Michael Clarke to retire from Test cricket after Oval Test

The legendary Australian player and captain Michael Clarke has announced that he will retire at the end of the ongoing Ashes series. Australia has already lost the series against England by 1-3 on third day of the 4th Test.

Clarke was reportedly not in the mood of retiring until the Trent Bridge Test, where his team lost the match by an innings and thus, adding one more to the consecutive series loss in England.

34-year-old Clarke has been playing Test cricket for past 11 years and believes that he was physically and mentally exhausted by now and should leave when it is time. Clarke himself confirmed the news soon after his team lost their 3th Test in the ongoing series. This was Australia's first loss by an innings against England in 30 years.

"The boys have worked hard, I don't blame anyone in that change room. As a team we haven't performed as well as we needed to be beat England, and as a captain I certainly haven't led from the front."

Michael Clarke will play the final Test match of the series as Captain against England at the Oval in London. The current Ashes series has not done any good for Clarke and he is now at his all-time lowest Ashes average of 16.71. He indicated that it is time for him to move on and make place for someone better. Former England captain Michael Vaughan supported Clarke's decision saying that he was not surprised with the decision.

Clarke has scored 8605 runs in his career that include 28 centuries and 27 half centuries. A big applause for one of the best Cricket players of all-time.

Zimbabwe vs NZ, 2nd ODI: New Zealand won by 10 wkts

New Zealand tour of Zimbabwe, 2015

 

New Zealand has won the second match of the 3-match ODI series against Zimbabwe by 10 wickets. The match was played on Tuesday, August 04, 2015 at Harare Sports Club, Harare. Zimbabwe, while playing first, scored 235 runs for 9 wickets. New Zealand chased down the target in 42.2 overs with all 10 wickets remaining.

Both Martin Guptill and Tom Latham have been chosen Man of the Match for their record opening stand (236*).

Zimbabwe won the toss and chose to bat first. The team struggled throughout its innings. Only Sikandar Raza, who came at seventh place, could score a respectable 100* for his team and none other player could reach even 50 runs.

Ish Sodhi took 3 wickets for New Zealand.

Zimbabwe Innings Score Card

New Zealand was given a target of 236 runs to be chased in 50 overs. The team did not loss any wicket and scored 236 runs in 42.2 overs. Martin Guptill scored 116 runs and Tom Latham scored 110 runs. Both openers remained not out and were given joint Man of the Match reward.

New Zealand Innings Score Card

England vs Australia 2nd Test, Day 1: AUS 337/1

The Ashes, 2015

Source: cricbuzz.com

The first day of the 2nd Test match between England and Australia is over. Australia has scored 337 runs with the loss of just one wicket in 90 overs played today. Chris Rogers is playing at 158 while Steven Smith is not out at 129 runs.

The 2nd Test match in the ongoing Ashes series started on Thursday, 16th July. Australia won the toss and chose to bat. Opener David Warner scored 38 runs of 42 balls and was caught by Anderson. Chris Rogers (158) and Steven Smith (129) are still batting and will continue the Australia Innings tomorrow. 90 overs of match were played today.

Australia 1st Day Score Card

The wicket of Warner was taken by Moeen Ali.

Check out the score card in the left side panel.

Champions League T20 (CLT20) tournament discontinued

The Champions League T20 tournament has been discontinued with immediate effect because of the poor demand and user base. BCCI, on Wednesday confirmed that an agreement has been reached by the Governing Council of CLT20 to discontinue the tournament with immediate effect.

CLT20, which was a joint venture of BCCI, Cricket South Africa (CSA) and Cricket Australia (CA), could not find enough sponsors or fans to be continued any longer. The fan base was poor since the very beginning of this tournament in 2009 and now, the hosts are even struggling to find sponsors. The decision was taken unanimously by all three host associations.

Anurag Thakur, Secretary of the BCCI said, “This has been a difficult decision as the Champions League T20 provided added context to a number of domestic Twenty 20 competitions around the world such as the IPL in India, Big Bash League in Australia and South Africa’s Ram Slam T20. "

After this decision, the upcoming edition of CLT20, scheduled in September and October, will be discarded.

CLT20 was not reportedly drawing enough attraction of audience from any country other than India and this was not good for the business. BCCI, though gave a hint of organizing a 'mini-IPL' to be played in the UAE to replace the discontinued CLT20.

CSK, RR suspended from IPL for two years

The Supreme court of India appointed Lodha panel has suspended IPL franchises Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals for two years after being charged in connection with the betting and spot-fixing scandals in the IPL.

Both IPL teams will not be able to participate in any IPL event for next two year. The committee also banned Gurunath Meiyappan and Raj Kundra for life from all BCCI-related cricket activities. Both of them were charged with the involvement in betting activities during IPL 2013. Players of the banned  franchises will not be affected with this ban and are still free to be a part of any of the remaining teams if chosen.

"The players are free. They will not be attached to a particular team of the franchise that is suspended. We thought that cricket is bigger than individuals and body andindividuals, then the financial loss to players and franchises is not of significance," Justice Lodha said.

The decision was taken based on the findings of the Mukul Mudgal panel. A committee was formed by the Supreme court of India comprising former Chief Justice of India, RM Lodha and ex-judges Ashok Bhan and RV Raveendran to define "the quantum of punishment, if any, to be imposed on Gurunath Meiyappan and Raj Kundra and also their respective franchises."

Justice Mukul Mudgal said that the decision has been taken for the best of the IPL. This may cause a temporary setback, but will have a positive long-term impact on players, administrators & others. "There will be a temporary setback but the game of cricket will be back cleaner. People will have more faith in cricket now," he said.

Well, the audience might get a little disappointed knowing that they will not be seeing their popular CSK and RR teams for next two IPLs. Both RR and CSK have been former champions in the IPL games and it will definitely affect the outcomes of the upcoming series without them.

Sri Lanka vs Pakistan 2nd Test, Day 5: Sri Lanka won by 7 wkts

Pakistan tour of Sri Lanka, 2015

Sri Lanka won the 2nd Test match on the fifth day of the match against Pakistan. After 4th day's game, Pakistan gave a target of 153 runs to its opponent, which Sri Lanka team chased in just 26.3 overs with 7 wickets remaining. Dhammika Prasad has been chosen the Man of the Match for his 7 wickets and 35 runs innings. The series yet has 1 Test match left.

With this win, Sri Lanka also records their first win in past 6 years at P Sara Oval, Colombo and they are now equal in the series with 1-1. The captain must be happy with the performance of his team. For Kumar Sangakkara, it was the last match of the series, as the player has already announced his retirement from Test cricket and will be playing last two Test matches in India series.

Sri Lanka team has shown its true colors in the game from the beginning of the first day when they bowled out the whole Pakistan team for just 138. The last day was also not bad as the team played really well to chase the target of 152 runs. They managed to chase down the score in just 26.3 overs with 7 wickets remaining.

SL 2nd Innings Score card

The 3rd and final Test match of the series is scheduled to start from 3rd July, 2015 at Pallekele International Cricket Stadium, Pallekele. If Sri Lanka wins this match, it will be their first Test series win since April 2006 at home.

Stay tuned!

Sangakkara announces retirement from Test after India Series

The legendary Sri Lankan player Kumar Sangakkara has announced that he would retire from Test cricket after the second Test match of India-Sri Lanka Test series scheduled in August 2015. He will also not play the third Test match of the ongoing Pakistan Test series and the two Test matches against India would be his last. Sangakkara is already retired from ODI format of Cricket.

Breaking the long silence about the rumors of retirement, the Sri Lankan player confirmed the news in a special press conference held after the third day's play of the second Test of Pakistan tour of Sri Lanka 2015. Sangakkara also mentioned that he was intended to retire from all forms of cricket after the 2015 Cricket World Cup, but was convinced to play 4 more Test matches by the Sri Lanka's previous selection committee.

"I've had the time of my life playing for Sri Lanka. It has been a great honour. Growing up as a kid, watching players like Aravinda de Silva play for Sri Lanka and then one day to get a chance to play with them. I've thoroughly enjoyed playing every format, but donning the whites for Sri Lanka has been a different feeling altogether. There have been so many ups and downs. I've had bad days as well but the good times outweigh the bad. I know, it's disappointing to say goodbye to something you've done for over 15 years, but I know this is the right time to leave," Sangakkara said.

Sangakkara has been one of the best ODI & Test players of all-time. He currently holds the third position in the ICC Test Batsmen Ranking and second in the ICC ODI Batsmen Ranking. His list of records is quite  long. He debuted his Test career in 2000 and in just 15 years, he managed to score 12271 Test runs, which is also the fifth-highest of all-time in Test cricket format.

The 37-years old Sri Lankan player hit 38 Test centuries that include 11 double-centuries, just one behind Sir Don Bradman's record of 12.

Sangakkara, during the announcement, indicated that he never played for personal records, but always for the country. "If that (personal milestones) is the only driving ambition, then it is time to say 'thank you very much'. I've prided myself in doing well individually, but I should be able to look at my teammates in the eye and say I really went out there for the country and not individual records."

We wish the great player Kumar Sangakkara a very well and successful future ahead.

Batting Powerplay No Longer a part of ODIs

ICC Annual Conference 2015

At the Annual Conference 2015 of the International Cricket Council, ICC Chief Executive Dave Richardson, on Friday, announced that the batting powerplay system has been removed from the One Day Internationals (50-over format). He also announced some other significant changes in the ODI formats after discussing the recommendations made by ICC Cricket Committee at the Conferencein Barbados.

The batting Powerplay was one of the systems being followed in One-Day International until now. From now on, there will be no batting powerplays in any innings of any International 50-over match that means, no restriction to field setting like before. Although ICC also announced that from now on, five fielders will be allowed to field outside the 30-yard circle in the final 10 overs of both innings while maximum of two fielders outside the circle for first ten overs and maximum four fielders outside the circle for overs 11 to 40. That means, No compulsory catchers in overs 1-10 in ODIs.

Also, all No balls, including 'over stepping by the bowlers' will result in free hits in both ODIs and Twenty20 formats.

All new rules will be in effect for any series starting starting on or after July 5.

"We have thoroughly reviewed the ODI format after a very successful ICC Cricket World Cup. There was no need to make any radical changes to what has proved to be a vibrant and popular format but we wanted to take this opportunity to make the format simpler and easier to follow for the public as well as maintaining a balance between bat and ball," Richarsdon said at the press conference.

Sri Lanka vs Pakistan 2nd Test Day 1 Highlights

Pakistan tour of Sri Lanka, 2015

The day 1 at the 2nd Test match between Sri Lanka and Pakistan was quite exciting with Pakistan being all out for 138 runs in just 42.5 overs and Sri Lanka playing on 70 Runs losing one wicket after 32 overs. Kumar Sangakkara and Kaushal Silva are still on the crease from Sril Lanka side who both will continue tomorrow's match.

Pakistan has already won the first match of the 3-Test match series against Sri Lanka. The 2nd Test match started on 24th June and is expected to conclude on or before 29th June.

Pakistan won the toss and captain Misbah chose to bat first, which was clearly not a good decision. The whole team got out at a score of 138 runs in just 42.5 overs. Sri Lankan bowlers did very good with the bowl. Tharindu Kaushal took 5 wickets including of the opener Mohammad Hafeez. Hafeez was the highest scorer from Pakistan team, who scored 42 runs of 75 balls.

Pakistan Innings Score Card

 

Sri Lanka team batted second and batted really well. Dimuth Karunaratne gave a good start to his team before he was caught by S Ahmed on a ball by Janaid Khan on a personal score of 28 Runs. Kaushal Silva (21) and Kumar Sangakkara (18) are not-out yet.

Sri Lanka Innings Score Card



There is still 4 days of match left and if Sri Lanka team manages to play whole day tomorrow and get a total score somewhere around 400, they can win this test easily.

Stay tuned!

The score cards here have been taken from the leading cricket website cricbuzz.com

12 Deserving Players who never won a World Cup

We all know about the teams and players who ever won a World Cup, but do we know about the players who never won a World cup even if they deserved one. Here is the list of 12 players who actually deserved to win a World Cup in their career but were disappointed

You can get here, ICC World Cup Score 2015

1. Saeed Anwar

ODIs 247
Runs 8824
Highest 194

2. Saurav Ganguly



ODIs 311
Runs 11363
Highest 183

3. Brian Lara



ODIs 299
Runs 10405
Highest 169

4. Jacques Kallis



ODIs 328
Runs 11579
Highest 139

5. Martin Crowe

ODIs 143
Runs 4704
Highest 107*

6. Rahul Dravid



ODIs 344
Runs 10889
Highest 153

7. Ian Botham



ODIs 116
Runs 2113
Highest 79
Wickets 145

8. Anil Kumble



ODIs 271
Runs 938
Wickets 337
Highest 6/12

9. Waqar Younis



ODIs 262
Runs 969
Wickets 416
Highest 7/36

10. Allan Donald



ODIs 164
Runs 95
Wickets 272
Highest 6/23

11. Curtly Ambrose



ODIs 176
Runs 639
Wickets 225
Highest 5/17

12. Jonty Rhodes



ODIs 245
Runs 5935

Highest 121