While a few franchises have suggested retaining five players, others favoured utilising the right-to-match cards

Nagraj Gollapudi21-Nov-2017Less than three months before the next IPL player auction, there is no consensus among the franchises on the number of players that can be retained in a squad. At a crucial meeting between the BCCI and the franchise owners on Tuesday in Mumbai, many owners were split between retaining as many as five players or none, but most favoured utilising the right-to-match (RTM) card option at the auction. It was also decided that the player auction will take place in India in the last week of January.Tuesday’s meeting was attended by owners, including Shah Rukh Khan and Jay Mehta (Kolkata Knight Riders), Akash Ambani (Mumbai Indians), Ness Wadia and Mohit Burman (Kings XI Punjab) and Manoj Badale (Rajasthan Royals).The meeting was called by the BCCI at the behest of the Committee of Administrators, which wanted to apprise the owners of the discussions that took place during the IPL Governing Council meeting on October 24. Last month the IPL Governing Council heard a presentation by Hemang Amin, the IPL’s chief operating officer, on various important topics including the number of retentions, the purse available for the auction and the RTM card. Amin’s presentation was based on his meeting with all eight franchises.While the Governing Council was in favour of allowing teams to retain three players, the owners of the two richest franchises, Mumbai Indians and Chennai Super Kings, argued in favour of retaining a maximum of five and four players respectively on Tuesday. ESPNcricinfo understands Mumbai wanted to retain five players and use two RTMs at the player auction, and were backed by Super Kings, who are back in the IPL after a two-year suspension and had suggested retaining four players with one RTM at the auction.However, Knight Riders proposed no retentions and sought five RTMs at the auction. Two franchises – Kings XI and Rajasthan Royals, the latter being the second franchise to return having served a two-year suspension – informed the BCCI that they wanted to build their teams from the scratch and did not want any retentions or RTMs. Meanwhile, Sunrisers and Royal Challengers were happy with three retentions and two RTMs.It is also understood that in the case of both Super Kings and Royals, they can only retain players from their 2015 squads. It comes as no surprise that both Mumbai and Super Kings, who have won the IPL multiple times, were in favour of retaining the maximum players in their attempts to keep their core group intact. Both teams included established match-winners who have been with the franchises for a long time.Mumbai will be keen to retain players like Rohit Sharma, Hardik Pandya, Jasprit Bumrah and probably Kieron Pollard, along with Krunal Pandya and Harbhajan Singh. Super Kings, on the other hand, would want to retain MS Dhoni, Ravindra Jadeja, Suresh Raina and possibly the overseas duo of Faf du Plessis and Brendon McCullum.According to an IPL official, Knight Riders, Royals and Kings XI Punjab suggested the salary cap could be hiked to INR 70-80 crore per team, up from INR 63 crore at the auction in 2017, while the other franchises left that decision to the IPL governing council. The official also said the formula previously used to calculate the salary of a retained player would remain the same. This means that, based on the number of retentions, a retained player would get a percentage of the actual purse.Among the other decisions at the meeting, the IPL has allowed Kings XI to play three of their home matches outside Chandigarh as long as the remaining four home games are played at their home base in Mohali.A final decision is yet to be taken on Royals’ home base of Jaipur, which is affiliated to the Rajasthan Cricket Association that was suspended by the BCCI in 2014 after Lalit Modi became its president. However, with Modi calling time on his tenure as an administrator recently, the BCCI will decide on the status of the RCA’s suspension at its special general meeting on December 9. It is understood that Royals have told the IPL they want to play in Jaipur.According to the IPL official, final decisions on all the matters are likely to be taken at the next Governing Council meeting, which will then have to be approved by the COA. “There was, to a large extent, a consensus between the franchises on many issues. All of them want the league to grow bigger. Soon, we will deliberate on the suggestions given today and take a final decision,” the official said.

Shane Warne was critical of Australia’s selectors for the decision to recall Tim Paine, but former gloveman Ian Healy said that Paine “won’t let Australia down”

Adam Collins17-Nov-2017In response to a trio of shock Ashes selections from Australia, former legspinner Shane Warne has declared that England are in prime position heading into the first Test, which starts from November 23 at the Gabba. Australia picked Tim Paine, Shaun Marsh and Cameron Bancroft in a 13-member squad for the first two Tests, leaving out Matthew Wade, Matt Renshaw and Glenn Maxwell.”Australia looks confused,” Warne said at the ‘s season launch in Sydney. “They’re picking wicketkeepers [Paine] that aren’t even keeping for their state. To me, I think England are in a better situation going into that first Test than Australia are.”Despite the loss of Steven Finn to injury and Ben Stokes’ unavailability before they had even boarded the plane, England are “going along just nicely”, according to Warne. The most important thing for the visitors, Warne believes, is a change in English attitudes from the seven successful Ashes campaigns he played in from 1993 to 2007.”They don’t fear Australia anymore,” he said. “[They] haven’t for a long time and hence that’s why they can beat Australia.”Discussing the Test selection with ESPNcricinfo, former captain Mark Taylor praised Trevor Hohns’ panel for making a “really tough decision” by dropping a badly out of form Renshaw.”They have come out and said that an Ashes series isn’t the place to find form and that’s probably a fair point,” he said. “They have been saying for a while that they wanted to pick guys who were in form at the start of the series and Cameron Bancroft has been.”Taylor’s then vice-captain and now television colleague, Ian Healy, was equally supportive of the decision to leave out the 21-year-old after ten Tests, in which he averages nearly 37. That was before Renshaw endured a horror run in the three recent Sheffield Shield rounds, tallying 70 runs for Queensland in six innings and never making it past 20.”The Australian cricket team is not a club side, it is a representative side,” Healy told ESPNcricinfo. “You need to earn your spot to get in and stay in it. He hasn’t coped well this summer.”The former wicketkeeper has also backed the decision to leave out Matthew Wade in favour of Paine, who had not so much as kept for his state, Tasmania, in the domestic season so far.”He [Paine] is very consistent, his technique is good so he should be able to cope with the pressure of being catapulted into this Ashes series,” Healy said.Healy also backed Paine’s glovework, saying it is comparable to Peter Nevill, the man he beat for the Test nod: “He will do the job and he won’t let Australia down.”Peter Parks/AFP/Getty Images

Turning to the decision to give Shaun Marsh a middle-order reprieve, Taylor argued the call was justified on the basis of Marsh’s time as an opener. Marsh had lost his Cricket Australia contract, following the Border-Gavaskar Trophy in March, where he scored 151 runs in eight innings in India at an average of 18.87.”Someone with Shaun Marsh’s experience at the top of the order coming in at six could be handy if and when England take a second new ball,” he said. “That’s why I think he’s been given the spot.”Casting an eye to England’s own batting line-up, another former captain, Ian Chappell, praised both Joe Root and Mark Stoneman. The latter, he thinks, is ripe for Ashes runs. Stoneman has shown good form in the tour matches, with fifty-plus scores in each of his four innings so far, including a century in the ongoing match against the Cricket Australia XI in Townsville.”Stoneman is a very good player,” Chappell said. “It won’t surprise me if he makes more runs in the series than Alastair Cook. He is a good player and I can’t believe England have taken so long to pick him as an opener when they have had so many false starts since Andrew Strauss’ retirement.”He advocated both Steven Smith and Root going up the order to No. 3 in this series – in classic Chappell style. “You are better off coming in at one-for-shit rather than two-for-shit,” he said. “That would be my approach. But neither of them wants to.”Chappell’s forecast for the series is that it will come down to pace. Specifically, whether Australia can consistently field a fit Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins combination.”In Australia if you are struggling for wickets you can always resort to a bit of short-pitched stuff and that is more easily done with genuine pace,” Chappell said. “England has a good attack but I am just not sure how they will go if the Kookaburra isn’t doing much. It is the extra pace of Starc and Cummins that I am basing Australia’s superiority on. If one or the other were to be injured, that would change the dynamics quite a bit.”Rounding out the contributions of the former Australian captains was the man who led the whitewash four years ago, Michael Clarke, who is watching for David Warner.”Warner is a key [player],” he said. “I know he’s changed his attitude and approach and softened since, as Davey says, he’s married Candice and had kids. But I think his attitude is the key to Australia’s intent. When he walks out and bats with that intent, he always has success.”

The employment of a sports psychologist and tapping into the wealth of knowledge in Sri Lanka’s network of former players are on the agenda for Sri Lanka’s new coach

Madushka Balasuriya28-Dec-2017The employment of a sports psychologist and tapping into the wealth of knowledge in Sri Lanka’s network of former players are among new coach Chandika Hathurusingha’s first moves towards rehabilitating Sri Lanka Cricket.”I will get Kumar Sangakkara’s expertise and invite him to come and help us. If I don’t look for his help, then I will be wasting this opportunity I’ve been given,” Hathurusingha said to the media, following a prolonged training session with a pool of 23 players, some of whom will be travelling to Bangladesh next month.”Not only him, but other past players such as Mahela Jayawardene and Muttiah Muralitharan will also hopefully be working with us. We will definitely try and get as much expertise out of them. Whenever they have the time, and depending on what our needs are, we will definitely be utilising them as a resource.”It was also revealed that one of Hathurusingha’s first acts upon meeting his new charges was to ask them to answer a questionnaire consisting of 40 questions. The questionnaire was developed by Australian Sports Psychologist Dr Phil Jauncey, who has been working with Hathurusingha for the past four years.”I met him while I was working with [BBL franchise] Sydney Thunder. I was introduced to him by Michael Hussey, who was using him as his personal psychologist. I will be hoping to bring him down from time to time, maybe four times a year depending on the availability of our time, so that we can utilise his time productively.”I think he will be very useful both for me and the players; in fact, he has helped me quite a bit in the past in better understanding my players, both with Bangladesh and Sydney Thunder. He has also worked with Australia for the Olympics, in baseball, rugby league, and with Cricket Australia when John Buchanan was in charge.”Jauncey will be holding his first session with the team on the January 3 and will be with them for ten days. Depending on availability, it is also a possibility he may accompany the team on some tours.While fixing the team’s mentality is utmost among Hathurusingha’s priorities given the team’s dismal run of form in 2017, he also sees poor training habits that need to be addressed.”The biggest thing is I want to change the way they approach their training. I think that’s where we can get the biggest gain and build their confidence. And, to build their confidence, I need to change the environment; how we train and how we communicate, as well as the amount of information that keeps going in and out. So those are the areas that I think we can gain very quickly.”There are quite a few things that I don’t think we’re doing right, that’s why we’re in this position. Like I said, it’s a very, very talented bunch. There are so many cricketers that I can see being in the world’s top five or top 10, and if they’re not doing justice to their talent then that means there are a lot of things going wrong.”Hathurusingha’s first tour in charge will be when Sri Lanka travel to Bangladesh next month. It will be a swift reunion for both Hathurusingha and Bangladesh, who were not happy to see the Sri Lankan depart their shores after he masterminded one of the most successful periods in their cricketing history.”It has generated a lot of interest because I’m going back. I will use the information I have on them, but they will also do the same because they know how I work. So I think there’s a benefit to both sides.”It’s going to be a challenge, because we’re not performing to our capabilities and Bangladesh have been very strong at home in the last two years. So it’s going to be a challenge for us, and then Zimbabwe are also on the way up and doing well. So I think we can expect a good competition.”Hathurusingha, though, isn’t getting caught up in the drama of his “homecoming”. “The challenge is not just about the Bangladesh tour. If I look at it like that, we will only be looking at things from match to match and react to different things – the things that happened yesterday and what will happen tomorrow. We need to look at the bigger picture.”My challenge is to take this team’s performance to its highest level. We’re targeting the World Cup, which is being played with a white ball. So when it comes to ODIs and T20 cricket, I will be judging the players’ performances with one eye on the World Cup. We’ll worry about the Test team ahead of the next Test series. The challenges we will face in that Test series will be different to the challenges we face in Bangladesh. But all the white-ball cricket we play will go towards identifying players for the World Cup in 2019.”

International cricket will arrive at the new Perth Stadium as the one-day series draws to a close with Australia looking to narrow the margin to 3-2

Andrew McGlashan27-Jan-2018

Big Picture

An historic day for cricket in Western Australia. It is not to the WACA that the players will arrive for the final ODI. Over the Swan River, the gleaming new Perth Stadium will make its international debut with 55,000 set to fill a ground that could hardly be more removed from its now second-tier neighbour. It adds a level of intrigue and significance to the final match of a series which England had wrapped up with room to spare.However, the whitewash is no longer on the cards after Australia were marginally the less rubbish side with the bat in Adelaide – although it threatened to be a close run thing, which was quite a feat given England were 5 for 8. Travis Head kept his while others around him lost theirs with 96, before Tim Paine finally put the chase to bed.It was not the first time this power-packed, world-leading, England side has come a cropper with dramatic results: against South Africa at Lord’s last year, also with the series safe, they found themselves 20 for 6 with the ball nibbling around. If there remains a question around this side it is batting first when there is some help on offer, although to still recover to 196 again highlighted their depth.Josh Hazlewood and Pat Cummins exploited conditions superbly and will hope to score a few more points in Perth. However, given Steven Smith’s comments after the faltering chase, the important issue for Australia is a more confident batting display. This is their last one-day international until they visit England for a series in June.

Form guide

(last five completed matches, most recent first)
AustraliaWLLLL
England LWWWW

In the spotlight

Jason Roy and Alex Hales could well be facing off against each other when Ben Stokes is available again – which may be for the series in New Zealand. Roy started this series with a record-breaking bang, making 180 at the MCG, but has found the going tougher since then while Hales has only hit his straps once in four innings and has been disturbed by Australia’s pace bowling. Although both will have a string of T20s over the next few weeks, they would like to finish this series with a score of note so that the selectors do not feel a decision is made for them.David Warner has had a lean series with 58 runs in four innings, kept quiet by some tight new-ball bowling and then the one time he did get set in Brisbane falling to Moeen Ali. Unlike a few other senior figures, Warner won’t be getting a rest after this series as he takes over the captaincy for the T20s which will mean a hurried lead-in to the South Africa tour. The Australia management will hope that fatigue is not becoming an issue.

Teams news

Steven Smith has hinted that Glenn Maxwell, who was snubbed in the original squad, could find a place in the side having come in for the injured Aaron Finch. Cameron White would be the man under pressure given a lean run since his surprise recall. Mitchell Starc, rested in Adelaide, and home-town boy Jhye Richardson are the other pace options.Australia (possible) 1 David Warner, 2 Travis Head, 3 Cameron White/Glenn Maxwell, 4 Steven Smith (capt), 5 Mitchell Marsh, 6 Marcus Stoinis, 7 Tim Paine (wk), 8 Pat Cummins, 9 Andrew Tye/Jhye Richardson, 10 Adam Zampa, 11 Josh HazlewoodSam Billings, David Willey, Dawid Malan and Jake Ball are England’s squad players yet to get a game in this series and they will struggle to find a spot in Perth unless the view is taken that it’s worth some rotation. The first three of that quartet are also in the T20 squad. For Jonny Bairstow, Moeen Ali and Joe Root this is their last outing of the tour – they have been rested from the T20 tri-series.England (possible) 1 Jason Roy, 2 Jonny Bairstow, 3 Alex Hales, 4 Joe Root, 5 Eoin Morgan (capt), 6 Jos Buttler (wk), 7 Moeen Ali, 8 Chris Woakes, 9 Adil Rashid, 10 Tom Curran, 11 Mark Wood

Pitch and conditions

The pitch, a drop-in, will be largely an unknown for its first international. It may be expecting too much for it to be a Perth flyer. The forecast is for a hot day and this is the only day-game of the series so there won’t be much relief from the heat.

Stats and trivia

• The Perth Stadium will be the 19th ground to host an ODI in Australia
• Perth (the WACA) was the venue for England’s only victory on the ill-fated 2013-14 tour.
• Chris Woakes needs one wicket for 100 in ODIs

Quotes

“We don’t want to wipe 10 overs out of the game and say, they bowled well but we only got 15-20 runs. We still want to take the game forward. I’d rather probably be 40 for 2 than 20 for 0.”

The board has appointed a task team to present a new business model for the tournament such that it can grow the cricketing fan base as well as turn a profit

Firdose Moonda14-Feb-2018A task team appointed by Cricket South Africa (CSA) has been asked to present a new business model for the T20 Global League such that a 20-over tournament can both grow the cricketing fan base and turn a profit in order to put South Africa on the world’s T20 landscape.The team will present its plans on March 31 to the Members’ Council, the decision-making body made up of the 12 provincial presidents, who rejected a proposal presented at a board meeting in Durban because they wanted more options to consider.The Members’ Council will take the final decision on whether the tournament will go ahead or not.The council were not in favour of the most recent model, which moved away from private ownership to a centrally owned CSA-run league – which also threatened the existing domestic game – but the CSA’s acting CEO Thabang Moroe, who is on the task team, told ESPNcricinfo that both the Members’ Council and the board want to see the tournament go ahead in some form.”It was not so much about rejecting the proposed model,” Moroe said. “The Members’ Council were of the opinion that a number of options needed to be considered to come up with the best possible model. There is general agreement that the final model should be based on growing CSA’s fans base to draw new fans to the game and produce a viable alternative source of revenue.”Growing the local fan base is part of the reason the proposal presented to the board at the beginning of February opted for a league that was owned and run by the CSA, as opposed to the original tournament in which all but one team was foreign owned. Three IPL owners, two PSL teams, and businesspersons based out of the UAE and Hong Kong were announced as owners of seven of the eight teams. However, contracts were signed and no money changed hands.Players who were contracted for the original event did receive contracts and were subsequently paid – foreign players received 50% and local players 60% of their total fee – and the postponement of the inaugural event cost CSA US $14 million. They had forecast that staging the event would amount to losses of US $25 million and are now aiming for an event which will only cost US $6 million to run per year – with fewer foreign players – for the first three years.Though the most cost-effective model was not approved by the Members’ Council, Moroe aims to present them with something better when they meet next on March 31. He also offered an assurance that a new T20 tournament will not crowd out the current domestic set-up, as has been feared.”The T20 [league] will be a product for fan and economic growth,” Moroe said. “The one-day cup and the Sunfoil Series four-day competitions are cricket-specific and will continue to operate as key elements of CSA’s talent and development pipelines to ensure that our future players are well-prepared to take the step up to international level.”A GLT20, however, will still not be possible without a host broadcaster and title sponsor, both of which were absent when the original tournament was postponed. Moroe confirmed those are “the two most important initial objectives,” and that negotiations were “underway with interested parties.”

Australia captain Steven Smith will not play the fourth Test against South Africa in Johannesburg, after the ICC gave him the maximum penalty for tampering with the ball

Daniel Brettig in Cape Town25-Mar-2018Australia captain Steven Smith will not play the fourth Test against South Africa in Johannesburg, after the ICC gave him the maximum penalty for tampering with the ball on the third day of the Newlands Test. Fielder Cameron Bancroft, the player to actually tamper with the ball, was given three demerit points and fined 75% of his match fee after accepting the Level 2 charge.Earlier on Sunday, Smith was stood down as captain by Cricket Australia for the rest of the ongoing Cape Town Test, while David Warner was removed as vice-captain. Both players took the field under the temporary leadership of wicketkeeper Tim Paine.ICC chief executive David Richardson laid the charge against Smith under Article 2.2.1 of the ICC Code of Conduct which prohibits to ‘all types of conduct of a serious nature that is contrary to the spirit of the game’. Smith accepted the charge and the sanction of two suspension points, which equates to a ban for the next Test match, and the 100% fine of his match fee. He will have four demerit points added to his record.”The decision made by the leadership group of the Australian team to act in this way is clearly contrary to the spirit of the game, risks causing significant damage to the integrity of the match, the players and the sport itself and is therefore ‘serious’ in nature. As captain, Steve Smith must take full responsibility for the actions of his players and it is appropriate that he be suspended,” ICC CEO David Richardson said.”The game needs to have a hard look at itself. In recent weeks we have seen incidents of ugly sledging, send-offs, dissent against umpires’ decisions, a walk-off, ball tampering and some ordinary off-field behaviour. The ICC needs to do more to prevent poor behaviour and better police the spirit of the game, defining more clearly what is expected of players and enforcing the regulations in a consistent fashion. In addition and most importantly Member countries need to show more accountability for their teams’ conduct. Winning is important but not at the expense of the spirit of the game which is intrinsic and precious to the sport of cricket. We have to raise the bar across all areas.”The ICC confirmed that the umpires had been made aware of the possibility of ball tampering by television replays on the big screen at Newlands. The on-field umpires Richard Illingworth and Nigel Llong then spoke to Bancroft and Smith, before they the third umpire Ian Gould and fourth umpire Allahudien Palekar, laid the ball-tampering charges. They did not replace the ball nor award South Africa five penalty runs because they did not believe the ball’s condition had been changed.The match referee Andy Pycroft said he hoped Bancroft would learn from the episode. “To carry a foreign object on to the field of play with the intention of changing the condition of the ball to gain an unfair advantage over your opponent is against not only the Laws, but the Spirit of the game as well,” he said.”That said, I acknowledge that Cameron has accepted responsibility for his actions by pleading guilty to the charge and apologising publicly. As a young player starting out in international cricket, I hope the lessons learned from this episode will strongly influence the way he plays the game during the rest of his career.”

CSK team members react to the news of having to move out of Chennai for their home games in IPL 2018

ESPNcricinfo staff12-Apr-2018

The Toronto Nationals, Montreal Tigers, Ottawa Royals, Vancouver Knights and Winnipeg Hawks and the Caribbean All-Stars will make up the six-team tournament

Peter Della Penna16-May-2018Global T20 Canada, the new six-team franchise league organized by Cricket Canada and Mercuri Group based out of Chennai, will take place between June 28 and July 15.Each team will play six games in the league phase: an initial round-robin followed by a single-match second round in which the teams will play one other opponent. The top four teams after the league phase advance to the playoffs beginning on July 12.Similar to the IPL, the top two teams will play in the first playoff, with the winner going into the tournament final while the loser gets a second chance by playing the winner of the first elimination playoff between the third and fourth-placed teams. The final will take place on July 15 at 2pm local time, the same day as the FIFA World Cup Final in Moscow.Though Cricket Canada president Ranjit Saini told ESPNcricinfo in February that the tournament would be spread across three venues in the greater Toronto area, the schedule unveiled this week lists all games to be held at Maple Leaf Cricket Club, 25 miles north of downtown Toronto in King City.Saini had indicated that there may be difficulty getting permits for access to certain venues such as the centrally-located Toronto Cricket, Skating & Curling Club, which hosted the Sahara Cup ODI series between India and Pakistan in the late 1990s.While no permanent infrastructure exists at Maple Leaf CC beyond a small clubhouse, the venue has installed temporary seating in the past to accommodate fans for a quadrangular series in 2008 between Canada, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe. The Global T20 Canada website lists the seating capacity for the tournament matches at Maple Leaf CC as 7,000, meaning temporary bleachers are expected to be brought in once more for the tournament.Though the entire tournament will take place at Maple Leaf CC, Global T20 Canada’s franchise names represent five cities across Canada as well as one team called “Caribbean All-Stars”. The other five teams are the Toronto Nationals, Montreal Tigers, Ottawa Royals, Vancouver Knights and Winnipeg Hawks.The tournament is scheduled to have a player draft on May 26 to fill out team rosters. However, no information has been provided by Cricket Canada or tournament organizers regarding any foreign players in the draft pool or regarding fixed salaries tied to a player’s draft slot akin to the Caribbean Premier League. Saini had told ESPNcricinfo in February that only a minimum of four Canada players would be required in each 15-man squad, with no mandate that any Canada players be in a starting XI.

A fine unbeaten century from Adam Lyth saw Yorkshire through to a supremely comfortable nine-wicket victory over Leicestershire

ECB Reporters Network27-May-2018
ScorecardA fine unbeaten century from Adam Lyth saw Yorkshire through to a supremely comfortable nine-wicket victory over Leicestershire at the Fischer County Ground.The left-handed opener played with real fluency and timing, albeit against some distinctly average seam bowling, first in compiling first a partnership of 153 with fellow opener Tom Kohler-Cadmore (74 from 71 balls) and then of 112 with Cheteshwar Pujara (75 not out from 81 balls).With the match being played on a pitch which had yielded over 700 runs in Leicestershire’s previous RL50 match, against Nottinghamshire, the Foxes were well aware they needed a good start: they got the opposite, losing their first three wickets for only 39 runs.First to go was Cameron Delport. Back from IPL duty, the South African cracked two boundaries off Ben Coad, but in the second over Matthew Fisher swung a ball back in to the left-hander to have him leg-before. Colin Ackermann gave Coad the charge but could only give the bowler a straightforward return catch, and captain Paul Horton then off-drove a delivery from Fisher waist-high to Steve Patterson at mid-off.Mark Cosgrove and Ned Eckersley repaired the innings with a stand of 128 for the fourth wicket, compiled in 20.1 overs, but having reached his 50 off 61 balls, Eckersley’s attempted on-drive failed to clear mid-on, and Pujara took a simple catch.Leicestershire badly needed Cosgrove to go on to three figures, but the Australian’s attempt to loft Adil Rashid for a straight six was well held by Kohler-Cadmore above his head on the boundary at long-on, and soon afterwards the same combination accounted for Tom Wells, this time at long-off. Neil Dexter and Callum Parkinson compiled a partnership of 41 for the eighth wicket, but though Dexter reached his half-century off the final ball, a total of under 300 never looked likely to be enough.So it proved. Neither Lyth nor Kohler-Cadmore needed to take risks in scoring at six runs an over, thanks in part to a series of half-volleys bowled by Richard Jones, making his first appearance of the season for the Foxes after returning from injury.Carelessness saw the end of Kohler-Cadmore, the right-hander pulling a long-hop from Delport to Horton at midwicket, but Lyth went to his century off just 96 balls, hitting thirteen fours and a six before finishing on 132 not out, just four short of his List A career best. Pujara too played with freedom and, towards the end, creativity, twice ramping countryman Aaron Varun for four to third man as the end came quickly.

Middlesex beat Gloucestershire at Uxbridge for the first time in 12 attempts last year but normal service was resumed as they succumbed to Michael Klinger’s ebullience

ECB Reporters Network08-Jul-2018
ScorecardMichael Klinger’s assured half-century saw Gloucestershire resume their T20 hoodoo over Middlesex with a comfortable six-wicket win at Uxbridge.Gloucestershire’s first defeat to Middlesex at Uxbridge last season came at the 12th attempt but thanks to Klinger’s 58 that result proved the exception.The 38-year-old Australian was content to play second fiddle initially to Miles Hammond before taking responsibility for seeing his charges comfortably to their under-par target with a succession of elegant variations.For Middlesex, the only cause for cheer was a belligerent 33 in just 12 balls from James Fuller, back playing again after an 18-month injury hell.Middlesex were glad to have skipper Dawid Malan back from 12th-man duties with England, but the left-hander’s recent run of low scores continued as he chipped one back to David Payne in the first over to depart without scoring.Worse followed in the next over when Paul Stirling skied a top-edge from Matt Taylor which eventually came down into the gloves of wicketkeeper Gareth Roderick.Nick Gubbins responded with four quick-fire boundaries but when he edged Thisara Perera to Roderick, Middlesex were 35 for 3.Attempts at a rebuild by Stevie Eskinazi and John Simpson also came up short when the latter holed out at long-off for 13 off Benny Howell. It was all-rounder’s last contribution to the bowling effort as he pulled up injured one ball later and promptly left the field. He has damaged a groin and could miss several weeks – a blow for Gloucestershire as he is the kingpin of their attack.However, there was to be no respite for Middlesex as Ryan Higgins grabbed the chance to bowl against his former county and promptly had Eskinazi caught off the glove.At 63 for 5 off nine, Middlesex effected a rally of sorts courtesy of Dwayne Bravo and Hilton Cartwright, the pair adding 47 in seven overs before Cartwright failed to clear cow corner.Such was the Gloucestershire strangled-hold, typified by Middlesex old-boy Tom Smith’s four overs for just 15 runs, it was the 18th over before Bravo (34) flayed the first six of the innings. He would depart next ball, hit wicket, to cue Fuller’s extraordinary cameo.Gloucester began their pursuit of 161 at full throttle, Hammond, in only his second match in almost three years because of architectural studies, hammering eight fours in a breezy 36 before hitting a Bravo full toss straight to substitute fielder James Harris.Under no scoreboard pressure skipper Klinger and Ian Cockbain continued, albeit with few boundaries, to tick the score along until the latter lofted Stirling to Cartwright on the square leg boundary with the score on 93.Roderick weighed in with 24 to go with his three catches and although Klinger, too, left before the end, bowled by Bravo, Gloucester eased home with eight balls to spare.