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Bangladesh claimed their first overseas Test series win when Sakib al Hasan’s fine all-round performance guided them to a four-wicket victory over West Indies in Grenada on Monday.
   Sakib, acting skipper in the Test, struck a majestic unbeaten 96 from 97 balls and Bangladesh, after an early scare, comfortably surpassed the target of 215 with a day to spare.
   In a series blighted by the boycott from first choice West Indies players, who are in dispute with their board over contractual and payment issues, Sakib provided genuine Test quality with bat and ball.
   The slow left-armer ended with figures of five for 70 as Bangladesh bowled out the weakened West Indies side for 209 in the morning session after picking up the final two wickets.
   In reply, Bangladesh wobbled at 67 for four after fine bowling from Kemar Roach and Darren Sammy but Sakib and Raqibul Hasan (65) put on 106 for the fifth wicket to take the tourists close to their target.
   The pair played with little sign of nerves, despite the precarious position of their team, picking off the bad balls with ease and punishing without mercy, particularly Sakib, whose timing was perfect.
   Sammy removed Hasan with a smart caught and bowled to offer a glimmer of hope to the West Indies and he got rid of Mushfiqur Rahim in the same fashion near the end.
   But Bangladesh comfortably secured just their third Test win in style when Sakib smashed Roach for a six to finish on 96 not out, a spectacular and emphatic end to what has been a low-key and at times poor quality Test series.
   The two Tests have largely been ignored by the Caribbean public with pitifully low attendance on each day in both St Vincent and Grenada and West Indies fans will hope the dispute between the players’ union and the board can be patched up quickly.
   The only positives for coach John Dyson will have been the bowling of Sammy and paceman Kemar Roach along with the all-round play of Dave Bernard, who scored three half-centuries and delivered some than useful medium pace.
   But West Indies’ upper order batting, without any recognised Test players, was incapable of playing the canny spin they faced and Bangladesh thoroughly deserved the series.
   Bangladesh’s achievement may be undermined in some eyes by the weakness of their opposition but they deserve credit for excellent spin bowling, particularly from Sakib and Mohammed Mahmudullah and very enthusiastic and quality fielding.

The Bangladesh cricket team will receive a bonus of Tk 1.5 crore ($2, 14,000) for their Test series win against West Indies, the Bangladesh Cricket Board announced on Tuesday.
   The incentives are Tk 20 lakh ($28500) more than the receivable bonus for winning a Test series, said the cricket board, which also thanked the cricket operations department and the sponsor.
   ‘With this win, the Bangladesh cricket team has fulfilled the dreams and aspirations of the millions,’ the board’s president Lieutenant General Sina Ibn Jamali said in a statement.
   ‘I congratulate the players and team management, the cricket operations department and all associated with the team. Our continuing efforts to develop cricket in Bangladesh will gather more momentum through this victory,’ he said.
   The board president also congratulated the team’s official sponsor Grameenphone and other sponsor partners. A Grameenphone delegation, headed by chief communications officer Rubaba Dowla, visited the cricket board in the afternoon and handed over a flower bouquet to Jamali, congratulating him on the team’s first Test Series win on an international ground.
   High BCB officials met the prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, later in the evening and shared sweets with her.
   Congratulatory messages have flooded the BCB office in Mirpur since the early morning, said the board officials.
   The Jatiya Sangsad speaker, Abdul Hamid, deputy leader of the parliament Sajeda Chowdhury, state minister for youth and sports Ahad Ali Sarkar and parliamentary standing committee on youth and sports ministry chairman Zahid Ahsan Russell have congratulated the team.
   The Bangladesh Football Federation, Bangladesh Olympic Association, Cricketers’ Welfare Association of Bangladesh and Chittagong Divisional Sports Association have also congratulated the series winning Tigers.

Bangladeshi stand-in captain Sakib al Hasan led from the front with 96 not out as his side beat the West Indies in the second and final test here on Monday and he declared the 2-0 series win was the biggest thing for the cricket side in nine years.
   Sakib hit the winning runs in style with a six to seal a first ever series win away from home - admittedly against a weakened and inexperienced West Indies side after the senior players boycotted the series over a pay dispute - and the first time they have won two successive Tests.
   Sakib and Raqibul Hasan made 65 - both career bests - to set things up for the Tigers, as they successfully chased 215 for victory to win by four wickets and claim only their second ever series win.
   ‘In our nine years, this is the biggest thing that has happened to Bangladesh cricket,’ said Sakib, who also hit 13 fours in 96 from 97 balls in a little over 2-1/2 hours to make him a shoe-in for the Man-of-the-Match award.
   ‘This series victory will give a boost to our confidence, and will help to take us to the next level, and with God’s help, we shall go forward. ‘There was not too much pressure on us (on Monday), since the boys have been playing really, really well. It was a good victory.’
   Bangladesh were wobbling on 67 for four about half-hour before the tea break, but Sakib joined Raqibul and they put Bangladesh solidly on course for victory with a stand of 106 for the fifth wicket either side of tea.
   Raqibul reached his 50 from 74 balls, when he steered Dave Bernard Jr to third man for his seventh fourth.
   About 25 minutes later, Sakib arrived at his landmark, when he drove Kemar Roach for his seventh boundary and the first of three in succession in the fast bowler’s 11th over.
   But Raqibul became the fourth of five wickets for 55 runs in 16 overs for Darren Sammy, when he gave an easy return catch with Bangladesh still needing 44.
   He batted for a shade under three hours, faced 99 balls, and struck eight fours and one six.
   Diminutive wicketkeeper/batsman Mushfiqur Rahim joined Sakib and inched Bangladesh closer in the 40 minutes he spent at the crease before he too, drove back a simple return catch to Sammy to leave the Tigers 14 short of the magic number, but they had no last-minute jitters and duly crossed over the threshold.
   ‘We had a good opportunity to win the game in the second innings, but we did not bat too well,’ said West Indies captain Floyd Reifer.
   ‘We always knew we needed around 280 runs to have a fighting chance to win the game and we fell way short.
   ‘It is pretty difficult to defend a victory target of 215. All they needed was one good partnership to have a good chance. But I felt Sammy bowled well, and our guys tried very hard, but it was a tough game.’
   About the frailty of West Indies’ batsmen against spin, he said: ‘In our domestic first-class competition, the spinners get the most wickets every year. This is something we will have to examine closely as players, as coaches, and try to work out the best way to play spin bowling.
   ‘There are many positives we can take away from the Tests, and take into the One-day International series, so we shall be positive and look to win the ODI series.’
   Before lunch, Bangladesh had made a steady start and reached 17 without loss, after they completed the demolition of the West Indies batting, following a delayed start.
   Sakib, who also captured the Man-of-the-Series award, finished with five wickets for 70 runs from 24.5 overs, and fellow left-arm spinner Enamul Haque Jr ended with three for 48 from 17 overs.

Whitewash is a word that frequently goes with Bangladesh, albeit for a wrong reason, as they have suffered the humiliation in at least 21 series out of 29 series they played in their nine years at the top flight.
   First time in the history the Tigers have turned the table upside down and have done something that no team have ever managed to do when they completed a series sweep in the West Indies on Monday.
   It was the first series whitewash for West Indies on home soil since they began playing Test cricket in 1928. They have played at least 54 Test series at home but were never whitewashed.
   In all West Indies lost only 14 home series with the biggest defeat margin being 0-3 against Australia and England respectively in 1954-55 and 2003-04. The number of the matches was five and four respectively.
   Wining the series in West Indies, Bangladesh also have done something that their two of the three most fancied sub-continental neighbours– Pakistan and Sri Lanka– have to yet to do. Zimbabwe also never tested a series win in West Indies.
   In their six tours in West Indies beginning from 1957, Pakistan lost four series and drew two series. Sri Lanka toured West Indies thrice and lost their first two series before pulling off a 1-1 draw in their last tour in 2004.
   Before Bangladesh, India was the only Asian country that had had some success in West Indies and that too only twice. They won their first series win in West Indies in 1971 and had to wait for another 35 years to win their second series in 2006. Both of their series victory came by 1-0 margin.
   In all India have played 37 Tests in West Indies and won only just four of them against 16 defeats. Bangladesh played four Tests in West Indies and won two against just one defeat.
   So, Bangladesh have done better than many other countries no matter what was the quality of their opponents and can surely celebrate their success.

British newspapers hailed England’s victorious cricket team Tuesday, saying their performance throughout the second Test against Australia bordered on brilliance.
   Captain Andrew Strauss was praised for his tactics while Andrew Flintoff was singled out for his dynamite fast bowling that helped England defeat Australia for the first time at Lord’s since 1934.
   With headlines such as ‘InFREDible,’ ‘Frightening, five-wicket phenomenal Fred’ and ‘All Hail Flintoff the hero,’ newspapers here poured praise on Flintoff who took five wickets for 92 runs in 27 overs.
   Former bowling great Ian Botham hailed Flintoff’s efforts as ‘one of the great fast bowling displays of our time.’
   ‘Flintoff’s effort was almost superhuman - because he produced a match-winning performance on a flat pitch,’ Botham said in the Daily Mirror.
   ‘There was nothing in that Lord’s wicket to encourage any pace bowler, but Fred was the only one on either side who was prepared to extract any life out of it by flogging himself to breaking point.’
   Flintoff announced before the match that he would retire from Test cricket at the end of this series because of injuries, prompting several commentators Tuesday to urge him to drop the plans and forge on.
   Former England captain Nasser Hussain said Strauss’s skippering skills during the Test, including the timing of England’s declaration on the fourth day, were near perfect.
   ‘Captains are rarely able to say that they produced the perfect performance at the helm of their side but Andrew Strauss came pretty damn close to it here at Lord’s,’ he wrote in the Daily Mail.
   ‘It was a spotless display of leadership from the England skipper.’
   Former England coach Duncan Fletcher said Strauss was proving the better captain, as he and Ricky Ponting face mounting pressure to win each match.
   ‘Suddenly you look at his (Strauss’s) opposite number and wonder which of the two has been captain for five years non-stop,’ Fletcher wrote in the Guardian newspaper.
   ‘As I’ve said before, Ponting was never really under pressure when he had those greats in his bowling attack, because the players captained themselves.’
   ‘Now his prickly side is coming out, both in Cardiff and again at Lord’s.’
   Former England captain Mike Atherton said Australia’s bowlers needed to significantly lift their performances in the third Test if they wanted to retain the Ashes.
   ‘Critics may look to Australia’s first innings, when they lost six wickets for 49 runs to concede a huge first-innings lead, in explaining their defeat. In reality, though, the bowling is by far the bigger problem,’ he said in The Times.
   Atherton said Australia had yet to win a match on this tour - failing even to bowl out county side Sussex ‘in 89 overs second time round’ in the run up to the Ashes series.
   Australia and England drew the first Test in Cardiff.

Australia will look to boost the flagging confidence of Mitchell Johnson after the fast bowler’s loss of form during the team’s 115-run second Test loss here at Lord’s.
   England’s first Ashes win ‘at the home of cricket’ in 75 years was aided by lacklustre left-arm quick Johnson, billed as the spearhead of Australia’s attack after impressing during this year’s series win in South Africa.
   But there were times at Lord’s when he struggled to land the ball on the cut strip and, despite switching from over the wicket to round and back again, little went right for the 27-year-old paceman.
   Johnson took just three wickets in the match for 200 runs in 38.4 overs, figures that included a second innings return of none for 68 in 17.
   ‘(Bowling coach) Troy (Cooley) is obviously working really closely with him,’ Ponting told reporters at Lord’s here on Monday after England had gone 1-0 up in the series with three to play.
   ‘What you don’t want to do with young-ish blokes - Mitch has only played 20-odd Tests and is still pretty new to the game and pretty new to fast bowling - is to fill their heads full of too much and have him thinking of too many things all the time.’
   Australia have a three-day tour match against Northamptonshire starting on Friday before the third Test gets underway at Edgbaston on July 30.
   Brett Lee, yet to feature so far in this series because of a rib injury, is still struggling for fitness and that leaves the reliable Stuart Clark as the leading candidate to replace Johnson should Australia decide to make a change.
   On-tour selector Jamie Cox is set to scrutinise Johnson’s performance closely if, as seems likely, the bowler is given the chance to find some form in Northampton.
   ‘We have to be careful of the way we manage him over the next little bit,’ Ponting said of Johnson, who first showed signs of struggling for accuracy in the closing stages of the first Test in Cardiff, where England salvaged a draw with just one wicket standing.
   ‘He’s up for the challenge. He’s continually trying to make himself better in all aspects of his game.
   ‘Hopefully we see some improvement from him in Northampton, if he does happen to play that game. It would be great to see him get a bit more confidence and a bit more rhythm than he’s got at the moment.’
   But Ponting said it was much too soon to talk about dropping Johnson, who made a valiant 63 before he was last man out at Lord’s.
   ‘Of course I can see him playing (at Edgbaston). It was only a couple of games ago that he was bowling as well as anyone going around ... It’s not as if he’s lost everything he’s ever had.’

Wily leg-spinner Danish Kaneria grabbed 5-62 as Pakistan inched ahead of Sri Lanka on the second day of the third and final cricket Test here on Tuesday.
   Off-spinner Saeed Ajmal chipped in with 3-70 as Pakistan, bowled out for 299 in the first innings, hit back to dismiss Sri Lanka for 233 in the final session of an absorbing day’s play.
   The tourists were 16-1 in their second knock at stumps to take an overall lead of 82 runs with nine wickets in hand on a pitch aiding spin at the Sinhalese sports club.
   Kaneria took his 13th five-wicket haul as the ball turned and bounced to claim 14 wickets on the second day after seven had fallen on the first.
   Sri Lanka’s left-arm spinner Rangana Herath bowled Khurram Manzoor in the day’s final over to leave Fawad Alam unbeaten on 14 and skipper Younus Khan on zero.
   Mahela Jayawardene, who top-scored for Sri Lanka with a fluent 79, dismissed suggestions the wicket would become unplayable on the third and fourth days.
   ‘It’s not a bad wicket at all,’ he said. ‘I think we did not bat to our potential. We should have batted them out of the match, but credit must go to Pakistan’s bowlers.
   ‘I think we did well to get to 233. Now we must put them under pressure and ensure we do not have a very big target to chase in the fourth innings.’
   Sri Lanka owe it to Jayawardene’s half-century, a brave 44 from the twice injured Tillakaratne Dilshan and shoddy fielding by Pakistan to ensure the deficit was not threatening.
   Sri Lanka were tottering at 181-8 when Dilshan stepped in to stop the rot with the tailenders despite a broken finger on his right hand that prevented him from keeping wicket in the morning.
   Dilshan hit two sixes and as many boundaries and inspired the last two batsmen, Herath and Thilan Thushara, to add a further 52 runs.
   Just before he was the last man to be dismissed, Dilshan suffered a bloody cut above the left eye as a ball from Ajmal crashed through his helmet, prompting immediate medical attention on the field.
   Pakistan will consider themselves unlucky to see Dilshan conjure the rescue act as umpire Ian Gould turned down an appeal for a catch at short-leg off Ajmal before the batsman had scored.
   Television replays indicated a clear edge off the bat.
   The tourists, however, put down three comfortable catches to allow Sri Lanka to wriggle out of a tight corner.
   Sri Lankan captain Kumar Sangakkara, who made 45, was dropped twice on 16 and 40, both times by Manzoor in the gully region off young left-arm fast bowler Mohammad Aamer.
   Sangakkara put on 40 for the third wicket with Jayawardene after openers Malinda Warnapura and Tharanga Paranavitana were dismissed early to reduce Sri Lanka to 23-2.
   All-rounder Angelo Mathews assisted in the rescue act with 31, adding a valuable 71 for the fifth wicket with Jayawardene before he was caught in the slips off Kaneria.
   Mathews should have gone on 12 when he nicked Ajmal, but wicket-keeper Kamran Akmal failed to hold a low sharp catch.
   Pakistan, who resumed at the overnight score of 289-7, lost their last three wickets in 22 balls for the addition of just 10 runs.
   Thushara finished with 5-83, his maiden five-wicket haul in seven Tests, while Nuwan Kulasekera claimed 3-47.

Andrew Flintoff insisted he would get through the rest of the Ashes series after bowling England to their first Test win over Australia at Lord’s in 75 years.
   Flintoff, on the eve of this match, announced he would retire from Test cricket at the end of the Ashes.
   The injury-plagued all-rounder has most recently been troubled by a knee problem and, when he started to suffer fresh discomfort at Lord’s, speculation began to grow he might bow out of Tests completely at the ‘home of cricket’.
   But as he came roaring in at top pace here on Monday, there was no sign of the fast bowler struggling for full fitness during an unbroken 10-over spell.
   He finished with five wickets for 92 runs as England won the second Test by 115 runs to go 1-0 up in the five-match series.
   The 31-year-old Lancashire favourite was adamant he was looking forward to the remainder of the series, telling reporters: ‘You hear what’s been said and it’s never been my intention to bow out at Lord’s
   ‘I want to be in an Ashes-winning team come the last Test match at the Oval. To be on that podium at the last Test will be the perfect way for me to go,’ said Flintoff, the star of England’s 2005 Ashes series win.
   His Monday haul was only the third time in 76 Tests for England that Flintoff had taken five wickets in an innings.
   Australia, chasing a world record fourth innings winning total of 522, were bowled out for 406 shortly before lunch on Monday’s final day after resuming on 313 for five.
   Flintoff, who calmed England’s nerves by removing Brad Haddin for the wicket-keeper’s overnight 80 with just his fourth ball of the day, went on to take his first five-wicket return since his five for 78 against Australia at the Oval four years ago.
   And, having been England’s captain when they were whitewashed 5-0 in Australia in 2006/07, Flintoff is desperate to play a full part in this series.
   ‘I’ve three Tests to go and I will do anything to get out onto that field and finish this series,’ he said. ‘The encouraging thing from my point of view is that I’ve bowled all my overs.
   ‘I may have had a bit of discomfort, but I’ve played most of my career in discomfort so that’s nothing new. I know where I am with it.’
   England captain Andrew Strauss will hope Flintoff does not suffer any adverse reaction.
   ‘I know that if you had to list the top three bowlers in world cricket that batsmen don’t want to face, Fred’s going to be on that list and probably at the top of it,’ Strauss said.
   ‘No one enjoys facing him and sometimes he doesn’t get his just rewards for the hostility he bowls with. Sometimes he doesn’t get those five-fors, but no one enjoys those spells he bowls.
   ‘It was good to see him get what he deserved this game because that kind of consistent hostility is unpleasant.
   ‘Quite frankly it’s unpleasant in the nets and it’s not much fun in the middle, either,’ the opening batsman added.
   ‘After he took that first wicket this morning he said ‘by the way, I ought to let you know I’ll keep bowling until all the wickets are gone’ - I thought that sounds like a good plan to me and so it proved.’
   Australia captain Ricky Ponting, whose side are 1-0 down in an Ashes series for the first time since 1997, said of Flintoff: ‘When he’s up and running as bowling as well as he can, good as anyone around.
   ‘He gives his all, his spells have not got shorter and his pace didn’t drop off. He’s always been a great competitor and when the game is on the line he wants the ball.’
   Flintoff’s return secured him a place on the dressing room honours board, which records all those who have taken five or more wickets in a Test innings at Lord’s.
   ‘It is nice to get five and get up on that board but to go 1-0 up in an Ashes series is the big one,’ Flintoff said.
   The series continues with the third Test at Edgbaston, starting on July 30, and Flintoff added: ‘This has been a fantastic team performance but we have to get better at Edgbaston next week.’

Sakib al Hasan broke into the top five of the ICC Test all-rounder ranking for the first time after his match-winning batting and bowling performance in the second Test against West Indies at St Georges on Monday.
   Sakib, already ranked the number one all-rounder in one-day cricket, claimed 5-70 in the second innings and sealed the match and series for Bangladesh later with an unbeaten 96 to jump seven places to be ranked as the fourth best Test all-rounder.
   Sakib, who achieved the feat on his captaincy debut, has only three players – South Africa’s Jacques Kallis, Australia’s Mitchell Johnson and New Zealand’s Daniel Vettori – ahead of him.
   His match tally of 8-129 that included fifth five-wicket haul also helped Sakib to advance 12 places to be ranked 21 as Test bowler. His batting graph also observed a significant improvement taking him to 43 from 56.

The Bangladesh Football Federation was in a limbo about the date of the final round of the AFC Challenge Cup that clashed with the next year’s SA Games in Dhaka.
   The BFF on Tuesday disclosed that it received a message from the Asian Football Confederation that the final round of the AFC Challenge Cup will kick-off from February 3, 2010 with the venue still undecided. The BFF was shocked to see the kick off collide with the SA Games procedures as the biggest regional games will be held in Dhaka from January 29 to February 8.
   Bangladesh is a contender for gold in football in the games.
   ‘We will talk about the problem with the AFC and will explain the situation. Bangladesh is not the lone country that will be facing the problem as India and Sri Lanka are also in the qualifiers of the final round who will also be playing in the SA Games football,’ said Al Musabbir Sadi, the general secretary of the BFF.
   Myanmar, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh qualified for the final round with the three direct entrants - India, North Korea and Tajikistan.

The Bangladesh Football Federation conducted a two-day seminar for the three newcomer clubs of the B League at the BFF House on Tuesday.
   Officials of Biyanibazar SC of Sylhet, Feni Socer Club and Shuktara Jubo Sagsad of Naryanganj got the ideas of the BFF administration and management, event management, the role of event manager, media and communication, marketing and sponsorship and other aspects of the B League.
   Monirul Islam, the deputy chairman of the referees committee of BFF conducted the course. Abu Naeem Shohag, the manager of Professional league and clubs, Ahmed Sayed al Fatah, manager media and communications, were also present on the occasion.

West Indies have added a couple of new faces and recalled a few others in a 14-member squad for the first two One-day Internationals against Bangladesh this coming Sunday and next Tuesday in Dominica.
   The batting has been boosted by the return of left-hander Devon Smith and fellow Grenadian Andre Fletcher, and the inclusion of uncapped left-hander Kieran Powell - all three are opening batsmen.
   The bowling too, has been fortified with leg-spinner Rawl Lewis being recalled and uncapped fast-medium bowler Gavin Tonge being added. Making room from the Test squad which was swept 0-2 by the Tigers are Ryan Austin, Tino Best, Ryan Hinds, Kevin McClean, and Omar Phillips.
   Smith last played for West Indies on their brief trip to England earlier this year, and Fletcher was dropped after making 53 in the opening match against Australia followed by 13 and three straight ducks in the Twenty20 World Cup in England.
   The 19-year-old Powell hails from the tiny island of Nevis, and has been rewarded for the promise he has shown in West Indies domestic competitions, where he has a reputation for being a clean striker of the ball.
   He was a member of the Young West Indies side to the 2008 Youth World Cup in Malaysia, where he scored 253 runs at an
   average of 42.16 with a strike rate of 124 which made him the second highest scorer in the competition.
   The 34-year-old Lewis played the last of his 26 ODIs for West Indies against South Africa on February 3 last year, and has not done his talent much justice in his sporadic appearances.
   Tonge, a 26-year-old from Antigua & Barbuda, has also been rewarded for consistent performances with the ball in domestic competitions, and is also a handy lower-order batsman.
   The rest of the side which is again being led by left-handed batsman Floyd Reifer comprises mostly the players that played in the preceding two Tests, as well as fast bowler Nelon Pascal, who was part of the Test squad, but did not play in either of the two matches.
   The first two ODIs will be staged at Windsor Park which has been significantly upgraded and allows Dominica to host its first international matches.
   The series concludes Friday next week at Warner Park in St. Kitts which also stages a Twenty20 International between the two sides two days later.
   Squad:
   Floyd Reifer (captain), Darren Sammy (vice captain), Dave Bernard Jr, Travis Dowlin, Andre Fletcher, Rawl Lewis, Nikita Miller, Nelon Pascal, Kieran Powell, Dale Richards, Kemar Roach, Devon Smith, Devon Thomas, Gavin Tonge.

West Indies cricket, which has united the islands of the Caribbean for over a century, could be split if the chief of Trinidad and Tobago’s cricket body follows through his idea of competing as independent nation.
   In an interview published on Tuesday, Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board chief executive Forbes Persaud said leading figures in the country’s cricket body were considering breaking away from the West Indies regional team.
   West Indies cricket is in crisis after leading players refused to play in the home series against Bangladesh due to contractual disputes with the regional board, and the tourists took advantage by winning both Tests against a weakened team.
   ‘My personal view (is) if the trend continues with the manner in which West Indies cricket is being administered, the board should go on its own and compete as Trinidad and Tobago, just as is in football,’ he told the Trinidad and Tobago Express.
   ‘If something is not done to have cricket administration at the West Indies level properly restructured, I believe we will have no choice but to think about playing as an individual territory on the international scene.’
   Trinidad and Tobago has been one of the traditional powerhouses of West Indian cricket along with Barbados and Jamaica.
   Cricket is the only sport in which the former British colonies still compete as one unit—all the Caribbean nations play soccer and compete in the Olympics independently.
   The West Indies Players Association, the players union at the centre of the dispute with the West Indies Cricket Board is based in Trinidad and on Sunday, leading Trinidad and international player Dwayne Bravo hit out at the WICB saying his local club was better organised than the regional body.
   Persaud said that his view on a split was a personal one and there had not been formal discussions at board level—but other members shared his view.
   ‘There are some board members who believe that we should start thinking about going on our own but, this has not been discussed in any official forum. It’s just people expressing their views informally.’
   Asked if such views were growing, Persaud responded: ‘Yes. Because of the present situation in West Indies cricket, people are becoming very disenchanted and they have been expressing their views along these lines.’
   Persaud said that the process would not happen overnight.
   ‘Even if we were to go that way, it would be a very long, drawn out process,’ he added.
   ‘It would have to go through the ICC and we must bear in mind the repercussions it is going to have and the impact it would have on the West Indian community since we know how passionate the Caribbean people are about cricket.
   ‘We all know how critical West Indies cricket is as a unifying force, to go that way would be destroying a legacy. It is not going to be an easy decision to make, if at all there is going to be a formal discussion on this.’

‘Verity’s Match’ will always retain a special place in cricket history.
   But England’s 115-run win over Australia here on Monday means they won’t now have to go back 75 years to recall an Ashes Test victory at Lord’s.
   Andrew Flintoff took centre stage Monday, the fast bowler’s haul of five wickets for 92 runs, doing much to end any lingering Australia hopes of reaching their imposing victory target of 522 as they were bowled out for 406.
   However, Flintoff would be the first to admit that his man-of-the-match efforts pale in comparison with those of Hedley Verity, the star of England’s 1934 innings and 38-run victory over Australia at Lord’s.
   Then, as now, Britain’s Prime Minister was a Scot dealing with the after-effects of an economic crisis with Ramsay MacDonald confronting a set of problems not dissimilar from the ones facing Gordon Brown.
   But the differences between England’s two Ashes bowling stars at Lord’s were stark. Verity was a modest, unassuming left-arm spinner from Yorkshire; Flintoff, a gregarious all-rounder from the rival county of Lancashire.
   England had gone 38 years without an Ashes win at Lord’s when an Australia team including Don Bradman, the greatest run-scorer Test cricket has known, arrived at the ‘home of cricket’ in 1934.
   But not even Bradman could master Verity in a match where the then 29-year-old took 15 wickets for 104 runs.
   Verity captured the prize wicket of Bradman, caught and bowled for 36.
   But Australia were still soundly placed at 192 for two as the match entered the weekend.
   However, these were the days of uncovered wickets and heavy rain turned the pitch into a ‘slow turner’. Only opener Bill Brown, who made 105, scored more than 37 as Verity took seven for 61.
   England captain Bob Wyatt, unlike 2009 successor Andrew Strauss, enforced the follow-on.
   Bradman, caught behind for 13, again fell cheaply to Verity, as Australia were bowled out for 118 with the left-armer taking seven for 61 and 14 wickets in all on the third day.
   When Flintoff took his fifth wicket Monday, an achievement that secured his place on the bowling honours board at Lord’s, which records all those who’ve taken five wickets or more in a Test innings at the ground, he got down on one knee and threw his arms wide open in celebration.
   It was a gesture inconceivable to players of Verity’s generation, where a bowler might permit himself a small smile of satisfaction, but not much more, at the fall of a wicket.
   Flintoff, who before this match said he would retire from Test cricket at the end of the series, said: ‘It was nice from my point of view to get five wickets in my last Test at Lord’s.
   ‘Maybe I milked the crowd a little bit, but the hard work had been done by the entire team. I was obviously pleased to get on the board at the end of it and my last Test here at Lord’s is obviously very special to me.’
   Monday’s win put England 1-0 up in the five-match series with three to play but in 1934 victory at Lord’s saw the home side draw level in a campaign they eventually lost 2-1.
   In 40 Tests, Verity took 144 wickets at an average of under 25 apiece and ten years of first-class cricket yielded 1,956 wickets at 14.87 runs each.
   No wonder his obituary in cricket almanack Wisden read: ‘Judged by any standard, Verity was a great bowler’
   But less than 10 years after his triumph at Lord’s, Verity was dead, as he achieved a different sort of heroic status to the one routinely accorded to leading modern-day sportsmen such as Flintoff.
   A captain in the British Army, Verity died of his wounds in a World War II prisoner of war camp in Italy two months following his 38th birthday after leading his company in an attack on German positions in Catania, Sicily.
   ‘Verity showed, as he was so sure to do, that rare courage which both calculates and inspires,’ Wisden said.

Australia fast bowler Brett Lee faces a race against time to be fit for next week’s third Ashes Test against England.
   A side injury has forced Lee to miss the first two Tests and the Australians have suffered in his absence, losing the second Test at Lord’s to go 1-0 down in the series.
   The 32-year-old needs to play in the tour match against Northamptonshire, starting on Friday, to prove his fitness for the Edgbaston Test and a decision on his involvement is expected in the next 48 hours.
   Australia coach Tim Nielsen knows his side’s attack at Lord’s lacked a pace spearhead, but he fears rushing Lee back too soon would only increase the chances of another injury lay-off.
   ‘We will see how we go. We are progressing him,’ Nielsen said. ‘The positive thing is that in a tour game we do have the flexibility on how much we can bowl him or how much we don’t bowl him. ‘He hasn’t bowled yet, so we just have to sit with the medical staff over the next few days and chat: about how much we need to get into him and whether it is going to progress him to the stage where he could play in the third Test.
   ‘My feeling is, if it is not going to mean he is available to play in the third Test match, we are going to have to be really careful about rushing him back.’
   Lee has not played for Australia in a Test since the Boxing Day defeat to South Africa.
   He displayed his credentials for a return with six first-innings wickets against England Lions last month but suffered discomfort in his ribs as a by-product.
   Nielsen confirmed: ‘The injury that he has is a bowling-specific injury and history shows if you have those injuries again it tends to be six, eight, 10 weeks before they come right, if you actually re-tear the side.
   ‘Two, three, four overs in the nets is probably not enough to prove that he is right to go.
   ‘If he had to bowl say 11 overs in a row, like Andrew Flintoff did at Lord’s, to win a Test match for us, we would want to be comfortable that he is strong and fit enough and able to do it.’

Tanzina Akter Tani of Motijheel Govt High School emerged as the champion of the Girls’ Section of the 11th Standard Chartered School Chess Tournament securing 7.5 points out of 8 on Tuesday.
   Tani beat Santha Thapa of Nepal and clinched the title with one match in hand.
   Tahmina Akter Tisha of Motijheel Govt Girls’ School and Protiva Talukder of Borga jointly held the 2nd position with 6.5 points each.
   Abdullah Al-Saif of South Banasri Model School and Debotpal Dey of Ramkrishna School of Tripura jointly maintained their lead with 7.5 points at the end of the 8th round of the Class VI to X group. Ikramul Haque Siam of Motijheel Model School and Souvik Roy Chowdhury were jointly second with 6.5 points each.
   Debdeeb Das of Kolkata continued his lead in the KG to Class V group with 7 points. Fahad Rahman of Madhukhali Model Primary School of Faridpur and Hrithik Prasad of Kolkata were jointly 2nd with 6.5 points each.
   Rafsun Bin Omer, Md Ripon, Abigyan Mukherjee, Sayantan Chandra and Prantik Debnath of Kolkata are sharing 3rd position with 6 points each.

Bangladesh Football Federation will host the AFC ‘A’ License Course for the coaches at the BFF House from July 27 to August 22.
   Iranian instructor Masoud Eghbali will conduct the course for the Bangladesh coaches who attempt to upgrade their rankings as an ‘A’ licensee. The course was scheduled to start from July 21 but due to the unavailability of the AFC instructor it was deferred for a week.

Australia’s bookmakers showed no room for patriotism Tuesday, installing England as favourites for the Ashes following the home side’s historic win over Ricky Ponting’s men at Lord’s.
   Online bookmaker Centrebet offered 2.00 dollars for each dollar bet on an England series win after they went 1-0 up in the five-Test series, while Australia’s odds blew out from 2.50 to 3.75.
   Centrebet spokesman Neil Evans said England’s first Lord’s Test win against Australia in 75 years had come as a shock to its customers, resulting in a surge of money backing the much-maligned ‘Poms.’
   However, he said many believed Australia could bounce back and win the Third Test at Edgbaston, provided changes were made to the team.
   ‘The clock will now be ticking on seam bowler Stuart Clark’s return, and the race to get paceman Brett Lee fit and ready for the Edgbaston Test,’ he said.
   Other online bookies were similarly pessimistic about Australia’s chances of claiming the series, with sportingbet paying 2.05 for an England win, 3.25 for a draw and 3.50 for Australia.
   Betfair Australia had England at 2.16, Australia at 3.75 and a draw at 3.55.

Manchester United boss Alex Ferguson believes Cristiano Ronaldo could play for the club again one day, as he praised the Portugese star’s commitment during his six-year spell at Old Trafford.
   ‘He may come back, you never know,’ Ferguson told Britain’s Press Association in Kuala Lumpur where the team are on a pre-season Asian tour.
   ‘Sometimes it happens that way. He loved United. If you look back at the six years he had with us, he never missed training.’
   Ronaldo became the world’s most expensive player when he moved to Real Madrid on a six-year deal worth around 94 million euros (131 million dollars) and he made a low-key debut against Shamrock Rovers in Ireland on Monday. Still just 24, Ferguson was quoted as saying Ronaldo’s best was yet to come, describing him as the top player in the world by a long shot.
   ‘His best is yet to come. He’s only 24. He came to the right club at the right part of his career,’ he said.
   ‘He could have gone to Real Madrid, Barcelona or other clubs. But he came to the right one and appreciates that. It was always his intention to make his move.
   ‘There’s no doubt he’s a huge loss and I think it’s a challenge for us. It won’t be the same without Ronaldo, it can’t be.
   ‘He’s the best player in this world by absolutely miles, streets ahead of Lionel Messi, and Kaka,’ Ferguson added.
   Madrid courted Ronaldo all through last summer but he decided to stay and try to help United defend their 2008 Champions League title, featuring in their final loss in May to Barcelona.
   Although United retained their English Premier League title, Ronaldo has said he made up his mind to leave in May 2007.

Sir Alex Ferguson is delighted with the partnership of Michael Owen and the teenaged Federico Macheda after they both found the back of the net on their Asian tour.
   Owen, who moved to the Red Devils on a free transfer, is proving to be a shrewd buy after bagging his second goal in as many games since making his debut, while Macheda is a player Ferguson has high hopes for.
   The pair started late Monday in preference to Wayne Rooney and Dimitar Berbatov and the Italian opened the scoring against a Malaysian XI on 11 minutes, finishing coolly after picking up a cross from Darren Fletcher.
   Owen struck again two minutes later, pouncing on a loose ball in the box after Zoran Tosic crossed from the left, driving it into the net from close range as the Red Devils won 2-0.
   ‘If he stays fit it will be an absolute bonus for us,’ Ferguson said of Owen, who was sensationally snapped up when his contract with the relegated Newcastle expired.
   ‘There were a couple of cases where he’s shown his real experience, and that’s what he’s really good at, his positioning, and he’s so quick to get to the ball.
   ‘Again, it was a typical Michael Owen goal. He reacted first and took it well, just as he did on Saturday. His whole contribution was very good so we’re very pleased.’
   While Owen has plenty of pedigree, Macheda, at 17, is still learning the ropes although he already has hero status at Old Trafford after scoring a stunning injury time winner on his debut against Aston Villa in April.
   ‘We’ve got big hopes for Macheda—that’s one of the main reasons why we didn’t move (for someone else) in the market,’ said Ferguson.
   ‘He’s still only 17, but we’ve got great faith in the boy.
   ‘He’s strong, aggressive and a terrific finisher, he’s got a lot of tremendous assets and is very much part of my pool of strikers though, along with Michael, Dimitar and Wayne.
   ‘Of course, Federico played his part last season and scored two vital goals for us, but in essence he’s still just a young lad improving his game, so having him alongside Michael is like having two new players really.’
   After giving all of his 22-strong squad some time on the pitch during their two victories over Malaysia, the manager also had praise for some of his younger players, such as Tosic, Jonny Evans, Fabio and Darron Gibson.
   ‘They did quite well,’ he said.
   ‘We have a very good squad of young players, and let’s not forget Anderson is still only 21 and Nani is just 22.
   ‘Everyone came through okay, apart from Fabio who was suffering with a little bit of tiredness and cramp. But overall we’re pleased with how things went.’
   They next play FC Seoul on Friday, with Park Ji-Sung, who missed the Malaysia leg, joining his teammates in the South Korean capital.
   The Asian tour is wrapped up with a match against Hangzhou Greentown in China on July 26 before they move to Munich for the Audi Cup.

Liverpool manager Rafael Benitez said on Tuesday he fears Manchester United will use the war chest from the Cristiano Ronaldo mega-transfer to make the Premier League champions even stronger.
   ‘I am sure they will have money and they will buy some players,’ Benitez said, with United’s Sir Alex Ferguson profiting from Ronaldo’s record-shattering move of 80 million pounds (131 million dollars) to Real Madrid.
   But Benitez hopes that Liverpool, runners-up last season, can close the gap with new signing Glen Johnson providing the missing link.
   ‘We have to be strong next season—we have improved with Glen and hopefully we can do a little bit better and that will be enough,’ said Benitez, who signed the England full-back from Portsmouth for 17 million pounds.
   Johnson agreed with his new boss that Liverpool could end their title drought in the coming season.
   ‘Liverpool are right up there with the world’s best. They showed that last season. A few minor errors can be cut out and that will lead to massive improvements,’ he said
   ‘My early days at Liverpool have been fantastic. Everyone has been good to me and I think I am settling in fast.’
   Benitez does not often see eye to eye with Sir Alex and he dismissed suggestions by the United manager that free-spending Manchester City would not pose a threat next season.
   ‘I think every club now is trying to improve and Manchester City is one of them,’ he said. ‘I would like to be there at the top of the table and be contending but I cannot say too much on the other teams.’
   Benitez refused to take questions on the future of Spanish midfielder Xabi Alonso, who is being chased by Real Madrid to join Ronaldo and Brazil’s Kaka in a new line-up of Galacticos.
   Alonso arrived with the squad for an exhibition match against Thailand taking place Wednesday night, and Liverpool’s local supporters have left him in no doubt that they want him to remain at Anfield.
   During a promotional event Tuesday at a Bangkok shopping mall, more than 250 fans chanted his name and waved banners reading ‘Alonso Please Stay’. He acknowledged the fans but made no comment about the transfer talk.
   Liverpool have made a slow start in their pre-season games, drawing 0-0 with Swiss club St Gallen and losing 1-0 to Rapid Vienna.
   After the match with Thailand, who are coached by former England international Peter Reid, Liverpool will take on the Singapore national team on Sunday.

Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard lashed out at a man ‘with the style and speed of a professional boxer’ after losing his cool in a bar brawl, a court heard Tuesday.
   The 29-year-old England midfielder is accused of being part of a group that injured businessman Marcus McGee, 34, at the Lounge Inn nightclub in Southport near Liverpool, northwest England, in December last year.
   Gerrard was celebrating Liverpool’s 5-1 win at Newcastle United at the time. He denies the charge of affray. An initial charge of assault was dropped at a court hearing in March.
   The row erupted after Gerrard asked McGee for a card controlling the CD player, saying: ‘Give me that, lad,’ the court heard.
   ‘Mr. McGee took offence at his attitude and the expression ‘lad’ and he refused. Not many people on Merseyside, or indeed anywhere else, would refuse a request from Steven Gerrard but Mr. McGee did,’ said prosecutor David Turner.
   Gerrard was left fuming by the exchange, and six minutes later came back over to Mr. McGee, squaring up to him ‘in the sort of hostile confrontation that is often seen between professional footballers,’ and asked him: ‘Who the fuck do you think you are?’
   ‘Steven Gerrard had clearly lost his cool: he was angry with Marcus McGee,’ said Turner.
   Gerrard’s friends came over to help, and one of them, John Doran, pushed McGee away and ‘could not resist following through with his right elbow into Mr McGee’s face’, said Turner.
   ‘We say at this stage Gerrard totally lost it.
   ‘Within seconds, Steven Gerrard joined in the attack with a succession of well aimed uppercut punches delivered with the style and speed of a professional boxer rather than a professional footballer.’
   Turner said the key question was whether Gerrard was acting in self-defence.
   ‘Steven Gerrard is a world class footballer. He has the honour to be captain of Liverpool FC and to play for England. He is a star. He is Liverpool born and bred and here on Merseyside is a hero,’ he said.
   ‘We do not say that Mr. Gerrard is normally an arrogant man, we don’t say that he is a bully.
   ‘What we do say is that that night he just lost his self control and joined in an attack which should never have taken place. He let himself down.’
   Gerrard is facing trial alone, after five co-defendants admitted affray, and one admitted a lesser charge of threatening behaviour.

Argentine coach Diego Maradona was granted the choice by soccer authorities on Monday to move September’s World Cup qualifier against arch-rivals Brazil away from the River Plate stadium in Buenos Aires.
   Maradona criticised the River Plate pitch before and after Argentina’s last home qualifier, a laboured 1-0 win over Colombia in June, and said players had asked to move the game to the more compact Rosario Central stadium in Argentina’s second city. The Argentine Football Association said on its website (www.afa.org.ar) on Monday that world governing body FIFA had passed the smaller Rosario Central stadium as fit to host Argentina’s qualifiers.
   The choice of venue would be taken by Maradona and national technical director Carlos Bilardo, who as coach steered Argentina to World Cup victory in 1986, AFA president Julio Grondona told local media. ‘The main thing in this case it to please those who play,’ Grondona said on newspaper Infobae’s website (www.infobae.com).
   The tight Gigante de Arroyito ground in Rosario, 400km north of Buenos Aires, would bring local fans much closer to the goals than the River’s Monumental, which has an athletics track around the pitch. Maradona’s row with River Plate, bitter enemies of his beloved Boca Juniors, has been in the news on and off since early June with the club upset by his criticism.
   Reports have also said players are wary of playing at River Plate out of superstition, given the Sept. 5 match will fall on the 16th anniversary of Argentina’s only home defeat in a World Cup qualifier, a 5-0 humiliation by Colombia.
   Argentina, struggling for form under Maradona, are precariously placed at fourth in the 10-nation South American group, five points behind leaders Brazil. Only the top four go through automatically to the finals in South Africa next year.
   Argentina must face third-placed Paraguay three days after the Brazil match, then meetings with Peru at home and Uruguay away in October in a tough run. River’s secretary of football Mario Israel warned Argentina not to turn its back on history. ‘I believe the national team’s home is historically our stadium. It’s a strategic mistake to spurn the Monumental,’ he told local radio, referring to the venue of Argentina’s first World Cup triumph in 1978.

Carlo Ancelotti has vowed John Terry’s Chelsea future will be settled within a week.
   The Blues boss is determined to keep Terry at Stamford Bridge, despite a huge offer on the table from Manchester City.
   Mark Hughes wants to take the England captain to Eastlands in a deal that could be worth up to £40m, but Ancelotti has now enlisted owner Roman Ambramovich to help persuade Terry to stay at Stamford Bridge for the rest of his career.
   And the Italian has promised a resolution in the next seven days. Ancelotti said: ‘For John it is not a distraction this question because he is very concentrated and focused. I think that in one week nobody will have a problem about John Terry.
   ‘John wants to stay in Chelsea and Chelsea want john terry to be captain for more years. It is normal other teams want him because he is a great player and all teams want to buy a great player.
   ‘These are normal questions but he stays in the same team because he is a captain for Chelsea, it is impossible to sell John Terry. There is no problem with Manchester City. If Manchester City want to improve and buy the best players.
   ‘Paolo Maldini never thinks to go away from Milan, and I think John Terry also thinks this. Loyalty is very important because Terry like Ashley Cole, Lampard, Drogba is a very important player.
   ‘Not only as players but as men, they are great men and they present an example for other players. This is very important for the club.’
   German midfielder Michael Ballack misses tonight’s friendly with Inter Milan and ex-Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho who faces his former club for the first time.
   Ballack has a toe injury and the rest of his tour is in doubt. The game kicks off at 8pm Los Angeles time which is 4am Wednesday morning UK time.

The world’s most expensive player Cristiano Ronaldo was kept at bay by semi-professional defenders here on Monday on his debut for Real Madrid as they eked out a 1-0 victory over Shamrock Rovers.
   In one of the more unlikely settings for the debut of the world’s most pricey player Ronaldo - who cost Real around 94 million euros from Manchester United earlier in June - was closely attended to and was taken off at half-time having failed to sparkle against some muscular defending.
   Indeed it was one of Real’s other newboys, French international striker Karim Benzema who sealed the narrow victory over the Irish side - who once boasted talents such as another former Manchester United great Johnny Giles - as the 35million euros signing from Lyon scored in the 87th minute.

Sir Alex Ferguson has hit back at Carlos Tevez, saying the Argentinian striker wasn’t worth the 25 million pounds that rivals Manchester City paid for him, reports said Tuesday.
   The 25-year-old international signed a five-year contract with City after his two-year deal at United ran out at the end of last season.
   Tevez, a fan favourite at Old Trafford, has claimed Ferguson never got in touch to try to persuade him to stay.
   But Ferguson told English dailies in Kuala Lumpur, where United are on an Asian tour, that this was not true.
   ‘We made contact with Carlos. We sent him texts and spoke to him when he was in Argentina,’ he said.
   ‘Our chief executive, David Gill, made an offer to (agent) Kia Joorabchian and we spoke to Tevez before we played Inter Milan (in March) and told him we had spoken to Kia, but we never heard back.’ In the end Tevez went to big-spending City, where he will play alongside Arsenal striker Emmanuel Adebayor next season.
   Ferguson drafted in Michael Owen on a free transfer to replace him, and made clear he felt Tevez was not worth what City manager Mark Hughes paid.
   ‘In my opinion, I don’t think he was worth 25 million pounds,’ he said.
   ‘He was popular with the supporters. The fans quite rightly have their heroes and I was happy to go along with the deal as long as it was the right one but, quite simply, he is not worth 25 million.’

FC Barcelona are counting on their French striker Thierry Henry for the upcoming season and have given up hope of recruiting Franck Ribery from German side Bayern Munich, the coach of the Spanish and European champions said Monday.
   ‘The role he was will depend on him. If he is fit, he will play, and frequently,’ Barcelona coach Josep Guardiola told a news conference regarding Henry as the squad resumed training after a break for the summer holidays.
   Asked about the possibility of recruiting Ribery, who is being chased by several clubs including Barcelona’s main Spanish league rivals Real Madrid, Guardiola sounded a pessimistic note.
   ‘It seems impossible to me. I think he will not come. First of all because Bayern does not want to let him go. And then because his agent prefers that he go elsewhere,’ he said.

Dubai-based businessman Sulaiman Al Fahim has been cleared to complete his purchase of Portsmouth after passing the Premier League’s fit and proper persons test, the club confirmed on Tuesday.
   Al Fahim, 32, struck a deal to buy the club from current owner Alexandre Gaydamak in May before entering a period of legal and financial due diligence.
   An official statement from the club said: ‘The Premier League can confirm that Mr Al Fahim has submitted all the documentation required to satisfy our fit and proper persons test.
   ‘Based on the information provided the League has found no reason why Mr Al Fahim would be liable to be disqualified as a Director of a Premier League club. ‘Accordingly we have advised Portsmouth FC that his appointment may proceed.
   ‘As with all changes in club ownership the Premier League will continue to monitor any material changes in circumstance.’
   The club confirmed that Al Fahim has joined the Portsmouth board as chairman with immediate effect.
   ‘I very much look forward to working closely with the club’s management and supporters to develop Portsmouth Football Club and deliver future success,’ Al Fahim said.
   ‘The club has a long and fine history of achievement that I intend to build on.’
   Peter Storrie, who has agreed to continue as Portsmouth’s chief executive, added: ‘This appointment brings stability to the club and is excellent news for Pompey supporters.
   ‘I have every reason to believe that together with the new chairman we will be able to take the club forward to further achievements, building on the successes of the past three years.’
   Al Fahim was the initial figurehead of the Abu Dhabi United Group when they took control of Manchester City in the summer of 2008.
   He is no longer involved but did not drop his interest in the Premier League.
   Earlier this year, Al Fahim was reported to have inquired about buying Chelsea from Roman Abramovich as part of a consortium believed to have bid more than 700 million pounds.
   But he eventually settled on Portsmouth and plans to overhaul the Fratton Park club, who finished 14th in the Premier League this season, a year after winning the FA Cup.
   Gaydamak had announced last December he was looking for a buyer because he was unable to devote sufficient time to the club.

A South African cricket row has spread to the international arena with Johannesburg shunned for most of the top ICC Champions Trophy fixtures this September and October.
   South Africa will play their three Group B fixtures at 20,000-capacity Centurion Park beside the highway linking Johannesburg and Pretoria and defending champions Australia go there for two Group A games.
   The showdown between Asian giants India and Pakistan is also scheduled for Centurion plus a semi-final and the final as a split between Cricket South Africa and its Wanderers-based Gauteng affiliate deepens.
   Wanderers can accommodate 11,000 more spectators than Centurion and Gauteng officials claim the original fixture list had South Africa playing two group games there and that the final was also scheduled for the ‘Bullring’.
   England (twice), Australia, Pakistan and India will appear at Wanderers, which ranks among the best known global Test cricket venues, but Sri Lanka, West Indies and New Zealand are unlikely crowd pullers.
   Pakistan should have staged the one-day mini-World Cup tournament in 2008, but security concerns led to South Africa taking over a 15-match event critics claim is an unnecessary addition to a congested international calendar.
   Gauteng stirred a storm last month by accusing chief executive Gerald Majola of putting CSA at financial risk and requesting details of an agreement between the national body and the Indian Premier League.
   The IPL, switched to South Africa last April because it clashed with general elections and there was insufficient security personnel to cover both events, fought with various CSA affiliates over stadium hospitality boxes.
   Indian officials wanted exclusive use of the suites and while an uneasy truce was declared, Gauteng relented at the last minute and later threatened a court interdict to halt the final.
   Legal steps were considered after an IPL demand for 1,000 extra parking places for the climax of the 59-fixture Twenty20 tournament was rejected only when the provincial government intervened.
   While the affiliate want talks, CSA has adopted a hard line, taking three fixtures on the England tour that starts in November away from Wanderers in a move set to cost Gauteng millions of dollars.
   CSA officials are furious that Gauteng documents describe some of those involved in the dispute as ‘lunatics’ and ‘dishonest’, and want the affiliate to apologise. The November 13 Twenty20 fixture against England has been moved to the Indian Ocean city of Durban while the central city of Bloemfontein takes over as hosts of the first ODI a week later.
   St George’s Park in the coastal city of Port Elizabeth replaces Wanderers as the venue for the last of four Tests between January 14 and 18 against England.
   Fixtures
   Group A
   Sept 23
   At Johannesburg
   Pakistan v West Indies 1230
   Sept 26
   At Johannesburg
   Australia (holders) v West Indies 0730
   At Centurion
   India v Pakistan 1230
   Sept 28
   At Centurion
   Australia v India 1230
   Sept 30
   At Centurion
   Australia v Pakistan 0730
   At Wanderers
   India v West Indies 1230
   Group B
   Sept 22
   At Centurion
   South Africa v Sri Lanka 1230
   Sept 24
   At Centurion
   South Africa v New Zealand 0730
   Sept 25
   At Johannesburg
   England v Sri Lanka 1230
   Sept 27
   At Johannesburg
   New Zealand v Sri Lanka 0730
   At Centurion
   South Africa v England 1230
   Sept 29
   At Johannesburg
   England v New Zealand 1230
   Semi-finals
   Oct 2
   At Centurion
   Group A winners v Group B runners-up 1230
   Oct 3
   
   At Johannesburg
   Group B winners v Group A runners-up 1230
   Final
   Oct 5
   At Centurion
   Winning semi-finalists 1230
   Note: Tournament name changed from ICC Knock Out after second edition

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd Tuesday admitted to a ‘sinking feeling’ after watching Australia’s Ashes Test defeat by England and urged the country to get behind the team.
   Rudd joined Australian media in lamenting the 115-run loss, which prompted local bookmakers to install bitter rivals England as favourites to snatch cricket’s most famous trophy.
   ‘Like all Australians, I watched telly last night with a sinking feeling in my stomach. But you know something, it’s only two Tests down, and there’s a few to go,’ Rudd said.
   ‘So I’m looking forward to the next Test, and we have a first-class Australian team. And we should all be in there backing them, each ball that’s bowled, and each delivery which is struck to the boundary by Australian batsmen in the remaining Tests.’
   Rudd’s comments came as media grumbled over umpiring, England’s attitude and the state of Australia’s once formidable team after their first loss at Lord’s in 75 years.
   ‘Ricky Ponting faces the greatest challenge of his captaincy to save the Ashes series,’ columnist Malcolm Conn wrote in the Daily Telegraph.
   ‘For decades we have heard how Australians are always inspired by the spiritual home of cricket,’ he added. ‘Unfortunately this inexperienced team was overwhelmed by the occasion.’
   A Sydney Morning Herald editorial lamented umpiring standards, after replays appeared to show England captain Andrew Strauss grassing a catch off opener Phillip Hughes.
   ‘What standards does the International Cricket Council live by?’ the Herald complained. ‘This is the television age, an era unforgiving of error by referees and umpires in major sports.
   ‘Yet even with the benefit of replay, the match officials in the current Ashes series have produced a medley of incompetence and inconsistency that has cast a shadow over the series.’
   Newspaper columnist Greg Baum also hit out at England’s ‘unexpectedly cynical’ approach.
   ‘It stands in stark contrast to the generally noble spirit of the 2005 series,’ Baum wrote in The Age.
   ‘It was evident before the series began, in the widespread sneering towards the unorthodoxy of rookie opener Phillip Hughes. It showed in England’s elaborate time-wasting tactics at the end of the first Test in Cardiff, which lay in that bleak no-man’s-land between gamesmanship and cheating.
   ‘At Lord’s, England again has been the uglier team ... England’s bowlers have sledged more than Australia’s.’
   Meanwhile online bookmaker Centrebet slashed the odds on England winning the five-match series, putting aside patriotism to install the ‘Poms’ as 2-to-1 favourites.
   Other online bookies were similarly pessimistic, with sportingbet paying 2.05 dollars per dollar bet for an England win, 3.25 for a draw and 3.50 for Australia.
   Many experts focused on Australia’s lacklustre bowling and on the key role played by England’s Andrew Flintoff, who took five wickets in the second innings.
   ‘Neither umpires, toss, luck nor the conditions were to blame for Australia’s poor position,’ wrote columnist Peter Roebuck.
   ‘Throughout, their fate has lain in their own hands. For three-and-a-half days the Australians were outgunned. At no stage did they look like the best side in the world.’

Sir Alex Ferguson has revealed Manchester United ‘explored’ the potential for a deal to sign Bayern Munich star Franck Ribery.
   France international Ribery has been a target for many of Europe’s leading clubs, with Spanish rivals Barcelona and Real Madrid expressing an interest, but Bayern have been adamant that the club will not be cashing in on the 26-year-old.
   United were rumoured to be readying a bid as they sought to spend some of the world-record windfall from the sale of Cristiano Ronaldo to Real.
   However, Ferguson confirmed a polite enquiry was met with a firm response from Bayern, who sold Owen Hargreaves to United two years ago.
   ‘We didn’t try to buy Ribery, we explored it in a nice, quiet way when David Gill was at one of his meetings with Bayern in March,’ said Ferguson. ‘They told him, ‘absolutely no chance’ and the one thing you can say about Bayern is that, when they say something, they mean it.
   ‘When we negotiated with them over Hargreaves, at the beginning they said ‘no’, but they also said that, if it ever changed, their minds, we’d be the first to know.
   ‘It was exactly the same this time. There is no way that they will sell Ribery.’
   Ferguson also considered signing Karim Benzema from Lyon, but conceded he did not want to pay over the odds for the Real new-boy.
   He added: ‘We tried to spend it (the Ronaldo money) on Karim Benzema as, at 21, I felt that there would be an improvement there.
   ‘He is tough, good physique, a good goalscoring record, so it was worth going a wee bit extra for him because of his age.
   ‘But when it went to £42m, it was beyond his value. We went to £35m and I think that was fair.’

Australia captain Ricky Ponting said his side had to address ‘fundamental skill errors’ after presiding over his country’s first
   Test defeat at Lord’s in 75 years.
   England’s 115-run win concluded here on Monday in the second Test saw them take a 1-0 lead in the five-match series just over a week after they scrambled to a draw with one wicket standing in the first Test in Cardiff.
   Ponting pinpointed the first innings, where Australia could only manage 215 in reply to England’s 425, on a typically good batting pitch at Lord’s, as a key factor in the eventual outcome.
   They then collapsed to 128 for five in their second innings, chasing a world record 522 to win, before a sixth-wicket stand of 185 between Michael Clarke, who made a superb 136, and wicket-keeper Brad Haddin (80) revived Australia.
   However, both men lost their wickets as England took the five they needed for victory before lunch on Monday, with fast bowler Andrew Flintoff (three) and off-spinner Graeme Swann (two) doing the damage.
   ‘There are fundamental skill errors that we have made in this game,’ Ponting told reporters here on Monday.
   ‘I’m not just talking about the bowling. We didn’t bat very well either in our first innings. Two hundred-odd on that wicket was a long way short of what we needed to get.
   ‘The first two days was where the game was decided. I was pretty happy with the way we stuck at things for the remainder of the game. It’s just little skill errors that have cost us big time.’
   Ponting insisted the teams remained evenly matched, unlike the 2006/07 Ashes where he led Australia to a 5-0 whitewash of their oldest foes.
   It’s grabbing the momentum when you can and running with it for as long as you can that’s going to decide this series,’ he said.
   ‘If you look at this game, they grabbed the momentum on day one, ran with it, and we found it hard to wrest it back.
   ‘A lot of Test matches are won with what happens in the first hour’s play. We were a fair bit off at the start of this game and we have to make sure we’re a whole lot better when we start the third one.’

Chelsea midfielder Florent Malouda on Tuesday signed his new three-year deal with the London club.
   And the French international warned that his best is yet to come as he hopes to improve his game under new manager Carlo Ancelotti.
   ‘This is just the beginning of the story,’ said Malouda, who had one year remaining on his current contract.
   ‘I was really happy when I heard it was Carlo Ancelotti because I have a lot of respect for him. At my former club Lyon I played many times against Milan. For me it is a really good choice and I believe in him,’ said Malouda.
   Malouda played on the left side of a midfield diamond during Chelsea’s recent pre-season friendly against Seattle.
   And he said: ‘This year he wants to try the new system with a diamond so I have to adapt myself and that is why we are training really hard to do what the manager wants.
   ‘It is a different role for me but that is part of my game, I can play in many positions, and I have played it a few times in Lyon when there were injuries and in the France national team I have played many times this position.’
   Malouda had agreed the new contract while away on holiday and he is delighted to be committed to Chelsea until 2012.
   He told chelseafc.com: ‘I am really happy because it shows a mutual trust between the club and myself and for me it is just the beginning of the story.

Guyana President Bharat Jagdeo will hold separate meetings on Tuesday in his nation’s capital with officials from the West Indies Cricket Board and the West Indies Players’ Association in an attempt to settle their bitter dispute.
   Attorney-at-law Gerard Pinard, a member of the WICB’s negotiating team, confirmed Tuesday’s meeting with President Jagdeo, chairman of the Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community, which is similar in its function to the African Union.
   ‘WIPA had asked President Jagdeo as chairman of CARICOM to intervene in the current dispute and as a matter of courtesy he has also extended an invitation to the WICB to meet with him,’ said Pinard in an interview with the Caribbean Media Corporation, the regional news agency.
   ‘We are not meeting together with WIPA. We will meet at 12 noon, and they will meet at another time during the day.’
   He added: ‘When the President of Guyana and the chairman of CARICOM invites you to a meeting you have to go and meet with him.

Arsenal and French international midfielder Samir Nasri has been ruled out of action for two to three months after breaking his leg in training on Tuesday, the English club announced.
   ‘Samir Nasri has sustained a fractured fibula during this morning’s training session at the club’s pre-season training camp in Austria,’ Arsenal said in a statement published on its website.
   ‘The midfielder will be out of action for two to three months,’ it added.
   Nasri, 22, was taken to hospital in Hartberg, near the club’s training camp in Bad Waltersdorf, in southeastern Austria, for tests.
   The Frenchman, who has 15 international caps, is now set to miss France’s next World Cup qualifying match against the Faroe Islands on August 12.
   The young Gunner, who joined Arsene Wenger’s team last year from French side Marseille, will also miss two further qualifiers again Romania on September 5 and Serbia on September 9.
   Arsenal arrived at their training camp on Monday and were due to play a friendly against local side Columbia Floridsdorf on Tuesday evening.

Veteran Portuguese international midfielder Maniche joined German side Cologne on a free transfer, the club’s website said on Monday.
   The 31-year-old - a Champions League winner with Porto in 2004 - was released from his previous contract with Spanish side Atletico Madrid in May.
   ‘Maniche is one of the great names in European football and we are proud to have signed him,’ Cologne chairman Wolfgang Overath said.
   Maniche - capped 52 times - enjoyed a golden spell under Jose Mourinho at Porto also collecting the 2003 UEFA Cup before an unhappy 16million pounds move to Russian side Dynamo Moscow.

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has revealed he is considering a bid for French champions Bordeaux’ Moroccan international striker Marouane Chamakh.
   The 25-yar-old has been linked with a move to the Emirates Stadium as a possible replacement for Emmanuel Adebayor, who joined Manchester City for 25 million pounds last week, and Wenger has put the Morocco international near the top of his wanted list.
   ‘We keep an eye on him,’ said Wenger on the club’s official website. ‘He is one of the players that we will follow and if we went for a striker then he would be one of the possibilities.’
   Chamakh, scorer of 13 goals last season, said his agent was in touch with a number of clubs, among them reportedly Arsenal, Sunderland, Blackburn, Tottenham and Fulham.
   Bordeaux manager Laurent Blanc is taking the squad to Canada on a pre-season tour on Thursday and Chamakh indicated a decision might be reached before then.
   Wenger also paid tribute to Adebayor and praised the Togo striker’s impact in his three years in north London.

England captain Andrew Strauss insisted he caught Phillip Hughes cleanly during the second Ashes Test here at Lord’s as the International Cricket Council defended the umpires’ use of replays.
   Strauss claimed a low slip catch to dismiss Phillip Hughes on the fourth day of a match England ultimately won by 115 runs to end their 75-year winless streak at Lord’s and so go 1-0 up in the five-Test series with three to play.
   The batsman started to walk off the field but was told to stay put by Australia captain Ricky Ponting.
   During Saturday’s third day Rudi Koertzen, standing in his 100th Test, and Billy Doctrove referred a catch claimed by Australia’s Nathan Hauritz off England’s Ravi Bopara to third umpire Nigel Llong. ‘This is one of the real problems of technology,’ Strauss told reporters after England had wrapped up victory on Monday.
   ‘I felt 100 per cent I caught the ball, I’ve got a couple of bruised fingers where the ball, I felt, bounced off. On the slow motion it looked like it hit the ground. It’s a tricky one.’
   ICC Test-match playing regulations state ‘the umpire at the bowler’s end shall be entitled to refer an appeal for a caught decision to the third umpire if both he and the square-leg umpire are unable to decide whether a catch was taken cleanly’.