Category Uncategorized

Ireland captain William Porterfield has said he wasn’t surprised by Bangladesh’s recent win against England in Bristol

Cricinfo staff14-Jul-2010

Ireland captain William Porterfield has said he wasn’t surprised by Bangladesh’s recent win against England at Bristol and expects them to come hard at his team during the two back-to-back ODIs at Belfast on Thursday and Friday.His counterpart Mashrafe Mortaza also expects it to be a competitive series and has challenged his players to maintain focus. Bangladesh’s victory in the second ODI was their first win against England in any format, but Porterfield knew the side were capable of causing an upset.”It was certainly not a surprise, I know Bangladesh is capable of doing this any time,” Porterfield said. “They are a very balanced and experienced team and great competitors.”Bangladesh failed to secure a dream series win after they were thrashed in the deciding ODI by 144 runs, after conceding 347 and Porterfield believes there will be some unfinished business for his opponents before they finish the tour.”This is completely different series and I know Bangladesh will come out of that lost series and will come hard against us,” Porterfield said. “We definitely won’t let us down at home, we will play our best cricket and the better side will win the games.”Ireland beat Bangladesh the last time they met in an international game, at the World Twenty20 in 2009. Porterfield, however, feels that recent results will not have a bearing on this series.”We really did well against them in recent past but they are a formidable side, we don’t expect to win easily but we are certain to put up a good fight and hopefully it will be great series,” he said.Mortaza said that despite giving England a scare, his team wasn’t taking Ireland for granted. Ireland have a chance to overtake Zimbabwe in the rankings and Mortaza added that he was aware of them being an emerging competitor.”I’m sure Ireland will try their best to do in the world cricket,” he said. “We need to play our best to outplay them in these two games.”Mortaza regained the captaincy for the limited-overs leg of the tour and he said he was settling in well to his new role after a long injury battle. “It’s great to be fit and back into the team,” he said. “I’m also enjoying the captaincy, thanks to all of who trusted me with the responsibility to lead such a talented team.”

Modi will now have to submit his response by May 31, a ten-day extension from the original deadline

Cricinfo staff18-May-2010

The BCCI has extended the deadline for Lalit Modi to respond to the second show-cause notice it issued to him on May 6, following a charge by Giles Clarke, the ECB chairman, that Modi was planning on setting up a parallel league in England. Modi will now have to submit his response by May 31, a ten-day extension from the original deadline.”The extension was asked because they needed more time for formulating an appropriate reply,” Mehmood Abdi, Modi’s legal counsel, told Cricinfo. “The request was sent in two days back, and N Srinivasan’s (the BCCI secretary) approval came back yesterday.”In his e-mail to the BCCI, Clarke alleged activities by Modi that he said were “detrimental to Indian cricket, English cricket and world cricket at large.” Modi has dismissed the charge as “fiction”.Modi, on May 15, responded to the first show-cause notice – containing charges of financial impropriety – issued to him by the BCCI in typically dramatic fashion. The reply, along with the supporting documents, ran up to 15,000 pages packed in large cardboard cartons wheeled into the BCCI headquarters in Mumbai.

Deccan Chargers bit another bullet on their route to a fourth win in a row that has given them an even chance in the semi-final race

The Bulletin by Sidharth Monga16-Apr-2010
Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
How they were out
Rohit Sharma avoided a repeat of the choke against Rajasthan Royals•Indian Premier League

Rohit Sharma avoided a repeat of the choke against Rajasthan Royals, and Deccan Chargers bit another bullet on route to a fourth consecutive win, one that gave them an even chance in the semi-final race. Deccan’s bowlers did plenty to lose this one, but a graceful yet lethal 68 off 38 balls from Rohit took them home. Apart from the falling wickets, Rohit had to make up for another ordinary finish by Deccan’s bowlers: 76 runs off the last five overs, during which time Mahela Jayawardene scored 57 off 18.Put in on a difficult pitch, Kings XI Punjab were 98 after 15 overs, Deccan reached 98 in 11. Deccan bowled tripe in the last five to reconfirm their reputation of being worst at the death, and their batsmen kept getting out regularly to bowling that was not extraordinary.That they reached 98 in 11 overs was thanks to some clean golf-like swinging from T Suman and Rohit who swung the momentum Deccan’s way. After Adam Gilchrist failed to last the Powerplay yet again, both Suman and Monish Mishra struggled against short deliveries on a tricky pitch.It was a dry surface covered by grass from a good-length area at one end to just short of a length at the other. Anything pitched in the grassy area got extra bounce and seam movement. Punjab’s inexperienced attack took advantage of that, but every time they pitched up Suman effortlessly lofted them out of the ground. When Suman did get out in the 14th over, with 55 required off 41, Deccan were favourites. Especially with Rohit, who had reached 40 off 22 without having moved a bone in a hurry.In the next over, though, Andrew Symonds went to manufacture a cut against Juan Theron and was bowled. Two tight overs followed, and Deccan were in familiar territory: 29 runs from 18 balls, Rohit in the middle and the Rajasthan choke fresh in everyone’s memory.It was then that Yuvraj Singh bowled an over that would take the game this way or that. It took the game this way that. Mitchell Marsh launched him for a six first ball, but holed out later in the over to leave Rohit needing to score 19 off the last two. That’s when Rohit added grit to the grace, converting two one-and-a-halves into twos in the 19th over, then picking an Irfan Pathan slower one over wide long-on for four.With seven required off seven, Rohit teased again, mis-hit another loft into the same area, Piyush Chawla ran across from long-on, didn’t cut the angle, and had to dive both back and to the right. The valiant dive resulted in his getting a hand onto it, and a parried six. Game over.While it might have been cathartic for Rohit to carry his team over the line, he shouldn’t have been chasing so much. Deccan had won an important toss on a tricky pitch, they had the better bowlers, and they had even got off to a good start. Even Mitchell, a medium-pace bowler, managed to trouble the batsmen. Ryan Harris used the conditions best, removing Shaun Marsh for a duck with the extra bounce.Mitchell and RP Singh, though, didn’t manage to hit the right lengths consistently. Kumar Sangakkara and Jayawardene made full use of either balls too short or half-volleys. Even as Jayawardene struggled to get the timing right in the middle overs, Sangakkara kept playing the pretty strokes, moving to 52 off 36.Rahul Sharma removed Sangakkara with the second ball he bowled, the next four overs went for just 12, but Jayawardene was about to shift a gear. In the 16th over Jayawardene, on 36 off 44 balls, smashed Rahul for a six and a four. In the 17th RP was short and wide, and went for five consecutive boundaries. In the 19th, even Harris bowled length and Jayawardene and Yuvraj took 18 runs off it, double of what he had gone for in the first three. Gilchrist bravely invited RP to bowl the last over. The bowler duly brought up his fifty by going for 14 runs.Put together, Jayawardene, Sangakkara and Rohit made up for the fact that the night match rendered invisible the breathtaking hilly surroundings in Dharamsala. Uncultured shots were conspicuous by absence.

Chris Hartley accepted the award named after his childhood hero as his exploits with bat and gloves earned him the Ian Healy Trophy

Peter English10-Apr-2010

Chris Hartley accepted the award named after his childhood hero as his exploits with bat and gloves earned him the Ian Healy Trophy for Queensland’s Player of the Year. Hartley, who was called on to Australia’s Ashes tour briefly in 2009, completed an outstanding all-round season and became the second wicketkeeper behind Brad Haddin to collect 800 runs in a Sheffield Shield campaign.”To receive an award named after a great Queensland and Australian cricketer, and my childhood hero, is pretty special,” Hartley said after being given the trophy by Healy. “If you look back at the [previous winners’] names like Love, Maher, Kasprowicz, to put my name there is a really, really special feeling.”Hartley began the summer wanting to back up a strong season in 2008-09 and he achieved that with 827 Shield runs at 48.64, including two hundreds, and also collected 43 catches and a stumping. Despite the accolades – he added the state’s Sheffield Shield Player of the Year to his overall domestic prize last month – he remains behind Haddin and Tim Paine in the national wicketkeeping rankings.Ben Cutting, the fast bowler, was voted the players’ player after leading the Shield wicket list with 46 at 23.91 and capturing 15 victims in the FR Cup. Lee Carseldine picked up the one-day prize while James Hopes was the state’s most valuable performer in the Twenty20 competition.Luke Feldman, who starred in the senior team with 33 wickets at 23.96, was the Queensland Academy of Sport Player of the Year. Melissa Bulow, who was recognised for being only the second Queensland woman to appear in 100 state matches, won the major prize for the Fire.

Having joined West Ham United in what was a £17.5m deal back in the summer of 2018, hopes for the then-28-year-old Andriy Yarmolenko were extremely high at the London Stadium.

Indeed, the Ukraine international had highly impressed during his time with Dynamo Kyiv, scoring a whopping 137 goals and registering 90 assists over his 340 appearances for the Premier Liga side, as well as bagging six goals and six assists over just 26 appearances during a season-long stint at Borussia Dortmund – before making the move to East London.

However, despite now being in his fourth season at West Ham, the £3.6m-rated forward has played a total of just 69 games for the club, something which has largely been down to a succession of serious injuries.

As a result, it has been reported that David Moyes could be looking to move the £115k-per-week man on in the January transfer window, something that would appear to be an incredibly wise move by the 58-year-old Scot – particularly if he manages to bring in one of his own reported targets in the shape of Jonathan David.

Moyes can finally axe Yarmolenko by signing David

Indeed, there is no comparison between the respective player’s returns in recent seasons, but, to illustrate a point, they are as follows.

Over Yarmolenko’s 23 Premier League fixtures in what was undoubtedly his best campaign since joining West Ham, the 32-year-old scored five goals, registered one assist and created six big chances for his teammates, as well as taking an average of 1.1 shots and making 0.9 key passes per game.

These returns saw the player who Declan Rice once dubbed “special” earn a seasonal SofaScore match rating of 6.85, ranking him as the Hammers’ 13th-best performer in the top flight of English football that time around.

For comparison, over David’s 18 Ligue 1 appearances this season alone, the £45m-rated LOSC Lille forward has already scored 11 goals and created three big chances for his teammates, as well as taking an average of 1.9 shots and making 0.9 key passes per game.

These returns have seen the player who John Herdman dubbed “fearless” and Hein Vanhaezebrouck labelled a “phenomenon” average a SofaScore match rating of 6.97, ranking him as the French side’s fifth-best player in the league this term.

As such, the numbers very much speak for themselves, and it is clear that Moyes should do all he can to axe Yarmolenko this January, and subsequently put the forward’s huge wages towards landing the 21-year-old David.

In other news: ExWHUemployee drops update on “Van Dijk-like signing” that’ll have WHU fans buzzing

Aston Villa are set to battle it out with ‘a lot of really big clubs’ for the signing of Boubacar Kamara ahead of the 2022 summer transfer window. 

That’s according to journalist Luke Hatfield, who was speaking to Give Me Sport.

The lowdown

The Athletic’s David Ornstein reported at the beginning of this week that Kamara, who can play as a defensive midfielder and as a centre-back, has decided to leave Olympique de Marseille on a free transfer when his contract expires at the end of the season.

Manchester United were said to be monitoring the 22-year-old’s situation, while German giants Bayern Munich and Spanish marquee FC Barcelona were named as strong admirers.

Kamara is yet to make his senior debut for the French national team but has featured nine times for Les Bleus at Under-21 level.

The latest

Hatfield picked out Kamara when he was asked about possible transfer targets for Steven Gerrard, but warned that there is doubt over Villa’s chances of landing the Frenchman.

“There is a lot of talk around Boubacar Kamara and Marseille,” he said.

“He’s going on a free in the summer but I think there’ll be a lot of really big clubs after him”

The verdict

Kamara is a precise passer and an effective shield for a defence, data from FBRef shows. In fact, he boasts a similar profile to Barcelona’s highly-decorated midfielder Sergio Busquets, and perhaps they view him as a successor.

Indeed, former team-mate Rolando has dubbed him a ‘phenomenon’, suggesting he can go right to the very top.

Do Villa have a shot? Well, it’s a matter of convincing the player rather than the club.

A healthy upgrade on his £46,000-per-week salary should be achievable for Villa, and then it’s down to Gerrard to make the project as attractive as possible.

In other news, fans react to this cruel injury blow.

It’s Christmas Day which means 2022 is soon on the horizon. And with the New Year comes a new transfer window.

Leeds United will surely be active given their struggles since the start of the season.

Injuries have crippled Marcelo Bielsa’s playing squad and the Yorkshire giants have found themselves sat in 15th place, just five points above the relegation zone and are at risk of being pulled into a relegation dogfight.

Second-season syndrome, perhaps?

The Whites notoriously do not operate much in the winter when it comes to transfers but you’d imagine that changes next month. It’s unlikely they spend big, though can you get 100% right in this quiz about Leeds’ most expensive signings?

Do you know your Rio Ferdinand from your Raphinha?

So sit back, enjoy your Christmas dinner and take on this not-so-very festive transfer quiz from us here at Football FanCast.

If you think you’re a die-hard Leeds fan, then you should have no trouble getting all of these right…

There has been lots to like about Crystal Palace’s start to the current campaign, but one player is perhaps being overlooked for his integral contributions.

Several new signings and existing stars such as Odsonne Edouard and Wilfried Zaha have received plenty of plaudits for their eye-catching displays in the final third of the pitch, yet it’s the solid performances at the back that have arguably been more important.

Joachim Andersen arrived at Selhurst Park over the summer after Palace splashed out £20m to secure his services, raising a few eyebrows after his relegation with Fulham.

However, the Denmark international has soon silenced his doubters after putting in a string of impressive performances alongside Marc Guehi in the heart of defence.

As per SofaScore, the 25-year-old has won a whopping 27 duels in his 11 Premier League appearances, made 26 clearances, 18 interceptions and 12 tackles, highlighting his domineering displays at the back.

But it’s not just his defensive contributions that have proved so pivotal to the south London outfit’s success.

Andersen’s ability with the ball at his feet is crucial to how Vieira wants to play, allowing the capital club to build from the back, or play more directly when the opportunity presents itself.

He’s regularly been found firing diagonal, crossfield passes to either wing in order to quickly shift play and start attacks, and his underlying numbers are evidence of how effective they’ve been.

According to WhoScored, Andersen has averaged 6.5 long balls per league game this term – the highest tally amongst his teammates – and has averaged 67.8 passes per game, achieving a passing accuracy of 84.2%.

In a recent interview with football.london, Vieira was quizzed over how vital Andersen was in helping the Eagles play his preferred style.

“He is massively important. Joachim played in France, he played in Italy, he was in the Premier League last year. He has this experience of moving around and going to a new club,” Vieira said.

“When you want to have possession, and you have a centre-back who is really comfortable having the ball at his feet, it’s quite important. He will be a massive help for Marc to build his confidence, and he is doing really well.”

While the likes of Zaha deserve huge amounts of credit for putting the ball in the back of the opposition’s net on a regular basis, Andersen and co. deserve just as much for keeping it out of Palace’s, and the Scandinavian gem has been doing a stellar job of that in recent weeks.

And, in other news…Huge boost: Palace handed injury lift ahead of Burnley, Vieira will be delighted

Angelique Taai will mark her return to international cricket after more than four years, following her inclusion in the 14-member South African squad to take on West Indies during the home series in October

Cricinfo staff29-Sep-2009Angelique Taai will mark her return to international cricket after more than four years, following her inclusion in the 14-member South African squad to take on West Indies during the home series in October. The 22-year old, who last represented her country against the same opposition back in April 2005, was delighted with her call-up.”I am really looking forward to the challenge ahead,” Taai said. “The selectors have shown a lot of faith in me, considering that I was not in the initial squad so I want to show that I deserved the call-up by producing results.”The hard-hitting middle-order batsman and medium-pace bowler was rewarded for her performances with East Coast at the Women’s Super 4’s that were held in Kimberly over the weekend. Highveld were the winners of the four-day competition as they coasted to a seven-wicket victory over defending champions, West Coast.Also included in the squad is Gauteng’s Kirsty Thompson. Thompson was initially part of the team for the 2009 Women’s World Cup held in Australia in March, but pulled out because of a lower-back stress fracture.”The Super 4’s was a very successful competition, the girls played quality cricket and some seriously put their hands up for selection,” said Denise Reid, the national convenor of selectors. “We felt that our batting was a bit thin and has been an area of weakness so we decided to bring in Angelique and Kirsty to help bolster up the batting order.”Angelique is an aggressive batter and she will bring in something extra to the squad, she is also very useful with the ball. Kirsty had an excellent tournament and stood out among the ladies and she will compliment Cri-zelda Brits and Mignon Du Preez at the top. “Squad: Sunette Loubser (capt), Cri-zelda Brits, Trisha Chetty, Mignon du Preez, Shandre Fritz, Shabnim Ismail, Marizanne Kapp, Ashlyn Kilowan, Marcia Letsoalo, Alicia Smith, Angelique Taai, Kirsty Thompson, Charlize van der Westhuizen, Dane van Niekerk.

كشفت تقارير صحفية إنجليزية عن وجود شكوك حول مشاركة أحد لاعبي فريق ليفربول، في مباراة الأربعاء المرتقبة ضد نابولي.

ويستضيف ملعب “دييجو مارادونا” مباراة الفريقين، مساء الأربعاء، في إطار منافسات الجولة الأولى من دور مجموعات دوري أبطال أوروبا.

وذكرت شبكة “ذا أثلتيك” الإنجليزية أن هناك شكوك حول إمكانية مشاركة لاعب ليفربول فابيو كارفاليو في مباراة الأربعاء المرتقبة أمام نابولي الإيطالي.

وكان كارفاليو قد شارك في مباراة السبت الماضي أمام إيفرتون، في الجولة السادسة من الدوري الإنجليزي، حيث تعادلا سلبيًا على ملعب “جوديسون بارك”.

ولم يتمكن كارفاليو من استكمال المباراة، حيث اضطر إلى الخروج في الدقيقة 46، ودخل بدلًا منه روبرتو فيرمينو.

اقرأ أيضًا | تقارير توضح مدة غياب هندرسون عن ليفربول للإصابة

وأوضح يورجن كلوب في تصريحاته بعد تلك المباراة أن كارفاليو يُعاني من إصابة في العظمة الموجودة أعلى الركبة.

وأفادت “ذا أثلتيك” أنه ليس من المعروف حتى الآن ما إذا كان كارفاليو سيكون قادرًا على اللعب بعد غد أم لا، ولكن هناك شكوك حول ذلك.