Wherever the Sri Lankan women’s cricket team go, the crowds should follow. Entertainment is virtually guaranteed. If they are not treating every run between the wicket as if it were their last (and it often is), they are hurling themselves around the field as though their lives depended on it. And, in between times, they can play some pretty good cricket.Today at Hagley Oval was no exception. In virtually guaranteeing themselves the winning of their mini-world cup within the CricInfo Women’s World Cup with a 26-win over the Netherlands, they contributed to making a low-scoring affair a highly entertaining spectacle.Being put in to bat on a Hagley Park pitch having its first use at the tournament, the Sri Lankan batsmen put supporters, opponents and neutral observers on a roller-coaster ride of emotions as they began by expertly accumulating a total of 94 for two in the 34th over, mainly courtesy of what turned out to be a match-winning innings by their captain, Rasanjali Silva. And then crashed to 113 for eight before the last two wickets added 26.It was almost as if the rest of the batsmen were in a different match from Silva. It took a special demonstration of keeper-bowler co-operation to snare the Sri Lankan captain, stumped Rowan Milburn, bowled Tessa van der Gun for 53 off 95 balls with the score at 94.Silva’s departure started the slide. The next highest score off the bat was 11 and that was from Hiroshi Abeysinghe. She was looking promising until she became the sacrificial lamb when the only case of the Sri Lankan disease in the innings struck. She found herself keeping company with Chamani Seneviratne at one end of the pitch while the Netherlands fielders were focusing with considerable pleasure on the other end.However, there was one other major contribution to the Sri Lankan score. Extras, through the generosity of the Netherland bowlers, contributed 37, 34 of those runs coming from wides. In a loss by 26 runs, it is a figure that will haunt them.While the Sri Lankans were going through their batting highs and lows, the procession from the batting crease was almost matched by that at the bowling crease. Van der Gun was the best of the eight bowlers used, picking up three for 18 off four overs, including another stumping collaboration with Milburn, while Maartje Koster’s six overs conceded eight runs for one wicket and Caroline Salomons rose above having her action scrutinised to return one for 13 off four.The boost to the Netherlands batting with Koster and Helmien Rambaldo returning from injury half worked. Koster departed in the first over, the first in a tough lbw day for Umpire Dave Quested. Rambaldo, however, went through to 38 and looked the best of the batsmen on offer from either side.The Sri Lankan’s were very keen on the possibility of lbws; their frequent demands would have been intimidating if it were not for Umpires Quested and Peter Williams towering over their tormentors. It at times looked like the Lilliputians advancing on Gulliver as they pleaded for deliverance from the batsmen.As it was, they received their quota in the space of four balls. Seneviratne was the beneficiary as Umpire Quested answered the call on the third, fourth and sixth balls of her second over. The hat-trick ball was a wide. That was the end as 43 for two suddenly became 44 for five.But the Netherlands never lie down. Amid a continuous cacophony of imploring appeals, they tried to accumulate the necessary runs. De Boer was the most defiant, her 26 coming off 67 balls. But it was just too much for the lower order to withstand the enthusiastic fielding and accurate bowling of Silva (CricInfo Player of the Match), three for 24 off eight, Seneviratne, four for 23 off 10 and Jayamali Indika, three for 14 off 6.2.A very happy Sri Lankan manager, Chandra Munaweera, said the team had done well under pressure. The bowling in particular had been very good.As far as the batting was concerned, she said, “losing the toss was a blessing in disguise. Other teams do not expect us to get runs.”And, of course, given previous performances, “just one run out was very good.”She said the team had gained a big boost from the highly vocal support from the local Sri Lankan community, who had turned Hagley Oval into a little bit of Asia with their lively contribution to proceedings.Now, said Mrs Munaweera, “we are looking forward to England.”Result: Sri Lanka 139; the Netherlands, 113. A win to Sri Lanka by 26 runs, barring miracles or disasters, depending on the points of view, guaranteeing them sixth place and a berth in the next World Cup in South Africa in 2004.

The Orissa team gave their state a very happy New Year’s gift by scoring a 129-run victory over Bengal in the East Zone Ranji Trophy tie at the Eden Gardens onSunday. The emphatic manner in which the cricketers from Utkal dominated thegame was hard to believe. Undoubtedly, the man of the match was the formerIndian seam bowler Debashis Mohanty. He took five wickets in the second inningsto take his match tally to 11, the first time that he had taken 10 or morewickets in a first class game. Incidentally this is the first time that Orissahave managed to defeat Bengal in 43 years of first class cricket.The issue was wide open on Saturday as Sourav Ganguly was still at the crease.But Mohanty had reserved one of the best deliveries for him. The ball that hadthe Indian captain could have done the same to any other batsmen. It pitchedjust outside the off-stump, bounced and moved off the seam late. Gangulydesperately tried to remove himself from the line of the delivery but could onlyglove it to wicket-keeper Gautam Gopal. Earlier, Mohanty had removed nightwatchman Sourashis Lahiri and then had dismissed the Bengal skipper DevangGandhi with successive deliveries. However, Gandhi could have left the ballalone. He tried to play it down and managed only to glove it for the secondcatch of the day to Gautam Gopal.An early lunch for Bengal was on the cards as Rohan Gavaskar was caught andbowled by Ajay Barik who had replaced Mohanty after the latter had bowledunchanged for two hours from the club house end. Gavaskar hit him for two lovelydrives through the covers. However, the moment Barik went round the wicket andaltered the line, Gavaskar was found wanting. He played well across to a balltrying to flick it through mid wicket. The ball caught the leading edge andlobbed back for a simple catch to the bowler. Srikkant Kalyani then was trappedplumb in front by P.Jayachandran as he shuffled too far across the stumps.Bengal finally managed to give some respectability to the score because of aninth wicket stand between Deep Dasgupta and Utpal Chatterjee. The two added 99runs for the ninth wicket taking the score over the 250 mark. However, the jobfor the two became comparatively easy as the Orissa spinners were operating.Both played freely and demonstrated to their predecessors that there was nothingin the pitch. Chatterjee scored 53 with seven boundaries. He was particularlysevere on off spinner S.Satpathy, repeatedly cutting him to the point fence.Dasgupta also looked quite solid in his 39. He was out to a dubious caughtbehind decision. Two balls later the match was over as Jayachandra had uprootedthe stumps of the last batsman Shiv Shankar Paul.Orissa now have 21 points from three matches while Bengal have 13. The latterwill at least need a minimum of five points to have a safe passage into theknockout stage. Assam have 16 points from two matches, while Bihar have eightfrom three.

• It was the 1549th Test match in cricket history.
• It was India’s 341st and Zimbabwe’s 52nd Test match – seventh betweenthese two sides.
• It was the 28th Test match on Zimbabwean soilfourth between thesetwo sides.
• Umpire Ian Robinson was officiating in his 25th Test match. He becamefirst Zimbabwean and 31st umpire in Test annals to reach thislandmark. The other umpire Asoka de Silva was standing in his thirdTest.
• Hemang Badani and Travis Friend became the 237th and 51st player torepresent India and Zimbabwe respectively. By an odd coincidence boththese players have appeared in 13 matches each for their respectivesides.
• Grant Flower was playing his 50th Test match. He became thirdZimbabwean after brother Andy and Alistair Campbell (52) and 171stplayer in all to have reached this milestone.
• Rahul Dravid on 25 in first innings became the highest run-scoreragainst Zimbabwe in Tests moving ahead of New Zealander Nathan Astlewho has an aggregate of 662 runs from 9 Tests and 15 innings. At theend of this match Dravid has scored 732 runs from five Tests and 8innings. Tendulkar with 664 runs from 7 Tests and 11 innings has movedto second place behind Dravid.
• Andy Blignaut’s three catches in first innings equalled the bestperformance by a Zimbabwean in the field in an innings against India.Guy Whittall had also taken three catches in the first innings of theBulawayo Test just a week ago.
• Andy Flower completed his 1000 Test runs against India when his scorereached 18 in first innings. He became first Zimbabwean and 22ndbatsman in all to have accomplished this feat. At the end of thismatch Andy has taken his aggregate to 1043 runs from 14 innings ofseven Tests against India. Flower The accompanying table lists thebatsman with 1000 runs in a career against India. It might be notedthat Andy’s average of 128.37 is the highest among this elite band.

Batsmen with a career aggregate of 1000 runs against India :

• The remarkable thing about Andy’s feat is that he needed only sevenTests to complete his 1000 runs.Flower now shares the record ofcompleting 1000 runs in a career against India in least Test matcheswith West Indian Everton Weekes. Weekes, however, is the fastest interms of innings as he accomplished this feat in four innings lesserthan Andy.
• Andy is now jointly placed second among the batsmen reaching 1000 runsin a career against a particular country in least matches alongwithWest Indian Everton Weekes, Australia’s Don Bradman and Doug Walterswith West Indian Viv Richards heading the table. Richards took onlysix Tests to achieve a runaggregate of 1000 against England. AnotherWest Indian Weekes holds the world record of being the fastest inleast innings as he took only nine inning to complete his 1000 runsagainst India. The details:

Fastest to complete 1000 test runs against a specific country :

• Heath Streak,on 11 in first innings,completed his 1000 runs in 40thTest. He became seventh Zimbabwean and 363rd batsman in Test annals toreach this landmark. The batsman with a career aggregate of 1000 runsfor Zimbabwe are :Andy Flower (3908 runs in 52 Tests), Grant Flower(2812 runs in 50 Tests), Alistair Campbell (2307 runs in 52 Tests),GuyWhittall (2056 runs in 41 Tests), Dave Houghton (1464 runs in 22Tests),Murray Goodwin (1414 runs in 19 Tests) and Heath Streak (1037runs in 40 Tests).
• With this, Streak also completed the coveted double of 1000 runs and100 wickets, becoming the first Zimbabwean and 36th allrounder to doso.
• Grant Flower,on 10 in first innings, became only the second batsmanafter brother Andy to reach 1000 runs at Harare Sports Club Ground. Atthe end of this Test,Grant has an aggregate of 1079 runs from 17 Testsafter Andy’s 1098 runs from 18 Tests.
• Harbhajan Singh and Ashish Nehra by returning the figures of four for71 and four for 72 achieved the two best figures by an Indian bowlerin Zimbabwe. Anil Kumble had figures of four for 87 at this same venuein 1998-99.
• Sachin Tendulkar,on 19 in second innings,became the second highestrun-getter for India in Tests. He surpassed Dilip Vengsarkar’s tallyof 6868 runs from 116 matches and 185 innings. Tendulkar overhauledVengsarkar’s aggregate in 32 Tests and 50 innings lesser. Now onlySunil Gavaskar with 10122 runs in 125 Tests and 214 innings is aheadof Tendulkar. Tendulkar,with 6919 runs at the end of this Test,isplaced 23rd in the list of leading Test batsmen.It is interesting tonote that Tendulkar’s average of 57.18 is second only to Don Bradman’s99.94.
• Tendulkar now has 53 scores of fifty plus on this name including 25hundreds which takes him past Vengsarkar who has 52 such scores (17hundreds and 35 fifties) to his credit. Only Gavaskar has more fiftyplus scores 79 (34+45) among Indian batsmen.
• Tendulkar now has aggregated 2004 runs in 25 Tests (ave 40.08) in thematches lost by India . He became second Indian after Sunil Gavaskar(2314 runs in 34 Tests) and 11th batsman in all to aggregate 2000 runsin the `lost’ matches. For the record Australia’s Allan Border has themaximum run aggregate of 2771 runs (ave.33.39) in 46 Tests lost byAustralia. The accompanying tables have details.

Most runs in `lost’ matches

• The duck in second innings was eighth for Ajit Agarkar in his tenthTest and 16th innings. Agarkar’s duck frequency of 50 % is the highestin Test cricket by a batsman aggregating atleast five ducks in acareer. The details :

Highest duck percentage in a career(Min 5 ducks)

• Ashish Nehra became 27th Indian to bag a Test match pair (i.e. duck inboth innings) on 36th occasion. He also achieved the dubiousdistinction of becoming the first Indian to suffer this ignominyagainst Zimbabwe. The other batsmen to do so against Zimbabwe arePakistan’s Manzoor Elahi (1994-95) and Mushtaq Ahmed (1997-98),WestIndian Adrian Griffith (1999-00) and Bangladesh’s Manjural Islam andMohammad Sharif (2000-01).
• Blignaut (5-74) became the third Zimbabwean to take a five wicket haulagainst India. Interestingly all three have performed this feat thissame ground. John Traicos (5-86) in 1992-93 and Henry Olonga (5-70)are the others to do so.
• Javagal Srinath now has taken 192 wickets in 52 Tests which puts himahead of Erapally Prasanna who had 189 wickets from 49 Tests to hiscredit. Now only Kapil Dev (434 wickets in 131 Tests), Anil Kumble(276 in 61), Bishan Singh Bedi (266 in 67) and Bhagwat Chandrasekhar(242 in 58) are ahead of Srinath for India.
• With the series tied at 1-1,India now has still not won a Test seriesoutside the sub-continent since 1986 when it defeated England by 2-0margin.
• The win was Zimbabwe’s sixth in 52 matches. Interestingly Zimbabwe hasnow beaten three neighbouring countries India, Pakistan and Bangladeshon two occasions each.
• The defeat was India’s 71st in 159th Test on foreign soil and secondin four Tests in Zimbabwe.
• At the end of this series :
• India’s overall Test record :played 341,won 66,lost 114,drawn 160 andtied one.
• Zimbabwe’s overall Test record:played 52,won 6,lost 26 and drawn 20.
• Saurav Ganguly’s captaincy record :played 8,won 5,lost 2 and drawnone.
• Heath Streak’s captaincy record :played 9,won 3,lost 4 and drawn 2.
  

It was a dream come true for the fast bowling duo from Bangladesh. Theyhad always dreamt of emulating him. But being from Bangladesh, theirchances of realising their dream were limited. However, both ManjuralIslam and Habibul Bashar now consider themselves very lucky to haveinteracted with the legendary Australian fast bowler Dennis Lillee.Islam and Bashar, incidentally are the first Bangladeshi cricketers toattend the MRF Pace Foundation at Chennai.Bashar and Islam went back to Dhaka via Kolkata today. On their way,they said that even after playing Test matches, they had not realizedthat they had so much to learn. Islam boasts the best bowlingperformance by a Bangladeshi in a Test match. Today, he said that thecaptain of their team, Naimur Rahman had captured six wickets againstIndia in the inaugural Test that their country played. "However,against Zimbabwe this year, I also took six wickets conceding a lessernumber of runs. So at the moment, the record belongs to me," saidIslam. He also added that both of them had created a record of sortsby being the first to attend the Pace Foundation from Bangladesh.Sitting at a hotel close to the airport, both expressed theirsatisfaction at the way Lillee had helped them. Bashar said, "He wassuch a great bowler. But he was always down to earth. He mixed freelywith us and paid us the same attention that others at the camp got."Of the two, the more Islam added, "We had certain problems in ourfollow through. Lillee was very patient with us and rectified ourfaults. I was not completing my follow through while Bashar was notbringing down his arm properly."While Bashar had played the first Test match against India, Islam hadnot and still regrets missing out on being a part of history. Basharincidentally had dismissed Sadagoppan Ramesh in the Indian firstinnings. Islam said, "He is lucky. However, I plan to make up when weplay in the Asian Test Championship match against India. After that wehave a full series against Zimbabwe consisting of three Test matchesand five one-dayers. Our aim is to remain fit and play in all thethree matches."Both at present, however, want to concentrate on what they have learntfrom Lillee. Islam informed that after returning home they would beunder the wing of former West Indies fast bowler Andy Roberts. "He isalso a great bowler. So we plan to pick up useful tips from him also.We have learnt that to fight in the international arena one has tolearn new things every now and then. Otherwise success becomes verydifficult."

• It was the 1739th ODI in cricket history.
• It was India’s 472nd and New Zealand’s 383rd match.
• It was the 60th match between these two sides. The record nowreads : New Zealand 27, India 30, abandoned 3.
• Umpires Peter Manuel and Gamini Silva were officiating in their34th and ninth match respectively.
• Ganguly’s figures (3-32) was the second best by an Indian captainagainst New Zealand. The best still remains with Kapil Dev who hadreturned the figures of 3 for 26 at Perth on January 18,1986 and atLaunceston on February 2, 1986.
• Adam Parore was getting dismissed without scoring for the 16thtime in his career.The duck was Parore’s 13th as wicketkeeper. He hasnow equalled Pakistan’s Moin Khan’s tally of ducks. Now only SriLankan Romesh Kaluwitharana has aggregated more ducks in a career thanthese two as a keeper- 21 in 162 matches.
• The duck was also Parore’s second against India. He has now joinedfive other New Zealanders – Richard Hadlee, Mat Horne,Ian Smith,Daniel Vettori and Bryan Young – to aggregate two ducks against India.
• The eighth wicket partnership of 43 runs between Dion Nash andDaniel Vettori was New Zealand’s best for this wicket position againstIndia. This obliterated the previous highest of 39 (unbeaten) atBrisbane on December 21, 1980.
• Dion Nash just failed to beat Scott Styris’ record of playinghighest innings for New Zealand against India at number eight. Styrishad made 43 at Hyderabad on November 8,1999. Chris Harris had alsomade unbeaten 42 against India at Auckland on January 16,1999.
• The catch of Yuvraj off Chris Harris was the 100th for Adam Parorein his 167th match. His tally includes the five catches taken in thefield. Parore became first New Zealander and 20th player in the worldto do so.
• Dion Nash was winning his maiden award in his 75th match.

* PCB refrains from commenting on India’s standThe Pakistan Cricket Board on Tuesday refrained from commenting onIndia’s reiteration of the ban on bilateral cricket series andannounced the list of probables for the forthcoming Asian Testchampionship. “This is not the time to for us to join issues. But atthe same time, we are very confident that Indian team will arrive hereto play in the Asian Test championship (ATC) match scheduled to takeplace between September 13 and 17,” a PCB official told PTI fromLahore.Minister of State for Sports Pon Radhakrishnan had on Mondayreiterated the Government’s stand disallowing its cricket team to playin bilateral series with Pakistan. India is scheduled to play Pakistanin Karachi in the Asian Test championship which is a multi-lateraltournament involving Sri Lanka and Bangladesh too. The Government hasallowed the Indian team to play Pakistan in multi-lateral tournaments.The ATC schedule: Sept 1-5: Pakistan vs Bangladesh in Pakistan, Sept13-17: Pakistan vs India in Pakistan, Sept 21-25: India vs Bangladeshin India. Oct 2-6: Sri Lanka vs Bangladesh in Sri Lanka. Jan 31-Feb 4:Sri Lanka vs Pakistan in Sri Lanka. Feb 7-11: India vs Sri Lanka inIndia. Feb 15-19: Final (venue to be decided later).* Kumble confident of being 100 per cent fit before SA tourIndian spin ace Anil Kumble, who returned to full-fledged competitivecricket on Wednesday after a nine-month injury layoff, expressedconfidence of being 100 per cent fit before India’s tour to SouthAfrica in October.”I am 80 per cent fit now and confident of being totally fit in twomonths,” Kumble, who is leading the Karnataka State CricketAssociation XI in the ongoing KSCA Diamond Jubilee All Indiatournament in Bangalore, told reporters.Kumble, who is returning to competitive cricket for the first timeafter withdrawing midway through a one-day series in Sharjah inOctober and undergoing shoulder surgery in Johannesburg in January,said he has been bowling 20 to 30 overs a day now and hoped that hewould regain his form.* Tendulkar rated best batsman both in Tests and one-dayersIndian batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar is rated as the world’s bestTest and one-day batsman in the international ratings released onWednesday. In arguably the most scientific system of ratings,PriceWaterhouseCoopers puts Australian captain Steve Waugh behindTendulkar at number two in Tests and many numbers below him in theone-dayers.Rahul Dravid is placed number four in Tests and skipper Sourav Gangulynumber five in one-dayers. Off-spinner Harbhajan Singh is rated as the7th best bowler in Test cricket. With 892 and 742 points in the Testand one-dayers respectively, Tendulkar leads his rivals in bothversions of the game by comfortable margins. Waugh has 861 pointswhile his teammate Michael Bevan is placed second in the one-day listwith 775 points.Harbhajan is the only Indian in the top ten of the Test bowling listwith 733 points. Glenn McGrath is rated number one with 913 points.Dravid, who tallied 807 points, was placed behind Waugh and AndyFlower of Zimbabwe (830). Ganguly, placed a lowly 45th in the Testswith 534 points, has 742 points in the one-dayers. The highest ratedIndian bowler in one-dayers was Ajit Agarkar, placed 27th with 613points. He was immediately followed by Venkatesh Prasad, Zaheer Khanand Anil Kumble.* Ghavri takes charge of Bengal Ranji teamFormer Indian all rounder Karsan Ghavri said on Wednesday that it willbe a big challenge to coach Bengal cricketers and hoped he would beable to bring about the desired results.The 50-year-old former left hander, who took over as the coach of theBengal Ranji team, said that the boys will have to work hard if theywere keen to improve their performance. “I have just taken over thejob today, so I am not in a position to talk much about the team. Giveme some time to know the players,” he told reporters. “It is achallenge for me. I know Bengal’s performance has not been too good inthe last few years. I hope I can change that,” he said.The former Test cricketer expressed satisfaction with the coachingfacilities available at the Eden Gardens. “The facilities are verygood. I am impressed with the indoor coaching centre here”.

A strong reply by the Mumbai Cricket Association XI ensured that their MRF Buchi Babu cricket tournament first round match against New Zealand A remained evenly poised at the end of the second day’s play at the Guru Nanak grounds, Chennai on Friday.With a day’s play remaining, the men from Mumbai, who were 198 for four at close, need another 132 runs to gain the first innings lead and effectively win the match. Their hopes will be pinned on opener Nilesh Patwardhan, who is batting on a patient 95 made off 210 balls during a relentless 330-minute vigil in the middle.In a well-paced innings, the Mumbai opener hit eleven fours. Patwardhan’s innings meant that his team made a fitting reply despite the other top-order batsmen failing to get good scores against a full-strength New Zealand A attack led by new ball bowlers Chris Drum and Kyle Mills.Patwardhan’s most significant partnership was with No 3 batsman Sachin Sawant who made 18 off 114 balls. The two added 62 runs for the second wicket. The unbeaten 52-run fifth wicket stand between Patwardhan and Sushant Manjrekar, who was batting on 21 off 80 balls, was the other highlight of the innings.Earlier, Paul Valthaty while making 22 off 63 balls had provided the Mumbai innings the right direction by putting on 47 runs for the opening wicket with Patwardhan. Saket Adhikari, the No 4 batsman, was out for a duck after scratching around for 16 balls while Kiran Powar, who followed him, made 17 off 29 balls.In the morning, the New Zealand A last wicket pair of Shane Bond, a last-minute inclusion, and Drum added 54 runs to guide their team to a healthy 329 in their first innings.While Bond went ballistic, hitting six fours in his 45-ball innings of 37, Drum was the steadying influence making 16 off 42 balls.The partnership ended when left-arm spinner Rajesh Pawar, who plays for Mumbai in the Ranji Trophy, snared Bond. The wicket also completed a five-wicket haul for Pawar. Paras Mhambrey who claimed two New Zealand A wickets and Nilesh Kulkarni and Aziz Shaikh, both of whom claimed one each, were the other successful bowlers. Indian discard Ajit Agarkar went wicketless despite bowling 12 overs.On Thursday, former New Zealand opener Matthew Horne, batting at No 3, made a stroke-filled 111 runs off 141 balls studded with 20 rasping hits to the boundary while guiding his team to 277 for nine at close of play. Another New Zealand opener Matthew Bell who made 47 and Hamish Marshall who made 33 were the other significant contributors. Horne and Bell added 144 runs for the second wicket off 47.4 overs but thereafter the New Zealand team lost wickets at regular intervals.

It couldn’t have been worse! In probably the most important game we have played so far this year, we tanked it.That is, we were beaten in what could be described as a pretty spineless performance.After winning the toss we were bundled out for only 101, the wicket was tough but not that tough.We were playing at the new Hampshire Bowl which is being used for the first time this season and is not yet completed but will be a great place to play as it develops.Therefore, the wicket is still very young and does keep the bowler interested. Their innings mirrored ours as they capitulated to 68/7 before a rearguard action tripled their score.We were back in the game at one stage during our second innings but that came to nothing as we lost our last five wickets cheaply.They scored the 160 for victory losing just four wickets, but three of those we grabbed before their score had reached 30. It gave us a sniff but they kept their nerve and grabbed the much needed points.On a personal note I was happy to pass the 1000-run mark for the year during my second innings of 74.It is a number that signifies a reasonable season and considering I missed three games during the year it was surprisingly satisfying.My initial target was 1500 but to do that I would have needed every innings available. If I can score well in this last game including another 100 I will leave my county experience reasonably happy.The last game is against Worcester and it is a must-win if we are to harbour any thoughts of moving up. Even if we do deliver we have to rely on other results going our way and with plenty of rain about it’s going to be a bit of a lottery.The talk in the cricket world this week has been about county cricket after a hard-hitting article by Australian coach John Buchanan. He believes every county has at least five imposters, that is, guys who are stealing a living. This he believes is the reason why the competition is mediocre and full of complacency.He also listed a couple of incidents within the English camp that they tried to exploit during the recent Test series.The interesting one was the relationship between Andrew Caddick and Darren Gough, what was perceived as a match-winning combination was viewed by the Australians as selfish individuals competing against one another and not the opposition.As you can imagine it has caused quite a stir.It has been a very hectic week for me getting all my bags packed for Pakistan. It’s amazing how much gear you collect during a season and I may have some explaining to do when I check in on Sunday.Being away for four days before my departure is not ideal so a lot of loose ends have had to be dealt with.I’m really looking forward to joining up with the New Zealand boys in Karachi and beginning what will be a tough and challenging three months of cricket.

My memories of a fantastic day -1st September 2001Saturday 1st September finally arrives and we are all excited to be back at Lords, eager to put the Final of 2 years ago behind us and at last bring back some silverware to ‘trophy-starved’ Taunton.On completing another strenuous warm-up, we retire to the changing room and are pleased that under a clear blue sky, Jamie wins the toss and elects to bat.Our openers got us off to a great start, buoyed by the huge roars which came from the stands for every run Somerset scored. The mood in the dressing room was already quite positive, although we all feel for Scott Boswell, obviously struggling to find his rhythm.Contributions from all the batters meant a total of 250 looked within reach. Rob and I were stifi together as the final overs began and we wanted to take full advantage of the situation and we quickly gathered good momentum. To reach a total of 271, and having personally hit the final 2 balls for 6, taking me to 60 not out, was an achievement beyond my wildest dreams but we still had a long way to go.Deep down, we all knew that Afridi, whilst being an incredibly dangerous player, was going to give us an early chance, and sure enough he did. Thankfully, it went straight In the safe hands of Rob Turner.This was the boost that we needed at the start of the Leicestershire innings, and although they had some useful partnerships, we got wickets at important times right up to that ‘magical moment’ when Steffan knocked over Scott Boswell’s leg stump – let the celebrations begin were the cries!Personally my day got even better when I learned the news that I had won the ‘Man of the Match’ accolade and I duly went to collect it from our former coach, Dermot Reeve.The lap of honour was an opportunity for us to say a big ‘thank you’ to all those loyal Somerset fans who made the trip up to Lords and had supported us through the not-so-good times.It really was a ‘dream day’ that I, the rest of the team, and all those who witnessed the excitement at Lords, will remember for many years.Here’s to retaining the trophy in 2002! Also I would like to take this opportunity to thank all those who kindly sent me congratulations letters and cards, they were all greatly appreciated.