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Australia 2 for 370 (Langer 162,Martyn 97,Lehmann 50,Chandana 4-94) v Sri Lanka Live scorecard

After the haymaking indulgences of yesterday, this second day at Cairnsbegan with a dull throb. It is often the way of mornings after. Australia’sbatsmen set purposefully about building an imposing total; Sri Lanka’s bowlers sought scratchily to claw back some dignity. By lunch 104 runs had been added and five wickets fiddled out, suggesting the visitors had been significantly more successful in achieving their objectives.In fact, Sri Lanka sloped off at the interval with considerable momentum, having nailed the last four Australian wickets for 20 runs. All four went toUpul Chandana, the legspinner, who was ignored for the first half of yesterday but flighted the ball intelligently today. He was helped out by some needlessly reckless shotmaking.Damien Martyn prodded tentatively forward on 97, made no concerted attemptto hit the ball and was struck on the front pad. Despite the look of derision he gave Aleem Dar, the Pakistan umpire, as he walked off, he appearedcosily leg-before. Simon Katich, a normally conservative beginner, wasbowled for 1, audaciously pulling at and missing a short floater from Chandana.Darren Lehmann, batting busily and inventively for 50, also departed in uncharacteristic fashion. He slogged at yet another well-flighted delivery from Chandana, didn’t quite time it, and was caught metres short of the sightscreen by Kumar Sangakkara. Shane Warne fell soon after for 2, slashing hypnotically and edging to Thilan Samaraweera in the slips. It seemed a terrible waste of resources.Justin Langer was first out for 162, wafting irritably at a wide ball fromLasith Malinga and edging high to Mahela Jayawardene at slip. He had ekedout only three runs this morning and failed to relocate his casual fluencyof yesterday.Martyn, by contrast, picked up precisely where he left off,all straight grace and elegance. Upon entering the nineties he receiveda thorough workout from a rejuvenated Nuwan Zoysa, who had Martyn playingand missing, inside-edging and repeatedly squared up. Martyn was tentativefor a while, then seemed almost to drift off into a slumber. The Australianscan safely be expected to wake up again sometime this afternoon.

Martin Hawkins, one of the Anti-Corruption officers of the International Cricket Council, has alleged that Maurice Odumbe had made four trips to Mumbai before the World Cup last year to meet an Indian bookmaker. Hawkins was speaking at the ICC’s tribunal at Nairobi into alleged the match-fixing allegations on Odumbe.Hawkins, who gave evidence at the hearing, said that he had investigated Odumbe’s telephone calls, travels and hotel accommodation between January and December 2002. He also said that he interviewed Odumbe in his hotel room in Johannesburg, during the World Cup, about his relationship with Jagdish Sodha, the bookie, and his trips to Mumbai.”Odumbe said,” according to Hawkins, “[that] he had been introduced to Sodha as someone he would do business of solar lighting with, when he retired from cricket. Sodha would also provide medicine for his mother who had hypertension. It was the year before the World Cup and it was unusual for a player to make four trips to Mumbai and be entertained by Sodha.”Hawkins added that his investigations had proved that the player had received money and had his accommodation in Mumbai paid for by his host.Ishan Kapila, Odumbe’s lawyer claimed that by giving detailed reports on Odumbe’s girlfriends and other personal affairs, the ICC investigators had infringed on his client’s private life . During his cross-examination, Kapila said, “The Code of Conduct is dramatically fraud[ulent] in the context.”Niranjan Singh Virk, another ICC investigator, told the inquiry that he had interviewed Sodha in 2000 when he was still working for the Central Bureau of Investigations in India and at the time, Sodha had confessed that he had been a bookmaker. However, he also said that Sodha had never been charged or convicted for the offence.Odumbe is expected to give evidence in his defence on Friday.

The ECB has denied reports that some of the England players have already pulled out of their one-day tour of Zimbabwe, which is due to take place in November.England were originally scheduled to play a two-Test series as well as the one-dayers, but Zimbabwe’s Test status has been put on hold for the rest of this year in the wake of the dispute with their leading players, which has severely weakened their team. However, the ECB recently agreed to play five one-dayers – one extra than originally planned – but it may have trouble persuading some of the players to go.An article in yesterday’s said that seven leading players, including Andrew Flintoff and Stephen Harmison, had already decided they wouldn’t tour Zimbabwe on moral grounds, but had been ordered by the ECB to keep quiet on the matter. Richard Bevan, the chief executive of the Professional Cricketers’ Association (PCA), was quoted as saying: “We’ve not agreed to gag players, although my advice is it would be inappropriate to comment while the situation is being dealt with by the ICC.”But the ECB responded to the article by saying: “The players have not been gagged as the newspaper suggests … Both the ECB and the players’ own representatives have asked the players to delay making any decision.”The ECB also promised to give the players as much information as possible before they made their decision on whether to tour or not. David Morgan, the ECB’s chairman, has already insisted that the players will not be forced to go.

Duncan Fletcher, England’s coach, will upset the purists with his latest theory: that his side should play fewer Test matches to make way for more one-day games.Speaking ahead of tomorrow’s first match of the NatWest Challenge series against India, which is a warm-up for the Champions Trophy, Fletcher told BBC Sport: “We’re going to have to look at replacing the odd Test match here and there with a substitute of four one-dayers so players have decent breaks.”But Fletcher warned that these must not lead to player burnout. He said: “We must play more one-day cricket – but that doesn’t mean we must play more cricket.”While England’s Test side proved formidable this summer – they completed a 7-0 clean sweep against New Zealand and West Indies – the one-day team has fared less well, with three wins and six defeats in their last ten games.England currently play less one-day cricket than the other leading teams. They have played just 17 one-day matches in 2004, and only Kenya have played fewer. Their comparative lack of match practice could explain why they are ranked a lowly eighth in the world. Every other side has played at least 20 matches, with Pakistan playing 33.However, despite this, Michael Vaughan and his team go into the NatWest Challenge against India, the World Cup finalists, as marginal favourites. This is a combination of home advantage, the absence of Sachin Tendulkar with tennis elbow, and India’s own questionable recent form – they have only won five of their last ten matches, and that includes victories over Bangladesh and the United Arab Emirates.

Kenya v Pakistan – Play abandonedIt was cold, windy and drizzling at Edgbaston, and there were few complaints when Pakistan’s match against Kenya was called off for the day. Although the heavy overnight rain had eased off significantly, the ground was still shrouded in tarpaulins as the umpires inspected the bowlers’ run-ups and decided that tomorrow would be a safer day to play.It is vital for both teams that they get some time on the field, as Pakistan are scheduled to play an India on the upswing here on Sunday, while Kenya don’t know when their next game is. If the weather clears – and www.weather.com certainly thinks so – we’ll have a match ready to go at 0915 GMT tomorrow.

England are refusing to pay Zimbabwe Cricket any compensation as a result of the decision not to reschedule the first one-day international of the current series, which was due to have been played at Harare last Friday (November 26).The match was cancelled because of the dispute over journalists’ accreditation which meant that England arrived in Zimbabwe two days later than scheduled. ZC tried to shift the match back 24 hours to the Saturday, but England refused, arguing that it would have meant them playing less than a day after arriving in the country.The Zimbabwe board claims that the cancellation has cost it US$600,000 in lost gate receipts as well as proceeds from sponsors and TV coverage. The English board dispute this, believing the figure to be closer to US$50,000.”Zimbabwe Cricket has indicated it has suffered a significant financial penalty as a result of there being one fewer match,” said David Morgan, the ECB’s chairman. “We’ve made it clear we don’t think the ECB are liable for that loss and that it’s a direct result of the delay in media accreditation.”Andrew Walpole, England’s media-relations manager, endorsed that stance: “We continue to attribute any loss to the delay in accrediting the 13 UK journalists. The figure quoted is incorrect and a far smaller sum is at issue.”

Bennett King, the coach of the West Indian team, has scoffed at rumours that Brian Lara was a difficult player to manage, but indicated that Lara might be allowed certain concessions in training to allow him to play longer.Talking to the media after the West Indian squad landed in Australia for the VB Series, King said: “I don’t know where it [the rumours] comes from and I was conscious of going in with an open book, having heard all the innuendo, and making my own opinion. But from my point of view, he smiles at me every day and I smile at him every day, so it goes all right.”King, who was earlier the chief coach of Cricket Australia’s Centre of Excellence, suggested that it was important to handle Lara well, so as to maximise his contribution to West Indian cricket. “We’ve got to be mindful of his longevity in the game and how we manage him so we get the best out of Brian for as long as he wants to play,” King stated. “Some people need to be treated differently and sometimes when you start maturing, you need to also be adaptable to some of their needs and the players around them need to understand that too.”He’s had 35 years in cricket and he’s hit ten million cricket balls in his career as it is, whereas a 20-year-old’s probably hit about 200,000, so it’s not going to take Brian that long to get into pretty good shape.”Talking about his experiences with the team so far, King said: “It’s been a pleasure to work with these boys from the islands and the limiting factor for them is the amount of resources that are available within the Caribbean to consistently train and put in the hours that some of the other nations have the opportunity to.”West Indies have been struggling in international cricket over the last few years, but showed signs of a resurgence last year, when they lifted the Champions Trophy after defeating England in a thrilling final. However, with Australia and Pakistan being the two other teams in the fray in the VB Series, West Indies will have their task cut out, and will start as underdogs in the tournament. They begin their campaign with a match against Australia at Melbourne on January 14.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball commentary
The end came swiftly. Off the fourth ball of the morning, Talha Jubair was caught on the boundary. India swept the series, winning this Test by an innings and 83 runs to give them a win-loss-draw record of 6-3-3 for the year.Bangladesh were out of their depth once again in this series, except for a few glimpses of the heights that they could reach. Mashrafe Mortaza and Mohammad Rafique bowled as if the team’s hopes rested solely on their shoulders. And then there was Mohammad Ashraful, who mauled India’s bowlers as if he had an Australian passport. While the team continues to lose heavily, something has changed. There is more defiance and, with injured players returning, a new strength. They cannot be taken as lightly as they once were.India broke several records within the last fortnight. The bowlers took wickets, and nearly every batsman plundered the attack. This was seen as the ideal opportunity to build form before Pakistan visit early next year. But while Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar stroked big hundreds fluently, and Irfan Pathan decimated the opposition thrice, the runs and wickets have come against a team that blew hot and cold. Numbers rose – a welcome sight at the end of a turbulent year – but somewhere it will linger that they could not weather the storm when it mattered most, losing the Border-Gavaskar Trophy to a team that widened the chasm between themselves and the rest of the planet.

One-day cricket requires a sharp overhaul and Twenty20 is the vehicle to drive the change, according to John Buchanan, the Australian coach. Buchanan told the Sydney Morning Herald that the 50-over game was overdue for alterations and there were no limits to the number of innovations.”What Twenty20 cricket will do is question why the 50-over format continues to be the way it is,” Buchanan told the newspaper. “The 20-over game can accelerate that whole format change.”Buchanan said Twenty20 should be a part of the “overall package of cricket” and hoped it would produce players who were fitter and more creative. Not only did the experimental Australia A v Pakistan match fill Adelaide Oval last Thursday, but its television ratings were better than the opening two VB Series games.One idea Buchanan suggested was to split 50-over innings with bonuses for being in front at the end of 20 or 25 overs. “Then teams have to decide whether they chase that incentive point or whether they’re more interested in chasing the win at the end,” he said. “I’m sure lots of other people have got lots of other ideas. The ODI game does need the ICC to rethink it’s format.”Bob Woolmer, the Pakistan coach who played for England in Australia’s first World Series Cup, said he would not be surprised if the VB Series was headed for a revamp. “I’m sure they’re thinking of a change of format because it is now 27 years,” Woolmer told the Courier-Mail. “It’s not necessarily outlived its popularity, but it needs to be looked at in terms of changing how it’s done. I don’t know how quickly Cricket Australia and the television people will come up with an answer.”The dwindling popularity of the neutral teams in the series has been shown by Channel 9’s decision to make the three Pakistan-West Indies matches day games. All of Australia’s remaining fixtures and the finals will be under lights. West Indies play Pakistan at the Gabba tomorrow.

Technology sucks. We rely on it for everything these days. As I was watching and typing simultaneously at the Challenger Series, my mind wandered between the shining green bowl of Wankhede Stadium and the dead grey screen of the laptop. And in doing this visual juggling act I missed the sweetly timed strokes of Robin Uthappa and VVS Laxman, who were trying to help India B stay in the hunt against India A.Normally, in the cosy environs of the office the TV replays would allow me to see the shot execution from every possible angle. But, sadly, the Challenger Series, India’s premier domestic one-day tournament, couldn’t attract enough sponsors, and hence no TV coverage. And this in a country where cricket is a supposedly a religion.But for the few hundreds who started filling the stadium as the evening drew in, the on-field action kept them on the edge of the seats. Once Uthappa and Laxman departed after showcasing their delectable array of strokes, the eager crowds got ready for the real show to begin as Virender Sehwag made his much-awaited entry at No. 4. As he started his walk to the crease, the old Indian rope-trick of clearing the dew was taking place. Soon he embarked on a more familiar rope-trick – clearing it at every opportunity, particularly when RP Singh dropped short.During one tense moment, Sehwag went for a sweep off Murali Kartik. The bowler, and his team, appealed in unison. The batsman stood his ground. The umpire was confused. The journalists didn’t have the television to make their decision. The umpire couldn’t make up his mind, and consulted with his square-leg counterpart. The two officials gave the benefit of doubt to the batsman. Dravid was furious. Immediately he charged towards the umpires, demanding an exclamation. He knew it was a helpless situation. We knew it, too. Only if there was a TV. Sigh.Another missed TV moment was the hop-skip-and-jump way in which Mohammad Kaif went through his innings. The ultra-fitness-conscious Kaif was a funny sight as he prepared for each ball in a fashion more reminiscent of the triple-jumper, Jonathan Edwards. Kaif has this habit of making a fashion statement wherever he goes on the field of play – his unique stance while batting and his knock-kneed stance while fielding in the slips.Another missing factor, which my colleague S Rajesh put his finger on, was: no sponsor, no television, so no group hugs after each wicket. That kid who, in the advert, scuttles through a tunnel beneath the pitch and pokes his head into the middle of the huddle to deliver brown-sugary-carbonated refreshments to his heroes had apparently been given the day off.Television has this ability to build a spectacle out of nothing. So it was quite unusual – and strangely frustrating – to view the game without the aid of that stupid box. In an age where computers rule our minds – and Ctrl-Z rectifies our errors – it was quite difficult to keep my sights clear.