Month: January 2023

England will test the depth of their white-ball reserves as they prepare to announce a depleted squad for their of Bangladesh in March this week. A combination of scheduling conflicts, injuries and franchise commitments will likely see limited-overs coach Matthew Mott and captain Jos Buttler lead a mixed squad of established players, fringe talent and new faces. The three ODIs and three T20Is in Bangladesh were originally due to take…

Gary Ballance is set to play Test cricket for the first time since 2017 after being named in Zimbabwe’s squad to face West Indies in next month’s two-match series. Sean Williams will miss the Tests in Bulawayo as he recovers from a fractured finger, with Craig Ervine, playing his first Test in three years, captaining the side in Williams’ absence. Zimbabwe will also be without allrounders Sikandar Raza and Ryan…

The inaugural Women’s Premier League (WPL) player auction is likely to take place on February 11 in New Delhi or February 13 in Mumbai. A final decision will be made by the BCCI this week. Originally, the BCCI was looking at holding the players’ auction on February 6 in Mumbai, which would have allowed the five newly minted franchises just under a month to get ready for the inaugural WPL…

What difference can 18 seconds make? It’s the time you may have taken to read that question eight, maybe nine times; or to decide you don’t want to read and click onto another page (but please don’t!); the time a train going at 25kph takes to pass through a 162 metre station and, if you believe the 1984 edition of the Annals of Internal Medicine, the time it takes for…

Ravindra Jadeja, who tested his match-fitness with a successful return to action in the Ranji Trophy, is set to join the India Test squad in Nagpur this week ahead of the first Test against Australia, which begins on February 9. Shreyas Iyer, however, is yet to get a fitness clearance as he continues his recovery from a stiff back at the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bengaluru. Related Ravindra Jadeja…

Big picture: South Africa aiming for series sweep The series has been won, but it’s not quite mission accomplished for South Africa, who are a win away from getting up into the top eight of the World Cup Super League. Two clinical performances against the reigning world champions (albeit England’s crown has slipped a fair bit recently) means they are sitting a little more comfortably, with a pair of home…

Lockie Ferguson refused to admit it at his press conference on the eve of the T20I series decider in Ahmedabad on Wednesday, but he is the leader of this inexperienced New Zealand pace pack in India. In the absence of Trent Boult, who is at the ILT20 in the UAE, and Tim Southee, who is resting ahead of the home Test series against England, Ferguson has been leading the scouting…

England Lions 249 for 3 (Hameed 81, Haines 62*, Lees 56) lead Sri Lanka A 136 (Fisher 5-34) by 113 runs Matthew Fisher took a sizeable step forward in his return from injury with career-best figures of 5 for 34 on the opening day of England Lions’ first “Test” against Sri Lanka A in Galle. Playing in just his fourth first-class match since the start of 2022, the first of…

Sussex have signed Nathan McAndrew as an overseas player for the 2023 season. McAndrew, the 29-year-old Australian pace-bowling allrounder, will be available from April until July to play in the LV= Insurance County Championship and T20 Vitality Blast. He will be reunited with Paul Farbrace, the Sussex head coach who signed up McAndrew while sporting director at Warwickshire, where he made seven Championship appearances, taking 20 wickets at 37.85 and…

Sunil Narine, the West Indian T20 allrounder, will be returning to Surrey for the 2023 Vitality Blast campaign. Narine, who claimed 14 wickets at an economy rate of 5.96 in last year’s competition, will be available for all Surrey fixtures that don’t clash with his commitments to the Knight Riders franchise. With this year’s Blast running from May 20 to July 15, this may entail an overlap with the IPL…