Scorecard

Younis Khan’s 79 guided Pakistan to a comfortable seven-wicket victory over South Africa on a difficult pitch in Trinidad. The match was stopped during South Africa’s innings when the batsmen complained about the surface, but Pakistan did not have any difficulty in reaching their total of 200 for 3 with 5.3 overs remaining.”It was a tale of two pitches,” Mickey Arthur, South Africa’s coach, told AFP. “When we batted it was wet and difficult, but later the pitch dried up and became easier.”Pakistan’s reply started poorly, Imran Nazir falling for 0, before Younis and Mohammad Hafeez eased towards the target. Hafeez was caught behind off Charl Langeveldt one short of a half-century, but Younis did not let the slip-up affect him and he managed the proceedings until departing lbw to Graeme Smith’s offspin at 157 for 3. He hit nine fours and a six during his 98-ball innings.Mohammad Yousuf (48) and Shoaib Malik (16) made sure of the victory to continue Pakistan’s strong preparation. After winning both of their warm-ups, the side is ideally placed before the tournament-opening match against West Indies on Tuesday. “I am delighted that all my batsmen and bowlers have got some good practice,” Inzamam-ul-Haq said. “This is an ideal time to enter the main competition.”South Africa have some problems after their batting also struggled in the match against Ireland, but Arthur said there was no panic from the No. 1-ranked side. “These are just practice games,” he said, “and I hope we do well when the main competition starts.”Loots Bosman provided the glue with a battling half-century to lift South Africa to a modest total after they had earlier come unstuck on the tricky pitch. Pakistan had them 27 for 3 before a Jacques Kallis and Ashwell Prince rescue act added 66 for the fourth wicket.They both fell on 93, leaving South Africa in some difficulty, before Bosman’s bashing helped them to 199. Pakistan’s bowlers kept plugging away, though, and removed them inside their 50 overs. However, Pakistan would have fancied their chances of containing them for even fewer after Mohammad Sami started by removing the opener AB de Villiers lbw and finding Herschelle Gibbs’ edge, while Umar Gul clean bowled Smith for 1.The match at St Augustine, Trinidad, was held up for nearly ten minutes owing to poor pitch conditions. South Africa were 56 for 3, with Kallis and Prince at the crease, after being put in when the game was stopped following complaints from the batsmen. Bob Woolmer, Pakistan’s coach, and Smith, South Africa’s captain, came on to the pitch and were involved in discussions with the umpires Peter Parker and Ian Gould.”The batsmen were not happy with the way the ball was bouncing,” an ICC official said, “but the umpires asked them to continue.” The interruption was the latest incident in Trinidad to hamper both sides’ preparations for the tournament. Earlier in the week the teams were evacuated because of a gas leak at their Hilton hotel, while Pakistan’s match against Canada was reduced to a 48-over affair because of a fallen sightscreen.

Andrew Symonds has completed his first batting training session in St Vincent to give the defending champions hope he could be ready to face South Africa on March 24. Symonds, who is recovering from arm surgery, faced a tennis balls for ten minutes after feeling strong enough to start hitting a day early.John Buchanan and Alex Kountouris, the physiotherapist, monitored the session that began with Symonds defending before he expaned to some attacking shots. “He has been using the bat against resistance with a bit of tubing in the rooms, so today we just thought we would get him out with a tennis ball,” Kountouris told the Herald Sun. “It’s not really that strenuous on his injured biceps so it wasn’t much of a worry. It feels fine. The harder things are to come over the next week.”Symonds will increase his load to face cricket balls and start throwing in the lead-up to the South Africa game. “He has been doing all the right things now and it’s looking really good,” Kountouris said. “But only time will tell.”Australia start the tournament on March 14 with a game against Scotland and then face The Netherlands four days later. Kountouris’ best-case planning involved Symonds appearing in the final group match against South Africa. “We are not locked into that, but between South Africa and probably the third Super Eight game,” he said of Symonds’ return. “If he doesn’t make it for the South Africa game, it doesn’t mean things have gone badly. It’s just that we haven’t had the courage to push it any harder.”The team will play its opening warm-up game against Zimbabwe on Tuesday and Michael Clarke is due to appear despite carrying soreness in his hip. With Symonds and Matthew Hayden injured and Adam Gilchrist expected back after paternity leave, Australia will have only 12 players to choose from.

Changes are already being made to the West Indies cricket team prior to their tour of England in May, according to West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) president Ken Gordon.”You better believe that they have started already”, Gordon said when asked whether changes would be made to the team prior to the upcoming tour to England in the face of their dismal performance in the current World Cup tournament. He however declined to go into details.And, asked to respond to a call being made in the Express editorial for the resignation of the WICB, Gordon said: “Well, that is par for the course. I can only say that if newspapers feel that is the best judgment they can make, who am I to tell them not to make it. But it just goes to exemplify the kind of very poor judgment of which I am speaking.” He added, however, he would have “absolutely no hesitation in resigning, if I thought for one moment that it would assist the situation. He said that such a call “absolutely doesn’t demoralise me, and it doesn’t demoralise the board”.Gordon was fully in defence of the West Indies team and its captain Brian Lara, even while conceding that all was not well with the team and its performances in the current Cricket World Cup. In an interview at his hotel Suite in Grand Anse, it was a combative Gordon who hit back at critics of the team and its captain, including journalists and commentators in the regional media have been calling for Lara’s resignation.Nothing is wrong, Gordon said, with proper and full analysis of the team’s performances “but when you make that almost like an agenda item, this attack, attack attack, it is not in anybody’s best interest. Not at this time”. Saying there was going to be ample time for such full scale, hard hitting analysis at the end of the series, Gordon said the force of the sustained criticisms at this time had the effect of demoralising the players.He had not spoken with or seen the players in the previous two days, certainly not after their fourth straight defeat to South Africa at the National Stadium on Tuesday. But, he said it was “almost unnatural that it would not have some kind of effect,” referring to what he described as the potentially demoralising commentary being carried on in parts of the regional media.”It is palpably unfair to be criticising the team and its captain in the middle of a series like this, he said. There was going to be the time when “no holds should be barred in the analysis that is necessary. But for the moment, he said what was required was an exercise of “some care, judgment and timing.”Calls for Lara’s resignation, he said, were premature and unjustified. “Let’s face it. He was put there by the management, and I would be prepared to take whatever responsibility for it,when the time comes,” he said, disputing the basis on which those calls were being made at the moment. Nothing fundamental about what Lara brings to the game had changed since he was reappointed captain, he added.Granting that Lara had been committing “errors of judgment” during the series up this point, Gordon said, however he was going to make no criticism of those decisions at this time. “Do you want to see them get out for 50 runs in a game?” he asked rhetorically, in answer to a question that on the basis of the loss to South Africa the West Indies was not effectively out of the series. “They have to continue to play the best game they can,” he said, adding that for too long now West Indies cricket had been propelled on the basis of raw talent and not much else. There was widespread hope across the region for the West Indies to be doing better than it is in this series and that was understandable, Gordon said.

But, he said, that was largely unrealistic, since “two years ago, there was not even that hope. The team was at the very bottom of the heap.” Some “sparks” were ignited in the interim to create that hope, But it ought to have been accepted that the team has not been enjoying its best days. “We all know that on its best day this team can beat anybody, but the reality is that the team is not enjoying its best days. We have come from very far. We had hoped to get back closer to the top but it has not happened,” he said.Reflecting on the time when the West Indies prevailed principally on the basis of that talent, he said the game had changed significantly. It changed, he said, “when the Australians went to the drawing board and decided to find away to beat these talented guys.” They came up with a formula, he said, and it was copied, “by the Indians, by England, by everybody except the West Indies.”We continue to send extraordinarily talented youngsters out there almost as sacrificial lambs,” he said, adding that “there is absolutely no substitute for the kinds of development that comes with the academies” and the other elements which ought to go into the production of a truly professional unit.

Super 4s cricket kicks off in England this weekend and Rosalie Birch has been named as the new Sapphires captain following Laura Newton’s retirement.The Twenty20 Challenge will be held on Monday 28 May, with Sapphires taking on the Emeralds, captained by Alexia Walker. Nicki Shaw’s Diamonds, last year’s winners, will take on the Rubies, who are led by Gill Richards.Shaw is taking over temporary charge of the Diamonds while Charlotte Edwards recovers from knee surgery. Edwards’s knee flared up after the quadrangular series in India, but she hopes to be back playing by mid-July ahead of the New Zealand series in mid-August.The winners from these two games will then face each other in the Final, while the remaining two teams will have a third place play-off. The first round of matches starts at 11.30am, followed by the third place play-off and the Final at 3pm. All games will be played at Loughborough University.The league competition begins on the weekend of June 2-3, with further matches taking place on June 16 and 23 and over the weekend of July 7-8.Ebony Rainford-Brent, representing the Diamonds had this to say about the Super 4s; “It’s a great platform for players to showcase their talent. It is also an excellent way of preparing for international level, by facing the best in the country on a regular basis and to push yourself either individually or as a team. For me this is my first Super 4s season and I look forward to having the opportunity of playing a key role and producing some good performances.”

South Division

Surrey slipped to their first defeat as Middlesex avenged their defeat at The Oval 11 days ago with an eight-wicket victory at Lord’s in another match shorted by the rain. That they played at all was nothing short of miraculous as torrential downpours lashed most of the capital. But a 20,000 plus crowd saw Surrey stumble to 85 for 5 in 13.3 overs before rain interrupted, and when play resumed Middlesex were set 73 from 10 overs. Opener Eoin Morgan made 25 not out off 18 balls and James Dalrymple smacked 26 off 15 as Middlesex cruised home with 14 deliveries in hand. Middlsex, who have had half their matches washed out, now go within one point of Surrey.Sussex moved into second place on Net Run Rate with a 17-run win over Essex under lights at Hove. Forties from Luke Wright and Chris Adams pushed Sussex to 163 for 6 and Grant Flower and Ravi Bopara seemed to have put the visitors well on course. But Sussex’s seamers came up trumps – which was just as well as their much-vaunted spinners struggled – and Essex, who needed 38 off four overs, lost their way and in the end fell well short.

North Division

Andrew Gale’s 56 led a well-paced Yorkshire chase as they beat Durham by six wickets with two balls in hand at Chester-le-Street. Durham’s 133 for 5 always looked below par.

Midlands-West-Wales Division

Worcestershire kept their hopes of a quarter-final place alive with a three-wicket win over Somerset at at Taunton with two balls to spare. Justin Langer’s 45 off 36 balls and James Hildreth’s 40 off 27 steered Somerset to 148 for 7, but another Australian opener – Phil Jaques – got Worcestershire off to a flier with 59 off 50 balls and then Roger Sillence hammered 19 not out off 11 balls at the death.

South

It may be just a bit of fun on a Friday night, but Surrey needed something to boost their season. And they got it at the Oval, beating Middlesex in a close London derby at The Oval. They had looked out of it, after slumping to 24 for 3, chasing 163, but Mark Ramprakash (85*) and Jon Batty (49) paved the way for their revival, with a fourth-wicket stand worth 110. Ramprakash was out of step early on but stayed firm and celebrated his late driven sixes – including the one which won the match off ex-Surrey player Tim Murtagh – with both arms aloft. James Benning may be thought of as the king of this game, but he made just 3, and it was Ramprakash who was once again Surrey’s hero. The weather was mostly fine but it, and Ramprakash, begain to rain on Middlesex’s parade in the closing overs.Some consolation news for Middlesex, though: Chad Keegan limped off the pitch after damaging his ankle, but told Cricinfo after the match that he expected to be fit for their next game this Sunday.A surprising evening at Chelmsford, where Murray Goodwin’s century wasn’t enough for Sussex; so, Essex won comfortably, but their victory wasn’t much to do with their new recruit Adam Hollioake. Sussex made 165, with Goodwin blasting 102 not out from 65 balls, but Essex knocked them off with 19 balls to spare. Hollioake bowled two overs, none for 21, and didn’t bat, while Grant Flower’s topscore of 37 was enough to help them to the win.The dramatic finish of the night came at Southampton where Hampshire’s Greg Lamb was dismissed off the final ball with one run needed to beat Kent leaving the match tied. Robert Key led the way for Kent with 59 off 53 balls.

North

Jeremy Snape took a hat-trick to give the reigning champions Leicestershire both their breath back and victory against Yorkshire at Grace Road. In a match reduced to 16 overs, Leicestershire climbed to 154, but Gerard Brophy and Craig White made the target look vulnerable with an opening stand of 57. Even three quick wickets later, Yorkshire had a very good chance. Enter the captain, Snape, who dismissed three victims in one over to really put the skids under the visitors. Yorkshire still made game chase, but it was not enough.Spin proved king for Lancashire at Old Trafford, as Gary Keedy and Sanath Jayasuriya restricted Durham to 149, which was duly overcome. Their target could have been lower – Durham were 73 for 5 – but Gordon Muchall and Gary Park at least gave Durham’s bowlers something to work with. Liam Plunkett did his best, with two wickets, but it was not enough. Mal Loye and Steven Croft were Lancashire’s saviours, with an unbeaten stand of 113 after they had been in early trouble at 35 for 3.Mark Ealham and Gareth Clough bowled out Derbyshire to set up a straightforward victory for Nottinghamshire at Derby . Ealham took 3 for 37, Clough 4 for 24 to dismiss Derbyshire for 148. Samit Patel’s unbeaten 55 did the rest.

Midlands/West/Wales

Warwickshire were able to steal a march on the rest of the group with a close win against Somerset at Edgbaston. They deserved their early lead, too – Tim Ambrose’s 47 lifted them to 166, while Jonathan Trott celebrated his England call-up with 44, but that had looked inadequate as Marcus Trescothick and Justin Langer climbed into the attack. But when their opening stand of 47 was broken, they lost wickets steadily and Warwickshire held their nerve, to win by 7 runs.Northamptonshire‘s match with Worcestershire was abandoned without a ball bowled, as was Glamorgan‘s game against Gloucestershire.

Sourav Ganguly’s arrival is barely noticed amid the commotion. A scrum of 20 journalists are crowded around a certain Sachin Tendulkar – hanging on his every word as they have hung for the best part of two decades, willing him to wax lyrical about the Lord’s Test century that he has never yet compiled. Meanwhile the Prince of Calcutta, Tendulkar’s former captain and fellow Galactico, slips serenely past the throng and takes his place at a nearby table. He is away from the limelight, back among the ranks. And the impression he would like to give is that he has never been happier.It has been a crazy year for Ganguly encompassing exile and acrimony, recalls and redemption. Eight months ago, when his feud with his ex-coach Greg Chappell was at its height, the notion of a third Test tour to England was so absurd it was not even a consideration. But now he is back at Lord’s, where his whole journey began, 11 years ago. In the corresponding Test of 1996, Ganguly announced his arrival with a sublime debut century and then followed up one innings and two weeks later with a second hundred – 136 at Nottingham. He has scarcely escaped from the headlines since.”The past is the past. There are phases in life that you just have to fight through,” says Ganguly. Nine days into his 36th year, and with more than 5500 runs from his 93 Test matches – including an Indian record of 21 wins in 49 as captain – he’s fought and won more battles than most men would seek in ten lifetimes. But he insists the fires within have not yet been dimmed, they’ve merely been brought under control. It is a quieter, more contemplative character who is embarking on the autumn of his illustrious career.”For those eight months [out of the side], I had all sorts of thoughts, but I never thought of giving up. It made me a tougher player to be honest. When I came back in South Africa [in December 2006], I felt I was tougher even than when I was playing my best cricket. I never thought so far as this tour. Even if I hadn’t been recalled, I would have carried on playing until the World Cup, expecting an opportunity and ready to cash in on it.”Ganguly has cashed in alright. The first innings of his rebirth was an indomitable 51 not out on a Johannesburg greentop, out of a total of 249, that ultimately set up an improbable 123-run victory. Another 110 runs in defeat at Cape Town meant he finished a tough tour as the series top-scorer, and a 13 th Test century followed four months later in Chittagong, as Bangladesh were made to pay for their insolence at the World Cup. Even during that tumultuous Group B defeat in Trinidad, Ganguly was the one Indian who would not be bowed – defiantly anchoring a disastrous batting performance with 66 from 129 balls.Those efforts were sufficient to re-establish his credentials. Now, at last, Ganguly is able to take pleasure in his cricket once again – something, you suspect, he has missed for many a long year. Certainly, he does not seem to miss the pressures of captaincy one little bit. “Oh yeah, completely,” he says when asked if he’s over his axing. “I’ve got so much more free time. Captaincy is never easy but in India it is harder because the demands are more. Now that I’m away from the job, I’ve been able to concentrate on myself and my [own] game again. I’ve got a lot of time to relax.”England suits his demeanour as well, despite the fact that the British press is scarcely any more forgiving than their Indian counterparts. In 2000 he endured an unsuccessful stint for Lancashire, scoring 671 runs in 14 matches with no centuries, and attracting the opprobrium of none other than the people’s Prince himself, Andrew Flintoff. He was even less successful in a brief foray for Northamptonshire last summer, averaging 4.80 in six innings, although in mitigation, a four-week midsummer stint was never going to suit him. “When you come from the subcontinent,” he says, “you need some time to get used to the conditions.”I had no problems at Lancashire, to be honest. The only thing is, I never used to drink, and if you’re a non-drinker in England it’s tough. I used to have my coke, pack my bags and go home to see my wife. My performance was not what they wanted of an overseas professional, and that may have been a reason for some disappointment, but we still managed second in the championship.”Whenever Ganguly has turned up here in India’s colours, however, the story has been significantly different. “Whether it’s the World Cup, Tests or one-day cricket, by God’s grace, I’ve done exceedingly well [here],” he says without exaggeration. His 379 runs in the 1999 World Cup included a career-best 183 against Sri Lanka at Taunton, while his six Tests to date in England have earned him the beastly tally of 666 runs, with three hundreds and three fifties. Only once has he failed, making 0 and 5 in the last Lord’s Test in 2002 – the only occasion on which he has been beaten.”I like coming to this part of the world, and I’m sure most of the players enjoy coming here too,” he says. “The facilities, the travel, the comfort. You’re not getting on flights every five days, you’re not packing suitcases every day. You’re just on the coach for a maximum of a couple of hours. It takes a lot of the tiredness out of you. The weather’s good, and it’s a country where everything’s accessible.”

Even so, Ganguly is too long in the tooth to allow complacency to seep into his assessment of the challenge. “I’ve done well here, but that doesn’t guarantee success – it’s a one-ball game for batsmen. It’s been raining a lot here, so there’ll be some movement, but if we put runs up on the board, that’s the key.” With the old firm of Ganguly, Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid reunited for a third and final assault, that side of the bargain is likely to be fulfilled, especially against an attack lacking the twin services of Steve Harmison and Andrew Flintoff. But what of India’s own bowling?”This is the best bowling team we’ve had in England,” says Ganguly. “In terms of the number of games they’ve played, they are inexperienced, but in terms of performances they have delivered. We won in West Indies and we won the first Test in South Africa in difficult conditions. Zaheer Khan had a great summer for Worcester [in 2006], but Sreesanth is my dark horse for the series – he runs in all the time, and bowls with pace and swing in the right areas.”One man who is missing, however, is Ganguly’s staunchest sidekick, Harbhajan Singh, and it is not hard to imagine what the senior man makes of his omission. “He’s not just a great ally, he’s a world-class bowler,” says Ganguly. “He and Anil Kumble are India’s biggest match winners, and he’s got nearly 250 Test wickets. Series after series he’s been on his own. He was our only bowler in 2001 when we beat Australia, because everyone else was injured. Anil was having a shoulder operation, while Srinath was injured after the first match. We kept on losing bowlers, but he just stood up at one end and picked off wickets.”Ganguly’s tussles with Australia remain the zenith of his career. When asked where India’s famous innings victory at Headingley in 2002 ranks in his all-time moments, it trails in a distant third, way behind the Adelaide triumph in 2003-04, and just about on a par with the away win in Pakistan that same season. But in terms of personal batting highlights, few occasions match Ganguly’s opening gambit, right here in North-West London.”The frame of mind I had in that Test [in 1996] I could never have it again,” says Ganguly. “It’s probably the best frame of mind I’ve had in my career. It’s an age factor. I was more carefree back then, because when you’re young you don’t worry about a lot of things. In last 11 years I’ve scored runs all around the world, but back then I had no nervousness, no fear of failure.”I wish I could get back to that mindset for this Test match,” he admits, a touch wistfully. Given all the battles he has fought and won in the intervening years, perhaps it is not entirely out of the question. He has proved his point and clawed his way back from the brink. Now all he has to do is enjoy the few moments that remain.

Although Dale Benkenstein and Shane Warne were captains with very different emotions when play was abandoned in the Friends Provident final they agreed that third umpire referrals haven’t worked in this year’s tournament.During Durham’s innings there was an occasion where each side could have used the system with some justification. Phil Mustard, batting well on 49, was trapped lbw by James Bruce. However, replays showed the ball pitched a fraction outside leg stump but by the time Mustard asked for a referral it was based on footage from the dressing room.Then, with Shivnarine Chanderpaul on 17, Chris Tremlett had a good shout for lbw turned down and this time the replays looked in favour of the bowler. But Warne didn’t opt to use the third umpire, and said that he had discussed the issue with Benkenstein before the match.”Both of us spoke at the start and we think if there was something obvious that would be the only way we’d refer it otherwise that’s what the umpires are there to do,” before adding that he didn’t think the technology was up to standard. “When you get the technology 100% that’s when you can use referrals, until it’s three dimensional and you see it from every angle there’s no point using it.”Benkenstein was equally lukewarm in his appraisal of the system, which hasn’t seen a single decision overturned during the televised matches of the tournament. “It just doesn’t work,” he said. “Every time you refer something it doesn’t get overturned. I think they need to use all the technology and if they are going to do it, do it 100%.”And the umpires and players must buy into it. At the moment it’s being done half-heartedly. The third umpires just keeping backing the onfield umpires. The umpires have to agree it’s not a negative thing and don’t see it as guys belittling their decision.”

Both Pakistan and Bangladesh come into this match with their immediate future confirmed. While Pakistan savour their progress in the tournament, Bangladesh will be checking-in for a flight back to Dhaka on Friday. Beaten comprehensively by Australia and Sri Lanka in the Super Eights, Bangladesh’s joy of upsetting the West Indian wagon earlier was short-lived as rash strokes and poor temperament got the better of their inexperienced batsmen.Pakistan, however, should barely sweat after resounding wins over the World Cup finalists and few will bet against them not to beat lesser opposition with greater authority and conviction. But, given the extremes that Pakistan experience, a repeat of Bangladesh’s victory over its Asian rivals at the 1999 World Cup should not be forgotten no matter how unlikely it seems at the moment.Bat play: Bangladesh have the ability to score quickly but their batsmen have taken a queer aversion to prolonging their innings. They are missing a plan on how to pace their sojourn in the middle that often results in a lofted mis-hit after a flurry of strokes. Aftab Ahmed, with 147 runs in the tournament, has been their best batsman with Mohammad Ashraful, not his usual flowing self, providing some hope in the middle order.Pakistan’s only worry is their opening combination; Imran Nazir and Salman Butt havebeen huge disappointments and a promotion for Shahid Afridi is likely to give him some batting practice. Younis Khan, Shoaib Malik and Misbah-ul-Haq, the tournament’s joint top-scorer, will try and add to Bangladesh’s miseries.Wrecking ball: Spin will be the key to Bangladesh’s chances of stopping Pakistan from wreaking havoc. Shakib Al Hasan, the slow left-armer, has been their most successful bowler in the tournament but not the most economical. Their opening combination of Syed Rasel and Mashrafe Mortaza has yielded only three wickets and has failed to provide the initial breakthroughs.Pakistan’s bowling department, however, has no such concerns. Afridi already boasts a wicket-tally of ten and the offspinner Mohammad Hafeez did well to contain Australia. Sohail Tanvir, a late replacement for Shoaib Akhtar, has built up a reputation of picking up wickets in his first over while Mohammad Asif, with eight wickets so far, should be able to create panic among the Bangladesh batsmen with his annoying accuracy.Keep your eyes on: Misbah was deemed by many as too old and inept for this format of the game. He has not only rescued Pakistan several times in this tournament, but has also hit the longest six. He also has 18 fours and three more sixes to go with that.Shop talk: Pakistan’s victory celebrations after their win against Australia even got the country’s president involved. Pervez Musharraf not only lavished praise on the team but also awarded US$10,000 to each member. Bangladesh, however, are hoping for an upset at the end of a largely disappointing tournament.Pitching it right: The weather is expected to be dry and warm and with Bangladesh having already played at this venue twice, they might want to make use of a batting pitch where England scored 188 against Zimbabwe. With a hard surface and good bounce, Asif and Tanvir could prove to be a handful.TeamsBangladesh (probable) Tamim Iqbal, Nazimuddin, Aftab Ahmed,Mohammad Ashraful (capt), Shakib Al Hasan, Nadif Chowdhury, Mahmudullah,Mashrafe Mortaza, Mushfiqur Rahim (wk), Abdur Razzak, Syed Rasel.Pakistan (probable) Imran Nazir, Mohammad Hafeez, Salman Butt,Younis Khan, Shoaib Malik (capt), Shahid Afridi, Kamran Akmal (wk),Misbah-ul-Haq, Sohail Tanvir, Umar Gul, Mohammad Asif.

Leicestershire have signed South Africa pair Boeta Dippenaar and Garnett Kruger on two-year deals. Dippenaar joins as the club’s one overseas player while Kruger comes on a Kolpak deal after a stint at Grace Road in 2007.Dippenaar is currently out of the South African team, but recently captained the A side in India and started the new South African domestic season in fine style with 115 against the Dolphins.”Boeta will add energy and much-needed experience to the batting line-up with the added option of moving him up the order in the one-day game,” said coach Tim Boon. “Kruger is fit and strong, and still has his best cricket years ahead of him, given his age and the fact that he has not been over bowled.”It is important that we have an experienced senior strike bowler capable of bowling hostile spells to place the opposition on the back foot. Garnett showed his worth in his stint with the county in 2007 and has started well with the Lions in South Africa.”The signings are a timely boost for Leicestershire after they lost John Sadler to Derbyshire.