lancaster plans to give skipper Simon Williams some technical backing from the sidelines.”I’ll be bringing my lap top along to the games and doing an few analytical things for the lads, which should help out.”I can’t see myself playing for some time. I’ve virtually had my knee rebuilt, Lancaster explained.Easton, who face a Wadworth 6X Village Championship replay against Flamingo at Cockets Mead on Sunday, parade Australian newcomer Francis Gilly.

The six-day cricket coaching camp for the Indian probables, starting in Bangalore on Sunday ahead of the coming Zimbabwe tour, is expected to be an indepth exercise in redrafting the strategy to end the country’s victory drought overseas.The camp, in preparation for the tour commencing from May 28, has assumed significance as it comes against the backdrop of India’s stupendous home Test series win over Australia.The Board of Control for Cricket in India has named 26 probables, virtually retaining all those who played against Australia. The selectors are expected to meet in Mumbai on May 17 to pick a 15-member squad for the tour.Skipper Sourav Ganguly, batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and the new batting star VVS Laxman are among those picked for the camp.Harbhajan Singh, who played a key role in India’s success against Australia, Virendra Shewag and Yuvaraj Singh would be keen to impress the selectors during the camp, expected to lay emphasis on physical fitness of the players.Notable among those omitted are Nayan Mongia and speedster Venkatesh Prasad.Ace leg spinner Anil Kumble, who has returned from Johensburg after undergoing a surgery to his shoulder, is back at the nets, but is unavailable for the Zimbabwe tour.Indian coach John Wright, who played a key role in shaping the side inrecent times, has already gone on record saying he would involve players, selectors and team managers in a thorough introspection to find out the reasons for the country’s failure when it plays away from home. The camp would also focus on the need to address the problem posed by a long Indian tail.Besides the Test series, India will play in a triangular one-day series involving Zimbabwe and West Indies. Wright and Andrew Leipus, the physio of the Indian team, have already arrived, while the probables were all expected to reach Bangalore by Saturday evening.The following are the probables: Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, VVS Laxman, Hemang Badani, Sadagopan Ramesh, Shiv Sundar Das, Mohammad Kaif, Yuvraj Singh, Virendra Shewag, Dinesh Mongia, Samir Dighe, Ajay Ratra, Das Gupta, Javagal Srinath, Ajit Agarkar, Zaheer Khan, Harvinder Singh, Ashish Nehra, Debashish Mohanty, Rakesh Patel, RS Sodhi, Harbhajan Singh, Sarandeep Singh, Rahul Sanghvi and Sairaj Bahutale.

Australia will target Hashim Amla with verbal aggression and engage him in a “psychological war”, according to a dossier of team game-plans published in News Ltd newspapers in Australia. The papers claimed that the leaked document contained Australia’s “secret” plans to combat each of South Africa’s players, and including peppering Jacques Kallis with bouncers and going after the legspinner Imran Tahir.However, it is the plan to use verbal tactics against Amla in an effort to break his concentration that will create the biggest stir. The document also mentions Australia’s intent to send down plenty of short balls to Amla, who is the No.2 batsman in the world on the ICC Test rankings, and was one of South Africa’s strongest performers in the two-match series against Australia last year. He led the run tally with 239 at 59.75 and made two of only four centuries in the series.Earlier on Wednesday, before the plans were published, Ricky Ponting was asked in Brisbane about whether sledging should be expected in the series, which begins at the Gabba on Friday. Ponting said Australia had no preconceived plans to sledge, but he conceded that in the heat of the battle for the No.1 Test ranking, things might get verbal at some point.”Whenever South Africa and Australia play the rivalry and the way we go about our cricket is very similar,” Ponting said. “I expect it to be good, hard tough Test match cricket. Whether that means there’s words spoken or not, I don’t know. That’s stuff that happens in the heat of the battle. We’ve got no preconceived ideas about going out there and sledging or talking. We’ll hopefully do the talking with bat and ball.”This will be the first series between the sides in which Australia will have the advantage of having as their mentor Mickey Arthur, the former South Africa coach who has worked with most of Graeme Smith’s squad in the past. Ponting said Arthur had been useful in devising plans against the South Africans, including how a powerful attack led by Dale Steyn would attack Australia’s batsman, and how best to rattle South Africa’s top order.”We’ve done our homework on all of their players,” Ponting said. “We’ve got very specific plans with the way we’re going to bowl to a lot of their batsmen. As a batting group we’ve spoken long and hard about the way their bowlers will bowl to us as well. It’s nice to know that stuff and a bit of inside information from the coach on how their bowlers will probably try to bowl to us as well is good.”We’ve got some areas for their batsmen that we’re going to target. Our young quicks are dying to get out there and have a crack at some of their top-order players. You can expect some fireworks. Some of their top order can expect a lot of short balls as well, that’s an area that we think we can really attack them. All in all our preparation so far has been good.”The dossier printed in Thursday’s newspapers also suggests the Australians will aim to trap Graeme Smith on the crease and dismiss him lbw, and test Vernon Philander’s endurance and his ability to come back for third and fourth spells. As well as attacking what it calls an “impatient” Tahir, the file encourages batsmen to go hard at Morne Morkel.The publication of the plans was reminiscent of an incident in 2000 when a dossier compiled by then-coach John Buchanan was leaked on a tour of New Zealand.

East Zone Under-16s were 219/3 at close of play on the second day against North Zone Under-16s in the final of the Vijay Hazare Trophy at the Rajinder Singh Institute Ground, Bangalore, on Friday.North Zone resumed at 398/7 and played on for another 23 overs, before being bowled out for 491. Gaurav Gupta remained unbeaten on 177 made off 250 balls including a six and 24 boundaries.Captain A Iqbal claimed the wickets of Abhishek Sharma (25) and Ankur Jund (0). Gupta and Sharma shared an eighth wicket partnership of 98 runs in 21.1 overs.Last man Puneet Sharma (0) held on for 15 balls before being trapped lbw by SK Ray. Iqbal was easily the best of the bowlers with the figures of 33-10-110-5.East Zone got off to a steady start with R Mohanty (48 with 8 fours) and M Biswas putting together 68 runs for the first wicket. A Garai and Biswas then added 56 runs for the second wicket, before Biswas was bowled by A Bali. Biswas made 45 off just 49 balls with the help of nine boundaries.SP Priyadarshan (38) struck five fours and a six in his 94-ball innings adding 65 runs for the third wicket with Garai. At close of play Iqbal (7) was batting with a resilient Garai (66). Garai has so far faced 193 balls, striking nine fours in his 206-minute stay at the crease. Bali has been the most successful bowler, taking 2/59.

Ricky Ponting’s dramatic century in Cape Town had the leadership hallmarks of a future Test skipper but he’s reluctant to see it that way.Ponting declared his 100 not out – reached with a six in the final to secure Australia’s four wicket win in the second Test against South Africa – among the best of his 10 Test centuries.The 27-year-old is still to earn the tag of match-winner from his 55 Tests but his Cape Town knock should erode some of his reputation as an inconsistent batsman under pressure.But Ponting laughed off a question about whether it was the innings of a future Test captain.”I don’t know about that,” Ponting said.”As far as my personal innings in a vital situation it was probably as good as any. That wicket out there was pretty good for batting as you could see by the scores.You had to bowl very well.”Ponting boosted his batting average to 45.09 and continued an impressive record since he was woken in Potchefstroom last month with the news he was Australia’snew one-day skipper, replacing Steve Waugh.He scored a century the following day against South Africa A and he showed maturity by remaining steady when Australia’s run chase hit bumpy ground in CapeTown.His first 50 runs were spiced by some dangerous moments but the Tasmanian put his head down after lunch on the final day to help steer Australia home.”I certainly took it upon myself once the top few batters were out and I wanted to make sure I was there at the end to give ourselves the best chance to win thegame,” Ponting said.”I think I played the situation pretty well.”As it turned out I paced things really well. It was just nice to be there at the end to hit the winning runs in a Test match.”