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Just two days after Darren Gough’s return as Yorkshire captain Anthony McGrath has performed a u-turn over his decision to leave the club and will now play for them in 2007 and Yorkshire are hopeful he’ll see out his contract.For much of the winter McGrath had made it clear he wouldn’t be playing for Yorkshire again, but the club had refused to terminate his contract. The issue was due to go before a mediation panel at Lord’s today, but that has now been cancelled after McGrath made up his own mind, which he admits was influenced by Gough’s return to Headingley.”I have known Goughy for years and regard him as a mate as well as a great cricketer,” he said in a statement. “He will breathe new life back into the dressing-room and I know the lads will run through brick walls for him. I am really chuffed he is coming back and will back him 100 percent.”The club has shared with him [Gough] their vision for the future of Yorkshire,” added McGrath. “Having fully considered my position I have decided to withdraw from the mediation which was due to take place today. I want to remain as part of the Yorkshire team and do not want to leave only to then regret my decision as Yorkshire go from strength to strength.”McGrath explained that despite the legal process his relationship with Yorkshire had stayed amicable throughout and that his heart remained with the club. Recent developments with player signings, including Jacques Rudolph, investment in the support staff and a pre-season trip also made McGrath believed the club had turned a corner.The chief executive, Stewart Regan, is relieved about the outcome. “This is the piece of news that Yorkshire members and supporters have been waiting for. We have said all along that Anthony was an important member of our squad and we were not prepared to simply let him walk away from a contract with three seasons to run.”After a turbulent winter, which included Chris Adams’ decision not to come to Yorkshire, Regan is now looking to the future. “We have worked hard to turn things around at Headingley and bring in some exciting players and we have proved to Anthony that we are ambitious and determined to bring success back to this club.”Most importantly we will create the right environment in which he can play cricket to the highest possible standard and be happy in so doing. This is a very good week for Yorkshire.”

Cricket Australia will wait at least eight weeks before deciding whether Australia will tour Pakistan in March. The assassination of the opposition leader Benazir Bhutto in Rawalpindi on Thursday raised further concerns about the series, but James Sutherland, the Cricket Australia chief executive, said the shooting and subsequent violence in the country had not changed the organisation’s view.”During February we’ll have a look at the circumstances that are relevant to the tour,” he said. “Right now playing in a neutral venue is not something that’s under consideration. There’s a commitment to tour Pakistan and we’ll be pursuing every avenue we can for that tour to go ahead.”Sutherland said Cricket Australia was not at the stage of “looking too deeply into this”, but it would remain in contact with the federal government and take advice from its security experts. “The tour is nearly three months away,” he said. “The appropriate time for us is really eight weeks away.”A delegation of officials from Cricket Australia and the Australian Cricketers’ Association is due to visit the country in February to make a decision on whether the trip will proceed. Sutherland said the safety of the players and the advance party was paramount.Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd was confident the tour would go ahead as he felt that cricket is a tool to improve diplomatic relations between countries. “I think we’ll sort that all out with Cricket Australia as the time approaches,” Rudd said in a radio program. “It’s always hard, it’s always difficult, but (cricket) is a great international game. It’s a great language of international diplomacy.In response to that, Nasim Ashraf, the chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board, said he was happy with Rudd’s positive statement. “We are happy that the Australia prime minister has taken a very positive approach on the issue,” Ashraf told . “The Australian team will be safe in Pakistan, which is a nation that loves sports. In addition, we will be providing them a fool-proof security cover here.”Michael Clarke said the team was confident with any choice made by Cricket Australia. “We’ll all be leaving it to them, we’re out of our depth,” he said. “I certainly don’t know enough about it. Cricket Australia will let us know when we get closer to touring there and I’ll go on whatever they say.”Malcolm Speed, the ICC chief executive, said if Australia’s investigation concluded that touring would be too dangerous the ICC would complete its own report. “If ultimately it’s decided it’s unsafe, the next step is a neutral venue and the next step is to defer the series and fit it in to the schedule,” he told ABC radio. “There will be no decisions in the next week or the next month.”Pakistan staged the 2002-03 series against Australia in Sharjah and Sri Lanka, but Speed said the ICC could not force the next contest to be held at a neutral venue. “That’s another option for Pakistan,” he said. “We need to wait and see how things settle down.” The Pakistan Cricket Board has said the matches would not be played outside Pakistan.Wasim Akram said the PCB could do nothing at the moment to ensure the Australia tour occurred. “First the country has to settle down into some state of normalcy,” he said. A previous Australian delegation visited Pakistan in July before the Australia A and Under-19 tours that were held without any problems.

There was confusion at Bulawayo’s Queens Sports Club last Sunday when a purported National League match organised by Zimbabwe Cricket could not be completed after Queens officials refused to allow the game to proceed.The row stemmed from the recent decision by leading club sides in Matabeleland and Mashonaland to boycott the official National Leagueand form their own competition. In a bid to salvage the National League, Terry Mumbwandarika, a ZC employee, was dispatched to Matabeleland to meetwith Victor Mhlanga, a former Matabeleland Cricket Association boardofficial, in a bid to get players to play in the league. It seems that effort cameto nothing.ZC coaches, players aspiring to go to the ZC Academy and youngsters whoare on the ZC scholarship scheme were brought in and two teams were put together to play against sides from Mashonaland. Local sources report that ashad been the case in the Faithwear Cup, the two teams from Mashonaland contained virtually unknown players, with the exception of Innocent Chinyoka, a medium-pace bowler who has played for Zimbabwe A.The matches started on Saturday afternoon and were supposed to becompleted on Sunday morning. The second match took place at Emakhandeni, astadium built by ZC, while Queens was the venue of the aborted match.Meanwhile, Queens had organised a friendly match against BulawayoAthletic Club and claimed to have notified ZC on the previous Wednesday that the ground would be unavailable.However, on Sunday morning, Queens and BAC turned up, as did the”official” teams to complete their match. Queens and BAC tossed, but when theQueens fielders walked onto the pitch, the National League sides marched tothe middle and sat on the pitch. The stalemate continued for almost twohours.Buster Pettican, a member of the local MCA board and cricket section chairman of Queens, eventually referred the situation to Ethan Dube, the MCA chairman.Dube then talked to Mumbwandarika and Sam Tsutsuru, the ZC-appointed Mashonaland general manager, and read out to them a section of thelease agreement between Zimbabwe Cricket and Queens Sports Club which clearly states that ZC only have first preference to the pitch for the purposesof staging international cricket only. Dave Everrington who was then the Zimbabwe Cricket Union vice-president, signed the lease on behalf ofthe union in 2000.The ZC-backed teams agreed that Queens had the right to use the groundbut asked to play at least 25 overs and use the Duckworth Lewis method toenable them to come up with a result. However, the Queens players refused andthe Queens and BAC match went ahead smoothly.A Queens official questioned the justification of ZC spending money istransporting the two sides from Harare – and putting them up overnight- to play in such a game. He said that in his opinion, the decision to playthe National League match was down to a desire to show that the rebellionby leading clubs had had no effect on the game, and that the situation wasnormal.A spokesman for ZC said that this “was an isolated incident that we have now put behind us.”Another potential row was brewing this weekend with another clash offixtures on the cards, but Queens moved to avoid confrontation bymoving their match against Bulawayo Athletic Club across to BAC’s ground.

Shane Warne has dismissed rumours of an impending ODI comeback for Australia. Warne, back in England for the start of a county season with Hampshire, was reported by AFP saying he had no intention of coming out of his self-imposed one-day international retirement.Warne was mystified by comments made by John Buchanan, Australia’s coach, hinting he might be ready to change his mind in time for the World Cup next year in the West Indies. “I must have said it 14,000 times. I have retired and I have no aspirations to return,” Warne reiterated after skippering Hampshire to victory in their C&G Ttrophy match against Essex at the Rose Bowl.This contradicts statements made by Buchanan, published by Australian papers, which said there had been discussions with Warne about the possibility of a return. “Ricky [Ponting], myself and Andrew Hilditch [chairman of selectors] have all had discussions with Shane about the World Cup,” Buchanan told . “There needs to be commitment or otherwise from him. Either he makes himself available in terms of the team moving forward with its plans, or not. And then the selectors will have some decisions on their plate from there. Shane spoke to us in South Africa, and then again in Bangladesh.”But Warne insisted, “I have to be fair to the squad. There is a lot of cricket ahead in the next year with the ICC Trophy, the VB Series and the World Cup and they have to prepare. I have been out of the limited-overs team for three years and I have absolutely no desire to come back.”I have taken 200 wickets in the last two years in Test matches and that is no coincidence. I have been playing better than ever. John Buchanan must have misunderstood what I was saying and I know people have been saying that I have been talking to Ricky Ponting but in Bangladesh there was not much else to do but talk.”Warne, who missed Australia’s victorious World Cup campaign in 2003 after failing a drugs test which saw him banned from professional cricket for a year, added, “If Ricky said to me at some stage ‘look we really need you’, then I would think about it, but I don’t think it would ever come to that. The team has done really well without me and I will be barracking for them in the World Cup, but not playing for them.”Warne, who has 293 wickets from 194 one-day internationals, subsequently went into voluntary retirement from ODIs. His only appearance since came in last year’s tsunami charity match between Asia and the Rest of the World in front of his home crowd at the MCG, a fixture controversially awarded full limited-overs international status.

“If Clive Lloyd is the Big Cat, then Chris Gayle is the Cool Cat,” a member of the West Indian support staff let on. He was once offered a lift by Gayle, from the team hotel in Kingston to a restaurant close by, and what should have been a five minute trip took close to an hour. Gayle took his own time getting in the car; even longer turning the key in the ignition; fiddled with the stereo getting the music going … everything just took so much longer, and time seemed to stand still.And that it does when he bludgeons the ball as he did against South Africa in the second semi-final today at Jaipur. At times it appeared as if Gayle was the only man in the stadium, standing in the middle, bathed in light, blasting the ball to all parts; the fielders did not have to move, it seemed not to matter who was bowling or what sort of ball was bowled: it just had to go, and fast.”I’m a moody guy, very very moody,” Gayle drawled at the end of the match, a big grin plastered across his face. “You see me doing ridiculous things at times. Sometimes I talk to myself a lot and try to motivate myself when I’m too laidback. At other times I just try to relax, cracking a joke to someone out in the field. Rather than standing around and doing nothing I try to do something on the ground. I want to be involved in the game at all times.”But perhaps it’s just the way of performers. When you put them on stage and the curtain rises, they’re one personality – confident, charming, expressive. And off it they’re no different from you and I; relaxed, leading seemingly normal lives. Gayle is a bit like that. On one day he can be the life of the party, garrulous, extroverted, cracking jokes, dancing like a fiend, and on another he can just be seated quietly at the bar, nursing a drink, barely saying a word to anyone. It’s much the same with his batting.For bowlers, the real question to ask is not whether Gayle is in form or not. It’s not whether the pitch suits him or not. It’s just a question of which Christopher Henry Gayle has turned up to the pitch. On the day it was not the quiet one, blocking or dropping anchor. The very first ball from Shaun Pollock – who was coming off figures of 7-0-20-2 in South Africa’s demolition of Pakistan – was flat-batted back past the bowler for a boundary. The next ball was played even better, with total control and a straight bat, and the result was the same.There was some suggestion that Gayle found Pollock’s pace agreeable. If that was the case he certainly didn’t mind the extra zip of Makhaya Ntini and Andre Nel. A clip through midwicket off Nel, an audacious slap over midwicket off Nel, and Graeme Smith was forced to pull his best bowlers out of the attack. Smith brought himself on, and with Jacques Kallis, began to restore some order, but Gayle quickly disabused them of such notions, reverse-sweeping Smith to the point fence. The fours came at a steady clip, but it was the sixes that really drove home the point. One each off Pollock and Kallis showed intent, but it was a blow against Robin Peterson, full stride down the pitch, massive heave of the bat, which wasn’t even especially well timed yet sailed high over long-on, that signaled it was Gayle’s day.But those who dismiss him as being unpredictable or unreliable should see that it has not merely been his day, it’s been his tournament, and his year. Gayle has scored 434 runs in this tournament, with three centuries, and is far and away the topscorer, with a game still to play. When he scored 10 on the day, he’d brought up 1000 runs for the calendar year, at an average of over 40.

Two days before the semi-final, Gayle had chatted to the media after a practice session. “I made some adjustments out in the middle, and it is working for me,” he said of his batting and recent success. “There is a lot of difference in my batting now, I am just trying to play straight. When I get a start, I try to capitalise on it and not give it away.” And he didn’t give it away, unbeaten on 130 as the winning runs were drilled down the ground and West Indies cantered to victory with six wickets and as many overs to spare.The Australians, who are already in the final, will remember Gayle well. In their encounter earlier in the tournament the normally chilled out Gayle was all keyed up, and some might say it was his constant chirping and encouragement that lifted the team and broke a crucial partnership. Brian Lara thought there might be more in store for the Australians in the big final. And Lara thought Gayle, who has scored heavily all tournament, will want to make a mark in the biggest game of them all. “It’s a brand new game,” said Lara. “We have requirements of our openers and Chris has fulfilled them in the tournament. I’m almost sure that he doesn’t want to leave centre-stage to anyone on the final. He’ll be very keen to get out there and replicate what he did today.”Ask Gayle what he’d make of it if he was sitting out watching himself bat, and the answer rolls of with no hesitation. “I don’t need to watch myself. I know what I am already – flamboyant,” he said. “But one thing I can tell you, if I were to watch myself, it’s going to be pretty, definitely. It’s got to be pretty.” When he bats as he did today, even the opposition, despite the hiding they’re receiving, have got to take out a moment and admire Gayle for his strokeplay.

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Surrey maintained their record of reaching every Twenty20 finals day with an overwhelming performance at Bristol, usually a fortress for Gloucestershire in one-day cricket. However, the home side made the unusual decision of bowling first and were never really in the contest. At 80 for 3, Surrey were not racing away but that soon changed as Mark Ramprakash and Rikki Clarke joined forces in a thrilling stand of 139 for the fourth wicket. There were boundaries galore as the pair tucked into the Gloucestershire attack with the spinners taking some fearful hammer. Ramprakash smashed 10 fours and three sixes while Clarke – dropped twice – struck five over the rope in his 42-ball 79. Ramprakash eventually fell for a 50-ball 85 but Surrey had a huge total and the pressure showed. Both Gloucestershire’s key strikers – Craig Spearman and Ian Harvey – went early and with them so did any hopes for the run chase. Anil Kumble used his experience while Nayan Doshi continued his wicket-taking form in this tournament. No one will want a semi-final against Surrey.
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David Hussey powered Nottinghamshire into the finals day for the first time with a powerful 71. Samit Patel also played a crucial part with 65 in a third-wicket stand of 121 as they ran Northamptonshire ragged in the field. Both batsmen treated Trent Bridge’s highest domestic crowd for more than 30 years to some fine stroke play as they launched nine sixes between them. Stephen Fleming had given the innings early momentum with 39 off 28 balls before falling to Sourav Ganguly – who conceded more than 11-an-over. The Northants top order couldn’t produce a similar boundary-crashing display as the Nottinghamshire seamers made vital early inroads. Ganguly’s poor form continued as he was caught off Ryan Sidebottom – whose spell cost just 16 – for 5. There was then an incident involving Rikki Wessels who was run out after a mix-up and had to be carried off the field on a stretcher. The chase quickly became a lost cause for Northants despite a violent innings from Lance Klusener and Nottinghamshire will now have home advantage on finals day.
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Leicestershire also continued with a full set of finals day appearances as they eased past a Kent side that struggled to compete at Grace Road. HD Ackerman and Darren Maddy showed their Twenty20 expertise with a superbly measured opening stand of 105 which took all the pressure off the run chase. The highlight of their stand was the remarkable success of the reverse sweep – with Maddy to the fore as his fifty came off 42 balls – and Leicestershire made light work of their target with a flurry of boundaries. Stuart Broad handed Leicestershire the early initiative with an outstanding spell of pace bowling which will have caught the eye of England’s selectors. He nipped out Robert Key in the first over and then benefited from two stunning catches – by Claude Henderson and David Masters – as Kent slumped to 31 for 4. The Leicestershire fielding was outstanding; Henderson caught his effort diving full-length, running back at mid-on with a bobble, Masters flung himself as the ball came over his head at backward point and also produced a direct hit to remove Tryon Henderson. Martin van Jaarsveld played well for his 70, and at least gave his team something to bowl at, but it was nowhere near enough.Essex 149 for 5 (Foster 47*) beat Yorkshire 143 for 6 (Brophy 43, Lehmann 40) by five wickets
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Essex eased into the semi-finals with a five-wicket win after Yorkshire had failed to capitalise on winning the toss in front of a sell-out crowd at Chelmsford. Gerard Brophy and Darren Lehmann revived their innings after they got off to a sluggish start, but they failed to press on in the final overs. Despite that, Yorkshire appeared on course for victory as Essex slid to 73 for 5 before Ryan ten Doeschate and James Foster turned the game with an unbeaten sixth-wicket stand of 76 with Foster clearing the ropes on four occasions as they crossed the winning line with four balls to spare. One of the highlights of the evening was Darren Gough against his former club. He had plenty of support from the crowd, especially after removing Michael Lumb in the first over. When he came out to bat, at No. 3, a number of the Yorkshire players enjoyed some banter with him. However, it was Gough and Essex who had the last laugh.

ScorecardHamish Bennett’s seven-wicket haul helped dismiss Wellington for 188 on a rain-affected third day at Basin Reserve and gave Canterbury a slender 27-run lead in the first innings of the State Championship final. Canterbury ended the day on 10 for no loss.Rain delayed the start until 3.15 pm local time and when play resumed Brandon Hiini broke the 48-run stand for the seventh wicket by having Dewayne Bowden caught behind by Kruger van Wyk for 22. The innings folded quickly thereafter – the last three wickets fell for 11 runs – with Bennett taking the three remaining wickets to add to his four on the second day. Luke Woodcock remained unbeaten on 35.Canterbury’s openers, Todd Astle and Michael Papps, batted for seven overs and remained unbeaten on 3 and 6 respectively.

Chris Schofield is confident that his hand injury won’t prevent him from taking part in the ICC World Twenty20.Schofield split the webbing on his left hand when fielding during Surrey’s Pro40 victory against Kent on Tuesday and had to have four stitches, but his club says there is nothing to worry about. He even batted as Surrey moved to the one-wicket win.”He was keen to return to the field,” a Surrey spokesperson told Cricinfo, “but Alan Butcher and Mark Butcher didn’t want to risk it, particularly with the internationals coming up.”He did, however, bat and made 11. “He batted really well – a little gingerly to start with, but then as the adrenaline kicked in he started to play his shots.”The stitches are due to come out around the time Schofield heads to South Africa on September 9. His international commitments mean he will miss the closing stages of Surrey’s Pro40 promotion campaign, which continues in earnest with the floodlit match at The Oval against Somerset on Tuesday.While Schofield is sad to be missing out on the end of Surrey’s season, he knows it’s for the right reasons. “It’s not a bad thing because I’m playing for England,” he told Cricinfo, “but Surrey have been brilliant and have given me every opportunity to express myself.”The change in Schofield’s fortunes has been well-documented, but his inclusion in the England side still hasn’t sunk in. “It was a massive surprise. The start of this year was a new beginning, like I hadn’t been in first-class cricket. I’ve had lots of challenges in the last two years and now I’m about to face another big challenge.”

It’s a tremendous loss to Indian cricket. Hanumant was one of the finest gentlemen I have met. He was talented enough to have gone on to lead the country but things didn’t go his way at all. He was a very good reader of the game, one of the shrewdest minds I have encountered. He was a wonderful mentor and fine coach.My fondest memory of him was during my Test debut in Kolkata. It was the game against West Indies when the stand was burnt down. There was tear gas being sprayed and I couldn’t see anything. Amid all that commotion I was trying to search for my shoes and blazer. It was Hanumant who came to me, found my things and guided me to safety. He always thought of others before thinking of himself.He was a very close friend of mine. It’s a sad day for Indian cricket. He was extremely knowledgeable and an excellent coach. He was also a man of multi-faceted talents – he was a good match-referee, director of the National Cricket Academy. I fondly remember our tour to England in 1967 and it was when I realised how well he analysed cricket. I haven’t come across someone who could analyse cricket so well. He also made batting look very easy.It’s very sad that such a thing should happen within two months of him getting ill. He was a close friend. Naturally a great loss as far as cricket is concerned. He was a brilliant player in his days and was doing his bit for Indian cricket by coaching youngsters. He was not afraid to take tough decisions and was a hugely respected coach.I have lost one my very best friends in Hanumant Singh. I played with him for many years for the State Bank team, along with Baloo Gupte, Sharad Diwadkar, Budhi Kunderan … and I’m the only one of the five left now.The main thing about Hanumant was that he was a damn good batsman off the back foot. It is very rare to find someone in India who is good off the back foot, generally all are front-foot players. We’ve shared some big partnerships for State Bank, and some great memories as well. He was a bit of an introvert, but a wonderful guy and a team man.It’s amazing that his India career was curtailed by that so-called injury. Otherwise I have no doubt he would have gone on to score plenty of runs for India. Even after that he was absolutely and completely devoted to the game. For him it was just cricket, cricket, cricket, in whatever role he played.The proof of his being a good coach is that one of his wards is now playing for England, in place of Marcus Trescothick – Ed Joyce used to come here to Mumbai for coaching at the World Cricket Academy.

Bangladesh coach Dav Whatmore has said that confidence was the key to their emphatic victory against India at Trinidad on March 17. Bangladesh have two more matches – against Sri Lanka and Bermuda – and are strong contenders from Group B to qualify for the Super Eight stage.Bangladesh dismissed India for 191 and then chased down the target with five wickets in hand. Whatmore said that the difference with this side was self-belief. “There is more self-belief,” Whatmore told AFP. “The Bangladesh side of two or three years ago might not to be able to overhaul the target of 192 against India.”A lot of these boys are willing to work a lot harder out in the middle in difficult periods. That’s the main difference. Our bowling attack has come along well. The fielding has improved and I was very pleased with what I saw [against India]. The catching is good. Our ground fielding is an area we would like to improve even further.”Bangladesh made it clear that they were not going to be pushovers by beating New Zealand and Scotland in their warm-up matches before stunning India.”We wanted to have very good preparations first,” said Whatmore. “We got to the West Indies before any other team. A particularly good game against New Zealand gave us confidence and we had another victory against Scotland. These games have given us confidence. In the bigger match, what we are trying to do is to replicate good things we did in previous matches.”Bangladesh’s chase against India was led by three teenagers – Tamim Iqbal, Saqibul Hasan and Mushfiqur Rahim – who scored half-centuries. Tamim had scored 46 off 48 balls in the warm-up game against New Zealand and pummelled India during his 51.”Tamim probably learnt his lessons from the match with New Zealand. He’s got a bit to learn still, but he has got the ability to be an asset to any team. Hasan’s learning and is learning pretty fast. So is Rahim. It was a very significant victory [against India]. It gives us a reasonable chance to go on and realise our first objective, which is to get to the Super Eight stage.”