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Bangladesh’s players’ association, the Cricketers’ Welfare Association of Bangladesh (CWAB), has been given full membership of the Federation of International Cricketers’ Association ( FICA).The CWAB was established in 2004 with a primary objective of promoting and protecting the general welfare of cricketers within the country, and it also engages in numerous projects for the benefit of the wider community.All first-class cricketers registered with the Bangladesh board are entitled to be members of CWAB. It currently has around 170 players on its books.”I am delighted to welcome CWAB as a member of FICA,” Tim May, FICA’s chief executive, said. “Bangladesh are young in International cricketing experience and have much to offer the world of cricket. FICA believe it is imperative that the players’ positions and concerns of all countries are represented with equal vigor to the ICC and the addition of CWAB to our membership obviously is a significant step to achieving this objective.”

Mark Boucher wanted Adam Gilchrist to extend his career by a year so the world’s top two Test wicketkeepers could have one final showdown on the field. Australia are hosting a three-Test series against South Africa next season before a return series in South Africa and Boucher said he was disappointed Gilchrist would not be part of it.Boucher will almost certainly reclaim the world Test wicketkeeping record from Gilchrist when he next plays a match and there will be no ongoing battle for the title as there was with Shane Warne and Muttiah Muralitharan’s bowling mark. Boucher is only 31 and therefore has plenty of time to put a significant gap between his final tally and Gilchrist’s record of 416 dismissals.”I sent him a message to say how disappointed I was to hear that he was calling it a day because the last time I saw him I told him he’d better keep his incredible career going so that we could have one last showdown at the end of the year,” Boucher told the . “It was a big shock to hear he was going. But everyone knows how important his family is to him so I’m sure he made the right call. I’ll miss him a lot.”If I think of the great innovators of my time, guys who revolutionised the game and made people see it in a different way, I’d say Jonty Rhodes and Adam Gilchrist would be top of the pile. Jonty changed the way people thought of fielding and Gilly has set the bar so high for the next generation of keeper-batsmen that it’s almost unfair.”Boucher’s captain Graeme Smith said Gilchrist would always have his respect. “The way he made an effort to contact Boucher when he broke the world record was typical of him,” Smith said. “We were in Pakistan and Australia were in India. It just wasn’t a question of dialling a local number.

Simon Katich, Damien Martyn and Jamie Cox have all continued to hit the headlines at the Bellerive Oval but their teams have departed the venue without outright points after a thrilling finish to the Tasmania-Western Australia Pura Cup match in Hobart today. Set a victory target of 387 from a minimum seventy-one overs, the Warriors finished at 9/373 – a score which respectively left the teams an agonising fourteen runs and one wicket adrift away from claiming maximum points.After Cox had established the parameters for the exciting pursuit by declaring the Tigers’ second innings closed at 9/238 thirty minutes before lunch, Katich (152) and Martyn (90) joined to set the Western Australians firmly on course for success. Undeterred by the early departures of openers Mike Hussey (5) and Ryan Campbell (19), the two Test aspirants added 193 runs in a rollicking exhibition of strokeplay that spanned less than two hours.Promoted up the order to maintain the momentum, Brendon Julian (39) capitalised effectively on the Katich-Martyn alliance by launching himself into the production of several towering hits. But his dismissal to a fast, straight delivery from David Saker (5/98) and the earlier departure of Martyn – to a loose shot outside off stump that gave thirty-two year old debutant Mark Colegrave (1/76) his maiden first-class wicket – prompted a near-reversal of the situation. Upon Julian’s dismissal, the Warriors suffered a collapse that saw six wickets tumble for the addition of just seventy runs.After receiving a hammering, like most of his teammates, at the hands of Katich and Martyn, Saker was the man who led the Tasmanian fightback. All-rounder Scott Kremerskothen (3/64) also played his part well, a part made more difficult by both the placid nature of the pitch and the loss of key bowlers Gerard Denton and Shaun Young to injury.In a major setback for the Tigers, Denton did not even take the field during the afternoon as a legacy of experiencing pain in his back – an ailment, worryingly, that has also troubled him in seasons past. Young did manage to deliver three overs, but was belted for thirty-three runs and strained his groin in the process.Their presence might well have made the difference in the concluding stages. But Saker and Kremerskothen did not appear to need all that much assistance, removing Murray Goodwin (12) quickly, engineering the vital dismissal of Katich, and then opening the way for Andrew Dykes to make a brilliant contribution of his own by taking a superb running catch at deep cover to send Mark Walsh (13) back to the pavilion as well. Matthew Nicholson (9) and Brad Oldroyd (3) did not last long and, by the time that number eleven Gavin Swan (0*) came in, he and captain Tom Moody (22*) were faced with the task of scoring eighteen runs from fourteen balls if the Warriors were to win. Swan somehow survived three raucous lbw appeals and played and missed once and, suitably discouraged from handing his partner back the strike, Moody opted that the only prudent course available to him was the act of denying the Tasmanians victory instead.Earlier, Cox (87) fell on the so-called devil’s number for the second time in the match on the Tigers’ route to their closure. Young (48) then held the lower order together as it underwent the ordeal of surviving some accurate medium pace and spin bowling from the pairing of Moody (3/23) and Oldroyd (3/87).In the end, though, all that was left to show for the teams’ imagination and enterprise was a first innings result that fell in favour of the Tasmanians.

Inzamam-ul-Haq
On whether this was his best innings
No. My contribution was very small. The real contributions came from the top order – from Afridi, Razzaq, Butt and Malik. It was a total team effort to chase 316.On what he was thinking on the last ball
I wasn’t thinking anything on the last ball. I was just praying to God to help me.On using Danish Kaneria so late
You have to use a bowler according to the match situation. Afridi was bowling well at the time so I didn’t use him.On Pakistan’s biggest chase
It was a difficult target, but our only chance was to keep wickets in hand for 25-30 overs. The top order did that and kept the required run-rate down which made it easier for us later on.On Ahmedabad
The public really supported us and looked after us. The team is very happy with the way things are here.On whether he thought Pakistan’s chances had gone at any stage
After Malik’s dismissal and then the two run-outs later, I thought our chances slipped a little. But the required run-rate, thanks to our top order, was always manageable.On the series from here
Every game is a new game. We have to work hard, continue working hard and plan well for the next few games.On the run-outs
In the one-day game it happens a lot. You have to take a chance, you have to push runs. It happens sometimes, Younis Khan is a good runner, and Akmal’s was a direct hit.On Sachin’s form
Sachin is a great player and he will make it difficult in the next few games. But if my boys play like this then we will be fine.On Sachin bowling the last over
He was the most experienced guy around. Sourav took a chance and it almost succeeded as well.Rahul Dravid

On the game-plan
The game-plan was to try and defend 315, that was the basic idea. Give credit to Pakistan, they chased brilliantly during the middle overs. The Malik-Razzaq and Malik-Inzamam partnerships were crucial, they ran lots of singles. We let them collect a lot of singles. We didn’t bowl as well during the middle overs, and the fielding wasn’t that great either.On Sourav Ganguly opening
The decision is for the team management and Sourav to take. But the decision has to be in the best interests of the team.On the commitment
We never gave up trying. We just didn’t bowl enough in the right areas. Three hundred and sixteen is a big total to defend, and although the game slipped during the middle overs we did well to fight back. But it was a little too late.On what’s gone wrong
In the last match we didn’t bat well. Here we didn’t defend well and the fielding wasn’t that great. We have to improve in all three areas, our allround game. We have to play well over 100 overs, we played well just in patches but we have to play well throughout.On missing Harbhajan
There’s no point talking about people who aren’t on the field. We have to do with the 11 players we have on the field.On Tendulkar bowling the last over
Experience. We thought he was a tough guy to face, especially out of the rough, in the last over. We had to take a gamble. Every decision is the captain’s. He is the final authority and he can take advice from anyone, including me. He has to take the praise or the criticism.On who had more at stake
You can’t say one team had more at stake than the other. We both want to win the series.On whether he would have made Sachin bowl the last over
Yes, I would have.On the crowd booing
You get used to the crowd reaction, whether it is praise or criticism. They are fulsome in their praise and vocal in their criticism, but it is part of the game and we have to deal with it.

Two additions have been made today to the South Australia squad for 2003-04 that was announced earlier this month.Outstanding grade performances by Northern Districts fast bowler Chris Duval and batting allrounder Ben Cameron from Tea Tree Gully have seen them awarded rookie contracts for the next summer. They will join two other rookies, Callum Ferguson and Trent Kelly, and the 15 senior-contracted players in new State coach Wayne Phillips’ squad.Duval, 19, made his mark in the A-grade competition last summer by taking 31 wickets at 19.74. He was included in this year’s Commonwealth Bank Cricket Academy intake and is in his second six-week session with the Academy at the moment.Cameron, 22, won the Hargrave Trophy last season for being judged the best A-grade player under 23. He averaged 51.80 with the bat, including a highest score of 109 not out, and with his medium-pace bowling he took 18 wickets at 17.06.South Australia Cricket Association general manager of cricket operations Harvey Jolly said the selection of Duval and Cameron showed there were still opportunities available for grade cricketers in South Australia.”Chris and Ben have been playing in the grade cricket competition for anumber of years and both have risen up through the various grade levels.Their selection into the Redbacks squad shows how the grade cricketsystem acts as a springboard into the State team for those players whohave the talent and perform,” he said.The Redbacks squad for 2003-04 is: Greg Blewett, Ryan Harris, Ben Cameron (rookie contract), Mark Higgs, Mark Cleary, Ben Johnson, Mark Cosgrove, Darren Lehmann (ACB contract), Chris Davies, Graham Manou, John Davison, Mick Miller, Shane Deitz, Paul Rofe, Chris Duval (rookie contract), Shaun Tait, David Fitzgerald, Callum Ferguson (rookie contract), Andy Flower, Trent Kelly (rookie contract), Jason Gillespie (ACB contract).

The BCCI is planning to reduce match fees for international cricketers once a contract system is introduced. According to The Times of India, Ratnakar Shetty, the BCCI’s joint secretary, has said that the pay cut for both, Tests and one-dayers, would be Rs 65,000.”There is a likelihood that the match fees for Tests and one-day internationals would be cut down by around Rs 65,000,” said Shetty. “But this is not final. The suggestion is that cricketers making the playing 11 would get Rs Two lakh for a Test, compared to Rs 2.68 lakh they are getting now. For one-dayers the amount works out to Rs 1.60 lakh as compared to the Rs 2.35 lakh they are getting now.” He added that the board would most likely implement the team’s suggestion about giving reserve players half of what the playing 11 received.* * *In the same paper, Sourav Ganguly reacted with disbelief when he was told that VVS Laxman, who has averaged 74.75 since January 2003, grumbled about being perpetually on trial. “VVS on trial? You’ve got to be joking,” said Ganguly. “His is one of the first names to be put down on paper by the selectors. I don’t see any question marks against his name.”He touched on the debate about the openers, saying, “Today Yuvraj [Singh] is ready for Tests and I see no reason why he should not get a shot at the top of the order. Just imagine both Viru [Virender Sehwag] and Yuvi firing together! Gee, it gives me goosebumps!”* * *Laxman again, and he talks of the record Test score in The Indian Express. “I’ve my sights on 400,” he says, “but only when the team needs it. It should come when the team requires it the most.” Laxman’s best score in Tests (281) was also India’s highest score for three years, until Sehwag’s 309 earlier this year.He spoke about his evolving game and experiences. “My shot selection has improved,” he said. “It’s not that I am playing lesser shots. Only, they are more risk-free. Also, I am able to judge the wickets better.”* * *Most of the Indian players were unable to follow the football too closely because of the training camp, but they all had their favourites, according to The Indian Express. Zaheer Khan likes Zidane and Henry, and in the event of the French faltering, he’s got van Nistelrooy and David Beckham as well. Laxman doesn’t follow the game much anymore, but France find favour with him too. Rahul Dravid likes Ronaldo, Rohan Gavaskar thinks Italy or the Czech Republic could win, Mohammad Kaif prefers Portugal, and Lakshmipathy Balaji prefers sleep. Yuvraj, though, has a way of watching the games. “Train, sleep, watch matches and again sleep.”But no one bends it like Badani. His favourites are France and he thinks Beckham is overrated by the English press. “I am not an idiot, though,” says Hemang Badani, presumably speaking about his understanding of football.

Makhaya Ntini is to be given the South African board’s (UCB) approval to play for Warwickshire during the break in South Africa’s schedule. Ntini will replace Heath Streak when he returns home in August for series against New Zealand and India.”In principle the deal has been approved, and we’re sorting out the conditions we will release him on,” Gerald Majola, the UCB’s chief executive, told Reuters. “He’s a rhythm bowler, and the feeling is that he needs to be bowling before our season starts.”Majola added that final approval for Ntini’s release should be completed by the end of the week.Warwickshire spokesman Keith Cook told BBC Sport: “We first targeted Makhaya about 18 months ago.”

Northerns 132 for 1 (Petersen 51*) beat Eastern Province 131 (Peterson 34, Mbhalati 3-26) by nine wicketsScorecardRain in East London put paid to the Border – KwaZulu-Natal match whileNortherns made short work of a troubled Eastern Province team in theStandard Bank Cup.The match in East London was abandoned without a ball being bowled when both captains decided to call the game off due to the rain, a wet pitch and a near unplayable outfield.At Centurion, Northerns never looked back after they won the toss and sentEastern Province in to bat. Traveling without their coach, Kepler Wessels,Eastern Province was bowled out for 131, in 38.4 overs. Robin Peterson with34 and Dumisa Makalima (25) were the only batsmen to offer any realresistance. Once again the young opening bowler, Ethy Mbhalati, showed somepromise, taking 3 for 26.Northerns left nothing to chance and raced away to the win by nine wicketsin 19.2 overs with only Abraham de Villiers losing his wicket, run out for28. Alviro Petersen ended on 51 and Jacques Rudolph on 28.

Close New Zealand 536 for 5 (Richardson 145, Styris 119)
Scorecard

India had more success on the second day than on the first, but not necessarily more joy, as New Zealand ground their way to a mammoth 536 for 5. The Indian bowlers were ineffective, unable to stop either Mark Richardson from extending his gritty knock or Scott Styris from chalking up an entertaining century. New Zealand controlled proceedings all day but did not make enough of an attempt to score quickly and give themselves sufficient time to bowl India out twice.The best part of the day was dogged, turgid cricket. New Zealand applied themselves in a manner more expected while batting on a greentop under overcast skies at Headingley, or if the ball was spitting and fizzing on a rank turner. But on a wicket that was nice and easy to bat on, with true bounce and pace, against a tiring attack that could only be called an attack because of Anil Kumble, it seemed rather strange. But Stephen Fleming is no fool. The Indians will know that he must have had firm plans in his mind when he instructed his team to play the way it did.Of all the batsmen, Richardson’s plans were easily the best-laid. He puts a high price on his wicket, tries nothing foolish and is utterly predictable in the best sort of way. There was no unseemly haste to score quick runs, and today Richardson dug deep into a seemingly endless well of concentration and accumulated runs, unmindful of whatever little commotion there was at the other end.Interestingly, in the course of his 410-ball stay at the crease, Richardson brought up 2000 Test runs. The fact that he has done so as quickly as anyone in New Zealand cricket seems to have slipped by unnoticed. He’s taken 26 Tests and 44 innings to do so, the same as Andrew Jones, the former New Zealand one-down batsman. Then again, it is hardly surprising that Richardson’s achievement went by without causing a flutter; his batting has been much the same, understated, without flourish and utterly effective.When he finally fell, lofting Harbhajan Singh to Kumble at long-on (382 for 2), Richardson had made a career-best 145. The wicket, falling against the run of play, brought Fleming out to the middle.It was only after lunch that the first signs of acceleration became apparent. Soon after the break, Styris unveiled his full range of strokes, driving well and lofted magnificently over the infield on the leg side. He enjoyed his cricket every bit, often holding the pose after playing a big shot and grinning from ear to ear to his colleague.Fleming had proceeded to drive with authority; without taking too much time to settle in, he took on the bowlers. He scored briskly, unusually so, hitting three boundaries and a six, but it did not last long. The 35th ball he faced, a Sachin Tendulkar delivery that swung late, knocked the off stump right out of the ground (433 for 3).The move to send Styris (119, 230 balls, 10 fours, 2 sixes) up the order proved to be a master stroke. Even Kumble, easily the best bowler on show, was thrashed back over his head for a huge six. He did eventually extract revenge though, trapping Styris in front of the stumps (447 for 4).From then on, all thoughts of acceleration were left squarely in the capable hands of Craig McMillan. He was aggressive from the moment he walked out to the middle, handlebar moustache and all. He irritated the spinners no end, sweeping, reverse-sweeping and dabbing the ball away into gaps. He even managed to get Rudi Koertzen’s goat, running up and down the wicket and receiving an official warning. At the other end, Nathan Astle was scratchy and used up 73 balls for 18 before chopping Harbhajan Singh into the wicketkeeper’s gloves (507 for 5).All said, New Zealand will still have to bat a bit on the third day before they can declare. From then on, the ball will be in India’s court, and Rahul Dravid’s men will then find themselves in the rare position of having to focus on avoiding the follow-on in a home Test. That, more than anything else, is an indication of how much in control New Zealand are.

North

Lancashire and Leicestershire‘s match, for example, went down to the wire at Grace Road, with Lancashire emerging triumphant thanks to Steven Croft’s last-ball four. Tight bowling from the young trio of Simon Marshall, Tom Smith and Oliver Newby, who each grabbed two wickets, left Leicestershire defending a target of just 161. But their own bowlers did a tidy job, Stuart Broad removing Mal Loye early on, yet it wasn’t to be. Stuart Law led Lancashire’s innings with 58 from 40 balls to set up the win.

Midlands/Wales/West

At Bristol, Gloucestershire‘s bowlers kept their nerve against Worcestershire to record their first win of this year’s tournament with a thrilling one-run victory. Gareth Batty took three wickets and Roger Sillence bagged a brace to restrict Gloucestershire to 181 for 7, with Chris Taylor topscoring with 61. But after Carl Greenidge snaffled the bighitting Graeme Hick for a second-ball duck, the Gloucestershire attack didn’t let up and, although Batty and Sillence nearly proved heroes with the bat at the end, they failed to get the runs they needed.But the tightest match of all was a tied game between Northants and Somerset at Northampton. After choosing to bat Somerset lost wickets regularly – two of them to Sourav Ganguly – until they crawled to 151 for 9. But if Northants thought they had an easy chase on their hands, particularly when Usman Afzaal was going great guns from the off, they were wrong. Richard Johnson and Charl Willoughby pegged them back with two wickets each and when the destructive Lance Klusener was run out for 7 the tide had turned in Somerset’s favour. Afzaal (67*) took Northants close and shared an unbeaten stand of 50 with Andrew White, but it was just not enough.

South

Only at The Rose Bowl was the result never in doubt, as Middlesex slumped to a second successive defeat, this time by 59 runs. Mike Carberry biffed 90 to boost Hampshire to 225 for 2 and Dominic Thornely added an unbeaten 50. Middlesex’s batsmen never really got going and by the time Paul Weekes had blasted 49 from the middle order, the momentum – and the match – was firmly with Hampshire.