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Tim Nielsen, the Australia coach, says his team was surprised by the intensity of the ICC World Twenty20, which left Ricky Ponting, Shane Watson and Michael Hussey suffering hamstring injuries. Despite Australia’s fitness problems leading into a limited-overs tour of India, Nielsen said the tournament in South Africa had been beneficial ahead of a busy 18 months.”It’s probably been a really good physical workout for us,” Nielsen told . “It’s been nice that the bowlers can get through four overs and they don’t have to flog themselves early in the year, so hopefully there is a lot of benefit to get out of it.”Nielsen said the seven-match ODI series in India would now seem like “a lazy old day in the sun playing Test cricket” in comparison to the Twenty20 competition. “It’s so fast,” he said. “We’ve only played one-off games in the past, so playing in a tournament where every game counts really means the pressure stacks up a bit, and then you factor in all the travelling and training and it’s quite an intense few weeks.”Although Ponting is expected to take part in some of the India games, Hussey and Watson have been sent home to recuperate ahead of the opening matches of Australia’s domestic season, which starts in just over a fortnight. Australia are already without Shaun Tait, whose recovery from elbow surgery has taken longer than expected. James Hopes, Brad Haddin and Adam Voges have been added to the squad to tour India.Adam Gilchrist said the players entered the World Twenty20 under-prepared so they would not tire too quickly as their international schedule becomes more hectic. “We knew we were underdone,” Gilchrist said in the . “We realised that very quickly.”However, he was pleased with the way Australia’s attack handled the pressure in South Africa and he said Mitchell Johnson’s form – he claimed eight wickets at 19.12 and went for 6.37 an over – was promising. “I really like the way the ball is coming out for him at the moment,” Gilchrist said. “Our bowlers have been pretty spot-on every game.”After the India series, which ends with a Twenty20 match, Australia’s players will have two and a half weeks without international cricket before their two-Test home series against Sri Lanka. The calendar eases slightly through December, with three ODIs and a Twenty20 against New Zealand, followed by India’s visit that begins with the Boxing Day Test.

Johan Botha, the South Africa offspinner, is looking to get his career back on track after being selected for the one-day side for the series against Pakistan, which ends his 18-month absence from international cricket.Botha underwent a rehabilitation programme to correct his action after being reported while making his Test debut in Sydney against Australia in January, 2006. His action was deemed illegal after testing at the University of Western Australia, based on which he was banned.In August, 2006, soon after the ICC had cleared his action, a second test found that he had continued to bend his arm beyond the permitted 15-degree angle. After further reworking, his action was cleared once again on November 21.”Obviously I’m very excited and thrilled to be back in the national team”, Botha told the , a South Africa-based newspaper. “It’s been a quite a while now and it will be great to be back in the set-up and have another go.””It’s in the past now, it happened then and it’s history to me. I won’t lie, it was not a nice feeling, it was a tough period for me but I knew it will be over. I kept backing myself and I never thought it was over for one minute.”Botha, who had captained the South Africa Emerging Players to victory in a one-day tournament in Australia, is keen to make the most of his selection.”This is an opportunity for me to put my hand up and do something special. I think Mickey [Arthur] and the selectors are just giving everyone a chance because they need a number one spinner. They had a look at Robin [Peterson] and Thandi [Tshabalala] and I think this is my chance.””I think, contrary to some beliefs, spinners have a huge role to play in one-day cricket and it will be nice to play that role for my country.”Botha made his ODI debut in December 2005, against India in Hyderabad, and has taken 7 wickets in 13 matches.

After six years as Justin Langer’s full-time partner, Matthew Hayden is about to parade his new public relationship when he walks out at the Gabba with Phil Jaques. The pair flirted as batting mates a couple of times over the past two years when Langer was injured, but now the men have the chance to develop something special of their own as they attempt to maintain the imposing collections of the previous combination.At times Jaques must have felt like he was the third wheel in a love affair. Since January, when Langer announced his split with Hayden and the Test team, Jaques has been linked to the post and he will begin life as a first-choice partner against Sri Lanka on Thursday.Hayden first seriously bonded with Jaques over a can of tinned stew during last year’s boot camp and he wants to develop the relationship, but he realises the feelings of batting with Langer will never be recaptured. “We’d played since 1990 together, that’s 17 years of knowing each other very intimately,” he said as the Australia squad completed its first training session. “Day in day out, playing against each other or with each other, you just can’t replace that.”John Buchanan’s boot camp gave Hayden and Jaques an idea of what to expect when the other was under extreme pressure. As members of Team Alpha they completed strenuous hikes, coped with sleep deprivation and shared cold stew and bread for dinner. “It tasted dreadful but we got through it,” Hayden said. “It was a lot of fun and a good start. It’s something I believe we can draw from.”Hayden calls Jaques a “very steady character” and believes he will settle comfortably and quickly into the Test set-up. “I’m not worried about Phil’s game at all,” he said, “I have zero concerns about that.”Jaques opened with 2 and 28 in his first Test against South Africa when Langer had a rib injury and he scored 66 after coming in when Langer missed the 2006 Bangladesh tour to recover from concussion. “It’s not like Phil’s played three games for New South Wales,” Hayden said. “He’s no rookie and that’s a great thing for this side. You come to this level knowing your game really well so there’s less to expose.”One thing that Hayden is slightly worried about is that Australia will enter the match a little rusty. The team has not played a Test since the Ashes series ended in January and has prepared for Sri Lanka by contesting two series of limited-overs matches. “There could be rust,” he said. “We’ve played a lot of one-day cricket. While we’ve played a few first-class games, Test cricket is still a different game. We’ve worked hard in the short time we’ve been home.”Hayden respects Sri Lanka’s pace attack but is in no doubt as to what he wants to do on Thursday. “Bat,” he said firmly. His new partner is probably feeling the same way.

India and Pakistan have been fined for a slow over-rate during the second ODI in Mohali on Thursday, the International Cricket Council said.ICC match referee Roshan Mahanama imposed the fines after the teams were ruled to be one over short of their targets when time allowances were taken into consideration. Captains Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Shoaib Malik were fined 10 percent of their match fees while the other players were fined five per cent each.

Richard Hadlee will attend the Chappell-Hadlee series after Cricket Australia moved quickly to make sure he was invited following an oversight which left he and his younger brother Dayle off the invitation list.He will now be present for all three matches, which means pulling out of a prior engagement in Invercargill, New Zealand, for the opener in Adelaide next Friday.CA’s chief executive James Sutherland phoned him on Thursday to clear up the situation, at which point Hadlee agreed to attend. “I’ll be going across and it is good that the family is represented,” he told the after. “It is logical, it’s a nice touch by them, a nice gesture. As James Sutherland said yesterday, it was a misunderstanding.”Hadlee had arranged to attend a New Zealand Cricket function in Invercargill but has been excused to watch the three-match one-dayers between Australia and New Zealand which run until December 20 in Hobart.

Richie Benaud became the first of ten Australian sporting greats to have sculptures of themselves unveiled at the SCG. Benaud was at the informal but intimate gathering behind the Ladies Stand and the audience included the Invincibles Arthur Morris and Neil Harvey and the former Australia captains Steve Waugh and Ian Craig.”The first thing I want to say is that I like it,” Benaud said. In the sculpture a relaxed Benaud, the bowler, is calling for a change in the field and his shirt has a couple of buttons undone in the tradition of the day.Dressed in a blue jacket, grey pants with a pink shirt and mauve tie, Benaud was his usual effusive self, throwing out nuggets of information that have helped make him such an endearing personality. “I don’t how they did it, but the positioning of the sculpture could hardly be better,” he said. “I would think that if they went back to people I played with, people who knew me well, that is the spot that I used to park the car. It’s a very nice gesture.”Benaud made his debut for New South Wales in 1948 and recalled the cherished moment. “I love this ground for a lot of reasons, but the main one is I started and finished my career here,” he said. “I started my first-class career on New Year’s Eve and Arthur Morris was my captain. It was one of those days where it rained from the start of the day till the finish and we had no play.”We played against Queensland and I was something of a surprise choice. I’m not sure I was precisely what Arthur wanted because the pitch out there was green. It was very low-scoring game and in fact there were only 160 overs bowled.”New South Wales were behind in the first innings and won the game, with Morris spanking 108 not out of 143 before lunch on the last day. It was a terrific game. Of those 160 overs I’d like to tell you I was a star. However, Arthur came up to me and said: “Son, I’m sorry I couldn’t get you to bowl.”The moment that became the fist turning point of Benaud’s cricketing life came in 1940 when he came to the SCG for the first time with his father, who took him by steam train and tram to watch New South Wales play South Australia. “It was at about the moment when they were about to abandon the Sheffield Shield due to the war,” he said. “New South Wales were captained by Stan McCabe and South Australia captained by Don Bradman.”Clarrie Grimmett was in the South Australian side and Bill O’Reilly in the New South Wales side. I sat with my father in the old Sheridan Stand with a little pack of sandwiches and a bottle of blue currant orange juice. I saw Grimmett’s 6 for 118 and next morning I was out bowling leg breaks against the wall.”Part of the Basil Sellers Sports Sculpture Project, Benaud’s life-size sculpture was inaugurated by professor Marie Bashir, the New South Wales governor. The ten subjects will include four cricketers, two rugby union players, two rugby league representatives and two Australian rules competitors. “It is worth remembering,” Benaud said, “that when I’m standing here what I’m really doing is representing all those players who played for New South Wales and had the honour to be at the SCG and be part of the a lovely atmosphere that has been at the ground ever since I saw it for the first time.”

Sourav Ganguly has said that umpire Mark Benson should have consulted Steve Bucknor in adjudicating on the controversial catch which led to his dismissal in the second innings of the second Test against Australia in Sydney.Batting on 51, Ganguly had edged Brett Lee low to Michael Clarke at second slip who immediately claimed the catch and the Australians celebrated before awaiting the umpire’s decision. Ganguly, convinced that the catch hadn’t carried, waited at the crease. Benson opted not to consult Bucknor at square leg and instead took Ricky Ponting’s word that the catch was legitimate.It was among several decisions that went against India through the Test and played a big part in their defeat. But Ganguly was willing to shrug off the disappointment and said that the playing conditions need to be respected if agreed upon before the series.”I thought he [Benson] could have done a better job speaking to Steve Bucknor,” Ganguly told the channel Star Cricket during the second day of the warm-up game against the ACT XI in Canberra. “The moment I nicked it I turned back and saw it didn’t carry. But that’s the way is. It was agreed to stick by the captain’s word and we have to stay with that.”If it’s a decision by the captains then I think in modern day cricket it’s fine. But the umpires have a responsibility too. You can leave it to the fielders but the umpires have to make a judgment. I think the umpires should interfere if they feel it’s a 50-50.”The umpiring aside, the Test ended in acrimony after offspinner Harbhajan Singh was charged with making an alleged racist remark to Andrew Symonds. Kumble, speaking after the game, said the Australians were guilty of not playing with the right spirit. His feelings were shared by several Australians, including former players who weren’t impressed by Ponting’s conduct.Ganguly however said that he admired Australia’s hunger to win. “Sometimes things happen at the heat of the moment. But I also admired how desperate they were to win. That’s not a bad thing in sport. Some decisions didn’t go our way. It hurt us. On the other side, it showed why they win so many Test matches.”Down 2-0 in the series, Ganguly said the team was a happy bunch and that the Perth Test will be a true measure of how good they are. He agreed that the team was a little under-done before the first Test and that a second tour game would have helped.”It’s a happy team. We had a good year before this series. I spoke to the Indian board and said one warm-up was not enough. We should have had two. We had the Pakistan home series so it was difficult to fit in another game.”

While the BCCI-run Indian Premier League gathers steam, the second tournament of the unofficial Indian Cricket League (ICL) gets underway on Sunday.Unlike the Twenty20 tournament conducted late last year in Panchkula, the second edition will be 50-over contests, and will be held in Chennai and Hyderabad. The hype surrounding the inaugural edition also seems to be missing, as are the overseas recruits who took part in the Twenty20 competition.The six teams – Chennai Superstars, Chandigarh Lions, Delhi Jets, Hyderabad Heroes, Kolkata Tigers and Mumbai Champs – will play each other once, and the top two teams head into the final in Chennai on February 10.The Chennai Superstars had triumphed in the Twenty20 competition, having beaten the Chandigarh Lions in the final. Among the ICL’s signings are former Indian players Dinesh Mongia, Hemang Badani, Reetinder Sodhi, Jai Prakash Yadav, Deep Dasgupta and Rohan Gavaskar, and promising youngsters such as Abhishek Jhunjhunwala and Ambati Rayudu.Schedule of matches
In Chennai:Jan 27: Chandigarh Lions vs Chennai Superstars,28: Chennai Superstars vs Hyderabad Heroes,29: Delhi Jets vs Mumbai Champs,30: Kolkata Tigers vs Hyderabad Heroes,31: Chandigarh Lions vs Mumbai Champs,Feb 1: Delhi Jets vs Kolkata Tigers,2: Delhi Jets vs Chennai Superstars,3: Kolkata Tigers vs Mumbai Champs,4: Chennai Super stars vs Mumbai Champs,6:Kolkata Tigers vs Chennai Superstars,8: Chandigarh Lions vs Kolkata Tigers,10: Final.
In Hyderabad:Feb 3: Chandigarh Lions vs Hyderabad Heroes,5: Delhi Jets vs Chandigarh Lions,6: Mumbai Champs vs Hyderabad Heroes,8: Delhi Jets vs Hyderabad Heroes.

Tasmania 6 for 291 (Di Venuto 144) v New South Wales
Scorecard

Michael Di Venuto reminded his home state of his fine batting powers during a century that kept New South Wales relatively quiet on the opening day at Bellerive Oval. The Blues are trying to stay ahead of Victoria, who have also confirmed their finals place, and both teams sent in their opponents after winning the toss – and soon wished they hadn’t.The opener Di Venuto, who will retire from the Australian scene after next week’s match, fired against a young New South Wales bowling attack and his 144 was responsible for the Tigers making a strong start, but a lack of support led to them being 6 for 291 at stumps. While his partner Dane Anderson laboured over 96 deliveries for 28, Di Venuto sprinted towards his 45th first-class century in 121 balls.He has always been an aggressive batsman and he pounded 18 fours and two sixes in the 216-delivery stay, which ended when he pulled Beau Casson to short mid-on. A chance had come on 85 off Mark Cameron, but Di Venuto was not bothered by the lapse and continued to attack in an innings that was of vital importance for his team.Anderson went to Dominic Thornely shortly after lunch as the Blues started to hit back. Travis Birt (15) gave Burt Cockley his maiden first-class wicket and George Bailey (6) was run-out following a deflection from a straight Di Venuto drive, leaving the Tigers at 3 for 174. The captain Dan Marsh was bowled by Cameron for 15 and Luke Butterworth managed 13 before becoming Casson’s second wicket. Di Venuto left at 6 for 243 and Tim Paine and Jason Krejza ensured there would be no further damage in an unbroken stand of 48.

The prolific season of Simon Katich, who will lead New South Wales in the final on Saturday, has resulted in him winning the Pura Cup Player of the Year award at the SCG. Katich has picked up 1328 runs in the competition at the incredible average of 94.85 and needs 137 in the decider against Victoria to steal the overall record from Michael Bevan.He finished six votes ahead of Queensland’s Ashley Noffke for the domestic prize while Doug Bollinger was third and David Hussey fourth. In ten games Katich hit five hundreds and six half-centuries with a top score of 306 in the match against Queensland. Katich was also named captain of the Australian Cricketers’ Association All-star Pura Cup outfit with Dan Marsh as his deputy, and the players switched spots for the ACA’s FR Cup squad.Katich said it was pleasing to be recognised by the ACA but his major focus remained leading New South Wales in the Pura Cup final against Victoria, which begins on Saturday. “It’s a huge honour, I was thrilled to win it,” Katich said. “But the main thing for me is for us to win the final so as much as it’s nice to win that award for me the biggest thrill of the season will be hopefully winning the Pura Cup.”Matthew Elliott, who has retired, was crowned the FR Cup Player of the Year for the second time in a row after he signed off with 521 runs at 74.42. Hussey captured the Twenty20 prize with 237 at a strike-rate of 153.89 while the New South Wales rookie Steven Smith was second. Lisa Sthalekar was handed the prize for the WNCL, Steve Davis picked up the Cricket Australia Umpire Award and Western Australia collected the Benaud Spirit of Cricket for the four-day and one-day competitions.Pura Cup Player of the Year Simon Katich
FR Cup Player of the Year Matthew Elliott
Twenty20 Player of the Year David Hussey
WNCL Player of the Year Lisa Sthalekar
Cricket Australia Umpire Award Steve Davis
Benaud Spirit of Cricket Awards Western Australia (Pura Cup & FR Cup)
Australian Cricketers’ Association All-star Pura Cup Michael Di Venuto (Tas), Chris Rogers (WA), Brad Hodge (Vic), Simon Katich (capt, NSW), David Hussey (Vic), Dan Marsh, (vc, Tas), Graham Manou (wk, SA), Ashley Noffke (Qld), Doug Bollinger (NSW), Steve Magoffin (WA), Bryce McGain (Vic), Ryan Harris (12th man, SA).Australian Cricketers’ Association All-star FR Cup Michael Dighton (Tas), Matthew Elliott (SA), Brad Hodge (Vic), David Hussey (Vic), Simon Katich (vc, NSW), Dan Marsh (capt, Tas), Brad Haddin (wk, NSW), Brett Geeves (Tas), Brendan Drew (Tas), Steve Magoffin (WA), Shaun Tait (SA), Daniel Cullen (12th man, SA).