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The Canadian squad to play in the inaugural World Cricket League in Kenya in late January and early February has been named. It includes 12 of the 14 players who recently played in South Africa.Returning to lead the squad is allrounder John Davison. Two pace-bowlers supplement the squad – Austin Codrington returns while the experienced former West Indian international Anderson Cummins is set to make his debut for Canada. Questions may be raised about the wisdom of including Cummins, a 40-year-old who plays for Cavaliers in the Toronto and District Cricket Association but who has not played a high standard of cricket for more than a decade.Sanjay Thuraisingham and Steve Welsh (flown in as a replacement) are the two players who played in South Africa that are not going to Kenya.This is a key event for the six leading Associates. It not only provides warm-up opportunities on the road to the World Cup, but the top two sides will qualify for the ICC’s new Twenty20 Championship in South Africa in September 2007. These sides will also receive significant extra funding from the ICC to help with preparations for that tournament.Canada squad John Davison (capt), Kevin Sandher, Qaiser Ali, George Codrington, Desmond Chumney, Sundeep Jyoti, Don Maxwell, Abdool Samad, Henry Osinde, Austin Codrington, Ashish Bagai, Ashif Mulla, Sunil Dhaniram, Umar Bhatti, Anderson Cummins.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
How they were out

Sri Lanka began their last innings of this tour 508 runs behind, on apitch whose bounce and spin suited the Indian spinners, a templatethat beckoned a fourth-day finish. And yet they fought hard, despitebeing outplayed, and ended the day on 235 for 6, still 273 behind. Thedestination was probably beyond them, but they made a fist of it onthe journey, never giving up, always scrapping hard, but simply beingoutplayed by a superior team.The highlight of Sri Lanka’s innings was a fifth-wicket partnership of105 between Mahela Jayawardene and Tillekeratne Dilshan. They cametogether with the score on 96 for 4, and batted sensibly, mixingcaution with opportunism and frustrating the Indian spinners.Jayawardene was compact, eschewing the flamboyant strokes he sometimesindulges in, a gatherer instead of a hunter. Dilshan, who had handledthe spinners superbly in the first innings, played with an ease thatbelied the trouble some of the others had got themselves in.It took a fast bowler to break the partnership, Ajit Agarkar pitchinga yorker-length delivery to Jayawardene which was hit straight back tohim. Jayawardene thought it was a bump-ball, but replays showedconclusively that his bat had hit the ground and the ball had gonestraight off the bat (201 for 5).Dilshan went shortly after, lured into a drive by a ball from Irfan Pathanthat moved away just enough to get an edge through to the wicketkeeper(229 for 6). He walked back to the pavilion with an anguished slownessthat reflected the intensity with which Sri Lanka had approached thisgame. Jehan Mubarak and Farveez Maharoof saw Sri Lanka safely throughto the close of play, but three long sessions still loomed ahead.India began the day on 287 for 9, extending their overnight leadby 29 runs before declaring. Anil Kumble and Harbhajan Singh had added a total of69 runs for the last wicket, demonstrating in the process that thepitch wasn’t quite such a nightmare to bat on. Strokeplay was possible- Harbhajan made 40 off 51 – and so was stodge – Kumble made 29 off68. It was a lesson Sri Lanka would surely have noted.But mere application simply wasn’t enough. Harbhajan opened thebowling with Pathan, and revelled in the conditions: he hadenjoyed the bounce of the pitch in the first innings, and generatedmore of it here, and some turn, too, with the new ball.Upul Tharanga batted with composure and assured footwork, and seemedup to the task of batting out sessions. Marvan Atapattu started uncertainly,and was lucky to be dropped at gully after an uppish cut off Pathanwas put down by Kumble. He was eventually out stepping forward toHarbhajan and edging to the on side, where a diving Mohammad Kaif,from forward short leg, took an excellent catch (39 for 1).Kumar Sangakkara and Tharanga then added 45, and the manner ofSangakkara’s dismissal, for 17, showed the cunning and experience ofKumble. Bowling round the wicket, he went very wide of the crease andbowled a superb ball to Sangakkara that, turning sharply into him,squared him up. He was plumb in front (84 for 2).Tharanga was next, surprised by one that spun viciously into him,managing to just tamely glance it to leg slip, where Gautam Gambhirtook a good catch (89 for 3). Thilan Samareewera didn’t last long,edging a ball through to Kaif at forward short leg (96 for 4).Then Jayawardene and Dilshan came together, and contrived to make surethe match would go into a fifth day. Sri Lanka might lose, but theywould not capitulate.How they were outSri LankaMarvan Atapattu c Kaif b Harbhajan 16 (39 for 1)
Kumar Sangakkara lbw Kumble 17 (84 for 2)
Upul Tharanga c Gambhir b Kumble 47 (89 for 3)
Thilan Samaraweera c Kaif b Kumble 5 (96 for 4)
Mahela Jayawardene c and b Agarkar 57 (201 for 5))
Tillekeratne Dilshan c Dhoni b Pathan 65 (229 for 6)

Hardships, misery, struggle: Thami Tsolekile has seen all that. Actually “seen” isn’t quite the right word: he has lived through all that. He has come a long way from those dark days. On Saturday Tsolekile made his Test debut against India, as South Africa’s wicketkeeper. He lists “life” as his alltime favourite movie. And in his 24 years to date he has lived some life.Born in Langa in Cape Town, the oldest of South Africa’s townships, Tsolekile started life in a stuffy atmosphere surrounded by 14 people in a two-room brick-and-mortar house. Brought up by a single parent – his mother, Bandile – Tsolekile started growing up in an environment where everything was informal. There were eyes looking at you from everywhere; in a place where there was no sense of privacy.However, one major advantage of growing up in a township is the sense of bonding one derives from it. “The community is very strong there. Life was tough in the township, a bit similar to the life here in India on the streets,” says Tsolekile. “There a lot of people, with different backgrounds, speaking different languages.”I was struck by his humility: he was embarrassed that he’d arrived for our chat a bit later than arranged. “Did I keep you waiting?” he asked – and it wasn’t his fault, as he’d been busy giving interviews at the team’s press conferences.Clad in the South African team colours, with his earstuds glistening, he chose his words carefully. “As I started growing up my mother was still starting with her professional career as a teacher. Life was uncertain and a struggle in a township, but the lucky part was that I grew up near the Langa cricket ground. Every day after school I used to go straight to the stadium and play with the other kids.” That’s where the seeds for his future were sown.Through the hardships came the resolve to battle – a willingness to do something. And the breaks came at the right time. When he was 18 the government offered him a bursary to go into a different environment. He went to a white school, the Pinelands High School, a place “where I learnt many things”.Tsolekile is a very strong character. He looks you in the eye while speaking. But that trait landed him in trouble many times, especially when he was the skipper of the Langa hockey team. He attended six disciplinary hearings as the referee punished his team for misbehaviour, or not turning up on time, or not wearing proper clothing for the match. This was probably something to do with snobbery against the lower classes, but Tsolekile was not to be bowed. He stood up for his team-mates no matter what. “Maybe from the struggle I have experienced I have become a strong character. I don’t feel disappointed easily – it takes a lot to get me down.”That’s a good starting point if you aspire to be a leader one day. Tsolekile has been a leader for many years now, even though he’s still young. He was the captain of the South African schools team in 1998-99. He’s also a handy soccer player – he led the Western Province team at Under-16 level – and represented his country in hockey in 2000 and scored with his first shot.

South Africa’s cricket selectors were quick to notice his leadership qualities. He says the turning point of his life was when he realised he had a good chance of representing his country in Test cricket. “I started thinking seriously about playing for South Africa when I captained the Under-19s to Pakistan in 1998-99. After that I was leader of the team for the Under-19 World Cup in Sri Lanka, where Graeme Smith played under me along with the Amla brothers [Ahmed and Hashim], Justin Ontong and Jacques Rudolph, who was my deputy.”It’s ironic that Smith now leads the South African national team, and it was he who presented Tsolekile with his first Test cap. Of Smith, Tsolekile says: “He has got a very good personality, and respect for people, two qualities of an able leader.”Tsolekile himself has the discipline, self-belief and affability of a natural leader. “I always saw myself as a leader, and was one right through my school and age-group levels in all the sports I played. The leadership qualities come from people respecting you as a person more than anything else, and then doing the right thing at the right time is also important.”He has captained people from diverse backgrounds, and says he learnt that to be a good leader you need to spend more time with people to know them better. He likes to socialise: “I hardly sit at home by myself,” he says. And he doesn’t just live and breathe sport. He’s a fan of Tupac Shakur, R Kelly and Bob Marley. “I like clubbing – Arabic and rap are my favourites.”The other important advantage for Tsolekile is that he is the perfect team man. Gerald de Kock, SA’s media manager, expands: “He was one of the best tourists on the England tour for the 2003 series.”Tsolekile did well with the South African A team, and found himself the understudy to Mark Boucher, the man he eventually replaced. Boucher had been the vice-captain, but his tough and somewhat high-handed approach won him few friends in the team. Some people suspected a racial motive for Tsolekile’s inclusion ahead of Boucher, but Neil Manthorp, a senior South African cricket writer, disagrees. “You can’t compare the two as Boucher has had more experience, and though the selectors favoured a few more coloured players Tsolekile can’t be blamed for his dropping.”Tsolekile has no qualms about people calling him black or coloured. “I don’t mind people calling [us] African or black people. I have always been happy for who I am. I have never really experienced any kind of racism, be it in the dressing-room or on the road, apart from the stupid remarks one hears once in a while.” And he adds: “There are things that I can’t control and some I can. I have always seen myself in the side as equal and selected on merit, and that really tells you the story.”Tsolekile is no loner. He picked up the gloves because “I don’t like to be bored when I am playing. I like to be involved in the game, and that’s why I chose to keep, as the keeper is always in the game.”He practised for Indian pitches by throwing the ball on rubble to get used to the bounce. He’s used to the bouncy and hard pitches back home, where the ball comes through at a comfortable height, and was wary of the unpredictable bounce in India. “The first ball bowled by Shaun Pollock in the tour game at Jaipur bounced twice before it got to me. It was the worst wicket I’d kept on.”Known as “Mara” to his team-mates because one of his idols is Diego Maradona, Tsolekile knows the pressure to which he will be subjected if he doesn’t perform on this tour, but he is confident of his abilities, and hopes to improve and make it harder for his competitors to take his place. “There is pressure from outside, but speaking for myself I don’t see any pressure. I am not expecting much or dreaming about a big game. I am just here to stay on this tour, and to stay in the side.”Thami Tsolekile is in for the long haul in international cricket. His motto in life is “Never forget your roots.” He hasn’t forgotten his: he still stays in Langa along with his mother, for whom he plans to buy a leather jacket, as he’s heard you can get them cheap in India. He’s a player to watch.

Essex’s Will Jefferson and the Worcestershire batsman Kadeer Ali are among 15 players, named today by the England & Wales Cricket Board (ECB), who will be considered for the 2003-04 National Academy intake.”As with last year, we wanted to concentrate our minds on the kind of players who might be invited to the National Academy this winter," said Rod Marsh, the ECB National Academy Director. "Creating such a list allows us to concentrate our resources and to film, study and analyse these players in-depth, which will enable us to create individual programmes for them in advance.”This is by no means an exclusive list and if other players perform well in the remainder of the season then they will also be considered for selection. Injured England players or other cricketers with international experience, not selected for next winter’s England overseas tours, will also be considered.”As this year’s National Academy programme and tour coincides with the Under 19 World Cup in Bangladesh, no U19 players are being considered, however we are planning a series of joint training sessions with the squad prior to their departure.”David Graveney, England’s chairman of selectors, will announce the final Academy squad, along with the England winter touring parties, at the end of the season. They will start their programme on Sunday, October 12, and will be based for the first time at the new facility at Loughborough University. The squad will tour Malaysia and India in the New Year.Provisional list of Academy players Kadeer Ali (Worcestershire), Simon Francis (Somerset), Alex Gidman (Gloucestershire), Will Jefferson (Essex), Shaftab Khalid (Worcestershire), Michael Lumb (Yorkshire), Tom Lungley (Derbyshire), Sajid Mahmood (Lancashire), Philip Mustard (Durham), Graham Napier (Essex), Kevin Pietersen (Nottinghamshire), Matthew Prior (Sussex), Bilal Shafayat (Nottinghamshire), James Tredwell (Kent), Graham Wagg (Warwickshire).

The Chairman of England’s cricket selectors, David Graveney, today issued the following statement in response to media reports that the Kent batsman, David Fulton, had been put on official stand-by for this winter’s tour of India and New Zealand.David Graveney said: “I did tell David Fulton at the end of the season that he was unlucky not to have been chosen for the winter tour squads and that he would be in our thoughts as a possible replacement if anyone withdrew from the tour party.”But I would like to make it clear that at this stage we have not formallyappointed any players to be on stand-by for this winter. We will not make any decision on replacements until we hear from the five players who have yet to confirm whether they are available for the tour of India.”

After a gap of more than two years, the third edition of the Bangladesh Premier League will begin on November 24. It will be a six-team competition with three new franchise owners set to take part.The Dhaka, Chittagong and Barisal teams will now be run by Beximco Group, DBL Group and Axiom Technologies respectively. There will not be a franchise for Rajshahi and Khulna this year.The BCB have retained only three of the old franchise owners. The board had said they would only accept bids from those who had paid their dues from the 2013 edition, as well as the Tk 5.5 crore (approx USD 750,000) bank guarantee that had to be paid for the third edition. Only Alif Group, Royal Sports Limited and I Sports were able to do so.Alif Group were previous owners of the Barisal franchise but this time they will own the Sylhet team and I Sports take control of Rangpur.Royal Sports Limited picked Comilla, which is not a division yet, but BPL governing council’s member secretary Haider Mallick reasoned that, “The government has made Mymensingh as a division recently and possibly Comilla is in line too. As a result, this year we have decided to go with City Corporations, and not divisions. It will be a 10-team competition in the future although there are 20 City Corporations. We are giving the team for four years and the contract can be renewed through discussions at the end of the term.”Mallick and BCB president Nazum Hasan are employees of Beximco, but Mallick said they will not be involved with the Dhaka franchise in any capacity. The BPL governing council has decided that none among them can own or advice a franchise but anyone outside the governing council can participate in a franchise.”Nobody from the BPL governing council can be involved with the teams. They can’t be an owner or even stay as an adviser. But board directors or anyone who is not in the governing council, they can participate with the team.”I work in Beximco Pharma. The team was bought by Beximco Group. I am employed by Beximco, I am not an owner. I will not be involved with the team. The board president is also not an owner, he is an employee. He will also not be involved with this team. There will be no conflict of interest in this matter,” Mallick said.

South Africa’s attempts to stay alive in the ODI series against England seemed to have ended when Reece Topley took the one-handed catch in his follow through that dismissed Farhaan Behardien, the last recognised batsmen in their line-up. Had Chris Morris not been picked for this match, it probably would have been.But the IPL’s newest dollar-millionaire is not just a bowler who can bat a bit. He has spent a lot of time working on his ability to build an innings and he has already shown that.On Test debut last month, Morris scored 69. Before that, he made 86 batting at No. 8 for his franchise, the Titans, in a first-class match to set them up for a match-winning total. After that, he hit an unbeaten 45 off 16 balls for them in a List A game to do the same. Morris knew he could probably see South Africa over the line if he had someone with him to do the same. Then, he lost David Wiese at the end of the 41st over and South Africa still needed 56 runs.”When Dave got out, I thought we were in a bit of strife,” Morris said at the post-match press conference. “I know KG can bat but…”Rabada was dismissed three balls later. South Africa needed 53 with Morris on 14 when he was dropped by Adil Rashid in the deep on the next delivery he faced. He knew he had to make it count.”Luckily they dropped me. I just thought that it’s an opportunity to play cricket for your country. If it’s the arc you can hit it far. I’ve played a lot of cricket here and I know the altitude helps,” he said.Before Morris moved to the Centurion-based franchise, he played at the Wanderers for the Lions and the Johannesburg-crowd did not forget their prodigal son. As AB de Villiers put it, “I think it was [the fans] that pushed us over the line,” and although the sell-out crowd would have helped, it was actually Morris who took South Africa to the line and Imran Tahir who took them over it.Morris credited the “work I have done on my batting in the last couple of months,” with some of it but admitted there’s still some work to do. With scores level, he was bowled by a googly from Rashid, who earned some redemption for dropping him, after Morris failed to read the delivery. “I didn’t pick that for anything. That wasn’t my best. He can have it,” Morris said.De Villiers would not have been thinking the same thing. When Morris went, the South African captain’s stress levels rose after they had been on a rollarcoaster through the game. “We didn’t need a nine-downer tonight. I was taking a bit of strain there in the change-room,” de Villiers said.”We could have made it easier for ourselves. We were a bit naughty there. My run out and a couple of other wickets were a little bit soft. We could have finished it earlier and with more wickets in hand.”In fact, de Villiers also thought they could have given themselves less to chase after reducing England to 108 for 6 at the halfway stage. “We had the opportunity to bowl them out for 150 but I was still very happy with 260 odd,” de Villiers said. He would have been because at that point, Eoin Morgan thought it “was South Africa’s game to lose after we fell 30 or 40 runs short.”England have posted totals of close to 400 and over 300 in the series so far and Morgan was “surprised it has taken us this long to fall this short.” Although England have now squandered a 2-nil advantage, Morgan was still full of praise for players like Joe Root, who scored a second successive century and Chris Woakes, who managed an impressive return on his recall including an athletic run out of de Villiers.”Joe’s run of form has been magnificent for the side,” Morgan said. “And Woakesy got the ball to move around. The game ebbed and flowed but it was our game to win.” Now it is anyone’s series to win, with the decider to take place in Cape Town on Sunday.

On the back of their match-winning performances with the ball, Dale Steyn and Brett Lee have broken into the top ten in the ICC player rankings for Test bowlers.Lee and Steyn jump into joint eighth position after their performances against Sri Lanka and New Zealand in the first of the coinciding two-Test contests being held in Australia and South Africa.Lee finished with figures of 8 for 112 at the Gabba, while Steyn bagged his first ten-wicket haul at The Wanderers as both their teams registered convincing victories. This is the first time the two bowlers have been placed in the top ten and they could move up further during the Tests beginning later this week in Hobart and Centurion.The other change in the top ten for Test bowlers is the advance of Stuart Clark to third place at the expense of Shane Bond, who dropped to fourth. Bond has been ruled out for at least four to six weeks after suffering an abdominal tear.Jacques Kallis’s continued run of prolific scores has seen him displace Mohammad Yousuf from the second position in the rankings for Test batsmen, one place behind Ricky Ponting. Kallis also extended his lead in the rankings for Test allrounders, where he is in first place ahead of Andrew Flintoff.

David Parsons, the acting director of the ECB’s Academy, has expressed his disappointment at Rod Marsh’s comments that England have gone backwards since winning the Ashes last year. Marsh was critical of Duncan Fletcher and said England had done themselves a huge disservice by losing their bowling coach Troy Cooley.”We’ve had two disappointing results here in Australia, but I don’t agree that our Test standards are slipping fast,” Parsons told . “When I read those comments, I thought it was a shame. Rod did a really good job when he was in charge and he got the academy up and running. It’s just sad that someone who has been so heavily involved in the programme feels that it is right to make that sort of comment.”Parsons also defended the decision to have the academy side based in Perth during the Ashes, despite the fact they have played only two one-day matches – both ending in defeat – and have one remaining game before their stay in Australia ends. He described the policy as “a risk worth taking”.”Given the injuries that England had last time, it was important to know someone was on stand-by if something was to go wrong,” Parsons said in the . “The other side of it is that you get the advantage of being out here in the sunshine on some really good pitches. Even if none of the players get the call-up they will still have benefited from being out here in the middle.”Parsons mentioned Ravi Bopara, Steven Davies, Stuart Broad, Chris Tremlett and Graham Onions as players who could help form the next generation of England cricket and who would take the most from the trip.

Speculation is rife that Aziz Al Kaiser Titoo, the vice-president of Bangladesh Cricket Board, has resigned as the row over a secret deal regarding television rights grows. The rumours come in the wake of the resignation of Reazuddin Al Mamun , the board joint-secretary and media committee chairman, in protest at the deal.Speaking to the Dhaka-based daily, , Titoo denied submitting any resignation letter, but did not rule out its possibility in the near future. “Honestly speaking, I am looking forward to the next board meeting to clarify my position. I will definitely raise some burning issues like the TV and sponsorship deal and the resignation of our joint-secretary in the meeting and if there is no satisfactory outcome then I will definitely think about my resignation.”Titoo also expressed his dissatisfaction at the way Ali Asghar, the board’s president, has handled the TV deal. “There is an elected committee in the board and I think nothing should be passed or accepted bypassing the executive committee. I don’t know whether president has accepted one of our top members’ resignation or not, but I think it should be discussed in the board meeting before taking a final decision.”He also expressed his ignorance about the alleged secret deal that Asghar struck with Aston Moore Sports and Entertainment in July, and demanded an inquiry into the affair.. “I’m not aware of such deal. If such deal was struck then it is certainly a big issue. I know Aston Moore but to be honest the company is not experienced enough to handle such a big matter. We should form an inquiry committee to bring out the truth.”