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To follow a year of swings and roundabouts, Australia have chosen to begin 2012 on a note of recently uncommon stability. The same team that swarmed on India in Melbourne has been asked to repeat the trick in Sydney, on a ground the visitors have always found to be friendly to their batsmen, even if the centuries of Sachin Tendulkar and VVS Laxman have not been enough to deliver a victory.Australia’s captain Michael Clarke followed his announcement that Ryan Harris would carry the drinks, leaving Nathan Lyon to weave his web around spin conversant batsmen, with a note of caution about consistency. He had delivered similar words in the aftermath of the MCG victory, and as a captain yet to win more than one Test in a series, the message is a vital one.”Consistency is obviously very important for us and I’ve said before this series that we’ve played some really positive cricket at times and some cricket we’d like to forget,” Clarke said. “I guess this is another test of our character to be able to back up after such an impressive win in Melbourne. It’s important our preparation has been just as good, which is a big part for our team improving our consistency – making sure we’re doing the hard work whether we have success on the field or not.”I’ve been really happy with the way the guys have trained over the last two days so our preparation has been spot on. Now it’s about the same commitment, the same determination and the same execution, we have to be able to execute our skills again like we did in Melbourne to beat this Indian team.”Sporting pitches have played some part in Australia’s fluctuating performances. Having raised their games admirably to defeat Sri Lanka on a tinder-dry Galle pitch, the Australians then slipped up badly in Cape Town, and were similarly confounded in Hobart against New Zealand. Clarke pointed to these surfaces as reasons, though not excuses.”I think it’s a mixture of things, I think conditions have played a big part,” Clarke said. “There’s no coincidence in Cape Town, South Africa were 9 for 47 we were all out for 47, Hobart not many runs were scored from both teams, throughout the Melbourne Test we rolled India for 150-odd in the second innings. So there’s been seam and swing consistently in the last half a dozen Test matches we’ve played – it’s not an excuse but it’s a reality, it’s there.”I think we’re learning from it, I think our techniques we’re working on our techniques at training, we’re working on our techniques at training we’re working on batting in tough conditions at training, as you guys see all the bowlers are using either brand new balls or reverse swinging balls and it’s a real challenge at training. When you’ve played, like a lot of guys have, so much cricket over such a long period of time it’s hard to change your technique, you can certainly improve little parts of it but it’s hard to really change, so it’s just about trying to do your best in fighting conditions I guess.”Such conditions may again be glimpsed on day one in Sydney, on the same pitch used for last year’s Ashes match. The first day had the ball swinging and seaming alarmingly at times, Clarke winning the toss as the then stand-in for Ricky Ponting and battling for traction against England’s crack bowling quartet.”I think there’s going to be enough in the wicket,” Clarke said. “There’s a tinge of green there, it’s a little bit tacky at the moment I think it’s going to be quite tough to bat on day one but the sun shine yesterday, today and tomorrow’s forecast obviously helps, but I think it’s going to be quite a similar wicket to what we faced against England last year. I think there’s going to be a bit of sideways movement early and I think it’s going to turn out to be a really good batting wicket.”James Pattinson, Peter Siddle and Ben Hilfenhaus formed a powerful fast bowling union in Melbourne, using intelligence and aggression in equal measure to keep the Indians uncomfortable. Gautam Gambhir and Virender Sehwag were chief contributors to India’s ascent to No. 1 in the world, and have been equally important to the subsequent decline, their returns petering out in 2011.”Hopefully they continue not scoring too many runs, they’re two very good players,” Clarke said. “It’s the game, your time comes around, you score runs, you don’t score runs, good form, bad form it’s just the game, they’re two class players and we’d love for them to continue not scoring too many runs in this series, but if they do they’re class players and it won’t surprise anybody if they do.”We have plans to every Indian batsman and we will continue to look at footage of them and improve those plans but I think we stuck to our guns well in Melbourne and that worked well for us so hopefully it won’t be any different in this Test match.”Pattinson has the capacity and the desire to be Australia’s speed spearhead for some years to come, possessing the sort of confident, prickly visage that his forebears used so well to torment opposing batsmen between the ears as well as the wickets. Clarke expressed quiet hope that Pattinson would go on from his imposing start, but also spoke of the depth of bowling that would help him.”I hope so, again I think Patto’s only just starting, he’s a wonderful talent, don’t get me wrong, I’d hate to see us put extra pressure on him, he’s got a good crew around him as well, let’s not forget that,” Clarke said. “Patto’s got the results over the last few Test matches, but with the way Sids has been bowling, Ryan Harris over the last couple of years, Hilfy the other day even Pat Cummins when he came in in South Africa I think we’re building a good crew of fast bowlers.”They’re all as vital as each other, I don’t think there’s one in my opinion who is above the rest, they’ve all got a lot of talent and we’re going to need every single one of them to continue to perform for us to continue to go forward in Test cricket.”At the other end of the scale from Pattinson is Ponting, who played two valuable innings in Melbourne though again falling short of three figures. Amid all the hubbub about Sachin Tendulkar, it has not been forgotten by Clarke and his team that a Ponting century would be met with similar enthusiasm.”I think the way Punter is batting at the moment is he’s not far away from a big one, that’s for sure,” Clarke said. “One thing I know about him is if he gets to 100 he won’t be stopping there, so he’s got a very good record at the SCG, I know he loves playing here at this wicket so it wouldn’t surprise me at all if he walked out and made a hundred in this Test match.”Like an unchanged and settled team, a Ponting century was almost unheard of in 2011. Australia have every right to expect more in 2012.

Will it, won’t it? Like a marauding medieval army sweeping over the vast plains of Haryana, the mere premonition of a winter fog has settled over those involved in the Ranji Trophy semi-final starting on Tuesday in Lahli, outside Rohtak.It is home team Haryana’s first Ranji Trophy semi-final in two decades. It is Rajashtan’s first as defending Ranji champions. To have that happen only because it has snowed in the distant Himalayas is of course meteorologically logical. Yet its consequences on cricket can be dire. Should the side batting second not complete 30 overs in their first innings due to bad weather, Haryana will go through on net run-rate.The match venue, Lalhi’s Ch Bansi Lal Cricket Stadium is a fog-magnet, set amid scenic open fields of sugarcane and mustard. Five years ago, when word went around that Virender Sehwag was coming to bat here, 2000 materialised from the neighbouring villages to watch Viru.As the teams practised at the Bansi Lal stadium on Monday, the sun shone after two days of grey misery, and anxiety dissipated. Were the semi-final scheduled to start today, match referee Pranab Roy reckoned that even a 9:30am start would have been possible.It is not as if the weather is part of Haryana’s home advantage. In last year’s quarter-final, in Lahli, they scored 379 for 6 declared in their first innings. Only 195 overs could be bowled in the entire match, and Tamil Nadu, who were 285 for 6 at the end of the game, went through to the semi-finals. They had qualified because they scored their runs at 3.60 an over during the game, against Haryana’s rate of 3.26. The same rule will apply in this year’s semi-final, should at least 30 overs be completed in the team batting second’s first innings. With fog lurking, who wants to win a toss and decide what to do?”The fog is a weather condition you can’t really control,” HCA secretary Anirudh Chaudhry said. “Saying we should not play here is like saying let’s not play in Chennai because it rains there. We are not worried about it.”Neither Rajasthan nor Haryana would want their campaign to end this way. The teams have tumbled their way through the league phase but landed on their feet, each finishing third in their group and somehow squeezing into the knockouts. They have played their best cricket when it mattered most, with minds free of clutter and fog-free game-plans.The semi-final will be a contest between two sets of unheralded triers and, barring a handful of better-known ‘professionals’, largely faceless fighters. If Rajasthan have been a revelation over the past two seasons, then Haryana’s omnipresence at the business end of the Ranji Trophy has surprised many. Amit Mishra, the Haryana captain, said getting to the latter stages of the tournament consistently would help his team earn recognition.”A lot of people don’t know that we have qualified for the knockouts three times in a row now,” Mishra said. “We need such matches to get our team’s profile higher.” By winning the Ranji Trophy last season, after starting the season in the Plate division, Rajasthan showed teams like Haryana how to upset the more-fancied teams. They would not want to be at the receiving end of their own lesson.Mishra, though, stuck to the facts. “I don’t want to get into discussions about underdogs and favourites. They are defending champions and this is our home ground.”Locals say the Lahli pitch is a swing and seam bowler’s delight; in both matches played here this season, however, first-innings scores crossed 300. Haryana coach Ashwini Kumar termed Lahli a “medium-pacer’s track”. Rajasthan captain Hrishikesh Kanitkar said he thought there would be runs in the pitch. “The surface will do a bit at the start but should things should pan out well later for the batsmen,” he said.The biggest blessing for the bowlers, Kumar says, is how clean the air is. “It is completely pollution-free. So bowlers who have the stamina to send down seven-over spells in normal conditions can run in and bowl 10 overs here. The air is so clean.”It has remained so over the course of the last five years, since Lahli’s first Ranji match, in 2006-07. However, a lot else has changed in Lahli, and Rohtak, and certainly in Haryana cricket. Aakash Chopra, the former India opener, played for Delhi in the 2006-07 season, and was involved in the match in Lahli that ended in three days and relegated the home team to the Plate division.He returned this year to find the journey from Rohtak to the stadium quicker, and on a smoother road. The ground has grown into a larger facility, and Chopra is happy to be away from the hotel where players had to pay Rs 10 for a bucket of hot water – free for India players – in the bad old days. Chopra now represents Rajasthan and he will face a new generation of Haryana bowlers in Lahli.Some weather reports promise clear skies over Lahli for the next three days. The Indian meteorological department predicts fog on Tuesday. The other semi-final, Mumbai v Tamil Nadu, may have a star cast, but Haryana v Rajasthan has the makings of a real thriller.

S Badrinath, the injured India middle-order batsman, has said he hopes to return to first-class cricket in two weeks. He has been sidelined since mid-October, after hurting his shoulder during the Challenger Trophy in Nagpur.”I’m making good progress. I have started batting from this week,” he said in Delhi. “I am aiming to play the upcoming Ranji match from December 6 [against Bengal]. I’ll get to know on Monday whether I would be able to take the field.”Badrinath is set to receive the Madhavrao Scindia award for the highest run-getter in last year’s Ranji season, where he amassed 922 runs at 131.71. “It was something I wanted to achieve. Last year I went into the season with an aim to do something phenomenal and make a statement with what I do on the field. So, I am happy I am able to achieve it and I hope it doesn’t go unnoticed.”He has missed the first three rounds of the Ranji Trophy, a tournament where he has been a heavy scorer over the past few seasons. Despite the early season set back, he has set his sights high this year as well. “I think I will come back and do whatever I can in the rest of the games. My aim is to make an impact. I have not got a triple century yet in a first-class game and that is what I want to do.”Badrinath, 31, last played for India during the tour of the West Indies earlier this year, and though there are several younger candidates for a spot in the middle-order, he remained optimistic of making a comeback. “I have been in the national team for a while, but didn’t get a chance to play [much]. In the back of my mind, I know I haven’t really lost. Maybe the [national] spots would open up soon and I feel I am the best guy to do the job.”

ScorecardBen Cutting scythed through Western Australia on the final day•Getty Images

Ben Cutting routed Western Australia’s batsmen as Queensland strode further ahead on the Sheffield Shield table with a 192-run victory on the final day at the WACA ground.After Peter Forrest reached an unbeaten 132 to set the Warriors a distant 394 to win from 94 overs, Cutting surged through the WA batting, helped by a handful of indifferent strokes from experienced batsmen.All of Cutting’s wickets arrived in the one spell at a cost of 12 runs in 37 balls. Only the teenage opener Marcus Harris was able to withstand the barrage, carrying his bat for 91 as the rest fell around him.WA received further bad news after the match as it emerged that the young fast bowler Nathan Coulter-Nile had suffered two side muscle tears. Having made a promising start to the season, Coulter-Nile will now be sidlined for about six weeks.It is a loss the Warriors could ill afford, as their form has started to trail away after opening the season with a Mitchell Johnson-inspired home victory over Tasmania.Ryan Duffield (side strain) and Matt Dixon (bruised heel) are also afflicted, leaving plenty of questions for the Warriors’ captain Marcus North and coach Mickey Arthur to ponder.By contrast the Bulls have three outright wins from as many matches and will on Sunday welcome the return of their captain James Hopes from injury in the domestic limited overs match against WA.