Symonds warns Indians of backlash

MELBOURNE: Australian all-rounder Andrew Symonds has added fuel to his simmering duel with Indians by describing the ongoing tour as “hostile” and warning the team of a backlash when it tours Down Under this year.

Symonds, who is engaged in a war of words with the hosts since the seven-match series began, said he knew India was “never an easy place to tour, but I am surprised how hostile it has been”.

The all rounder, on his fifth tour of India, said the ‘World Twenty20 champions’ still had a lot to prove and were set for a searing summer in Australia.

“They’re saying they’ve built up this new Indian team, but we’ll see how much they’ve changed at the end of our summer,” he was quoted as saying by the ‘Sunday Telegraph’.

“We have had the edge on them here and we will get them again in Australia this summer. They’ve beaten us in a Twenty20 game and one one-dayer in four years. You can’t gauge much on that, but we’ll see how this so-called new Indian team goes on our soil,” he said.

On the crowd making ‘monkey chants’ at him during the fifth one-dayer in Vadodara, he said “I don’t know what is going to transpire from what happened to me the other day.

“I am a pretty liberal sort of bloke. But racism is a big issue in world sport, not just cricket. It is a sensitive issue and guys have been made an example of in the past, but what do you do in this instance if it’s coming from the crowd?

“I’m not allowed to comment on exactly what went on, but I’m not the most deadly serious bloke. Life goes on.”

Let a private cricket league bloom

Cricket has become the second most popular sport in the world and is the dominant sport in South Asian countries. Cricket’s popularity is an opportunity for India to grow the nation’s service sector.

As an economy develops economically, the share of the sports, entertainment, and leisure industry soars. Sports leagues are multi-billion dollar franchises that generate not only income directly from sports, but also generate tourism, auxiliary businesses, jobs and revenue. In the United States the overall revenues for the National Football League (NFL), MLB (Major League Baseball) and National Baseball Association (NBA) are tens of billions of dollars. Experience across the globe suggest a strong latent demand for sports entertainment in India. What better way to realise this demand than to facilitate private cricket leagues?

The world’s most affluent cricket board, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), has for long enjoyed a monopoly on all cricket-related actions in India. Founded in 1929, the BCCI has complete control over the selection of players, umpires and officials who represent India in international cricket events. After the tremendous success of the Twenty20 world cup, it might seem BCCI need not do anything more. Such complacency would be unfortunate. The potential to provide entertainment is boundless and held back only by the limited imagination.

The potential, however, won’t be unlocked unless privately owned, vigorously competitive teams organise themselves into a cricket league playing a large number of games in various cities in the Indian subcontinent. Whether such a league is a reincarnation and transformation of BCCI or a newly-formed league, e.g., the Indian Cricket League (ICL) is moot. What’s important is that competitive league cricket becomes a reality in India and that competition to develop a successful cricket league is facilitated, not subverted by the BCCI or the government.

Cricket is India’s national obsession. Schoolboys play it in midsummer heat. Offices ‘unofficially’ allow early going and late-coming if there is an important match on. That is for the national team. But ask the average Indian who won the last local first division league in his city, or to name the state Ranji squad, chances are you’ll come up blank.

Why should this be so? A Manchester United soccer team’s supporter would be able to name players of his club and national side. An LA Lakers basketball fan, or NY Yankees baseball fan, would not be caught out. Indeed, where sports have been promoted well, and marketed successfully, the fans have their thrills, the players their earnings, and clubs their profits. In India, however, the only winners seem to be the BCCI, and some player’s agents!

In part, this is British colonial legacy, when cricket was a ‘gentleman’s game’ to be unsullied by professionals, and untarnished by modern management methods. In Kolkata, the erstwhile capital of the British Raj, the sprawling Maidan is dotted with small, often worn down, tents and structure of clubs, with quaint names like Wari, Greer, George Telegraph, Aryans — nearly each has a first division side in cricket and football. Each is affiliated and has voting rights to select the state body, which administers the game in the state, and votes in turn for the national body, i.e., BCCI or AIFA, or IHF.

BCCI didn’t receive letter from ICC: Shetty

The BCCI on Sunday said it had not yet received any letter from the International Cricket Council demanding an explanation on the alleged racist chants against Australian all-rounder Andrew Symonds in Vadodara.

“We have not yet received any letter from the ICC,” said BCCI Chief Administrative Officer Ratnakar Shetty from Mumbai.

When told that ICC Chief Executive Malcolm Speed had posted a letter on their official website which said the game’s world governing body had written to the BCCI asking for their comments on the issue in the light of media reports, Shetty said “they may have said anything but we have not received any letter from them yet.”

Symonds had complained of ‘monkey chants’ from a section of the Vadodara crowd when he was fielding on the boundary but Cricket Australia had refused to lodge an official complaint and left the matter for the BCCI to handle.

Shetty, however, hit out at Symonds for his remarks in the Australian media on the awards given to Indian cricketers after their Twenty20 World Cup win.

“He does not need to make comment on what we do,” he said referring to Symonds remarks that the Indian cricketers were treated like princes.

“Our blokes thought it was over the top. Some of the things their players have been given and the way they are treated, it’s like they are rock stars and princes.

“The Indian government gave them a heap of money. Yuvraj Singh got a Porsche. Blokes are getting houses and blocks of land,” Symonds told the ‘Sunday Telegraph’.

FLINTOFF FACING LONG LAY-OFF

Coach Peter Moores does not expect Andrew Flintoff to be back in action for England until next summer at the earliest.

The 29-year-old has just undergone a fourth operation on his troublesome left ankle.

The Lancashire all-rounder travelled to Holland for the procedure, which was performed by leading surgeon Professor Niek van Dijk, who removed fragments of bone which were pressing on a tendon.

Flintoff missed the whole of summer 2007, barring the end-of-season one-day series against India, and was then clearly in discomfort when bowling during the ICC World Twenty20 in South Africa.

Moores – whose side have just secured victory in the one-day series in Sri Lanka – maintains Flintoff will not be rushed back into action until he is ready and “pain free”.

“There has been a positive from the operation (which) is the fact they found something,” Moores told BBC Radio 5Live’s Sportsweek programme.

“It has been really frustrating for Andrew over the last two months that he had pain, but they did not really know what it was.

“They all seem positive it has gone well and that he has a great chance to make a full recovery.

“Hopefully we can just support Andrew and get him fit back playing for England.

“We just have to wait and see that the whole thing has gone well.

“Andrew went into that operation so he could play with that ankle and still play effectively.

“We want Andrew Flintoff playing the sort of cricket we know he can and to enjoy that pain free.

“All the reports I have heard off the medical team have been really positive.”

Moores, though, maintained: “I do not want to put a time frame on it because it is not something we want to rush and want to make sure it is right.

“We want to get him fit to play and in the right form.

“At the moment there is the target of getting back for the domestic summer in England, and hopefully that will go well.

“There will be a period of rehabilitation he will have to go through, building the strength up and so on and we will keep an eye on the progress.”

Sir Ian Botham has claimed Flintoff should change his bowling action to limit future ankle problems.

England have just appointed Ottis Gibson as their full-time bowling coach after the team’s one-day success in Sri Lanka.

Moores, though, rejected notions they would now be pressing for “wholesale changes” to Flintoff’s approach.

He said: “There is not any evidence that would make the ankle feel better anyway. The idea is to get the ankle fit and stronger. Andrew can bowl with the action he has got.

“Foot position, which is talked about a lot, Andrew can alter that himself so it’s slightly more aligned anyway, and he did that during the Twenty20 series anyway.

“But they are all things which can be looked at later on.

“At the moment, the main thing is to get Andrew fit and back on the field.”

Botham, though, believes changing Flintoff’s action would have great benefit.

“I think Andrew is worried about it, and quite rightly,” he told the programme.

“What he is going to have to do is straighten that front foot up and get it almost chest-on.

“That will not affect him too much because he reverses the ball.

“If he can do that, then I think we can get a bit more out of Freddie – but the ankle is a real worry.”

PCB insists on Twenty-20 match during Indian tour

The Pakistan Cricket Board is trying to convince their Indian counterparts to accommodate a Twenty20 match in the upcoming series between the two sides to raise funds for the cricket academy of late Bob Woolmer.PCB Chairman Nasim Ashraf said the Indian board had rejected the proposal as requested by the widow of late Woolmer, who died during the World Cup in March.

“They say that since the ICC has kept a cap of seven Twenty20 matches a year for all teams, they can’t fit in this match this season,” Ashraf said.

“But we feel this is a match for a noble cause and something can be managed. We are still trying to convince the Indian board to review the situation,” he added.

Pakistan will tour India from November 1 to play in five one-day internationals and three Tests besides a three-day warm up match.

Gill, the widow of Pakistan’s late coach had sent a letter to the Pakistan and Indian boards requesting them to play a Twenty20 international to raise funds for the academy, which Woolmer had established in his hometown of Capetown.

“We are very keen to do something for Woolmer’s academy and if it is not possible on this tour we will look at other alternatives as well.

“Bob had a very fruitful association with Pakistan cricket and we feel we need to contribute something for his academy,” Ashraf said.

Twenty20 is bad for youngsters, says Gaekwad

Former India cricket coach and opening batsman Anshuman Gaekwad took a dig at the newest form of the game saying that Twenty20 was bad for youngsters.

“Twenty20 is not meant for youngsters. For youngsters it is very important to have their basics right. In Twenty20 cricket you don’t need to have your basics right because you don’t need to play cricketing shots to score runs,” Gaekwad said on Friday.

“It is a game for the mass and not the class. For youngsters my advice will be to focus on Test cricket. Players who are doing well in Twenty20 are those who have proved themselves in Test and One-day cricket,” the former Indian coach said.

“The real test of talent lies in Test cricket. ODIs are also an improvisation of Test cricket. In ODIs you have to play pure cricketing shots if you have to succeed,” said Gaekwad, who is the son of former Test captain Dattajirao Kishnarao.

Gaekwad, who has the slowest double century record to his name, also criticised the new initiatives taken by different bodies to promote cricket at the grassroots level by organising Twenty20 tournaments.

“It is a wrong way to promote cricket at the grassroots level. This will have a negative effect on the game,” he said.

The former India coach seemed to have been impressed by newly appointed captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni, who led the nation to victory in the inaugural Twenty20 World Championship.

“Dhoni has all the ingredients of a good captain. The only thing he lacks is experience. I think he should be given more time to mature,” he said.

Gaekwad rubbished claims that the Indian team was suffering from a hangover from the Twenty20 win, which has resulted in three losses in the ongoing seven-match series.

“I would have agreed to it, but after seeing India winning in Chandigarh, I am not ready to buy that theory. The only problem is that we are playing badly against a tough opposition like Australia,” he said.

On the role of three seniors, Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid, the former India coach said: “They have proved their critics wrong. They have been the most consistent performers in the team. Let the youngsters prove themselves and then challenge the three seniors.”

Australia Beats India by 18 Runs to Clinch 1-Day Cricket Series

Australia beat India by 18 runs in the sixth one-day cricket international in Nagpur to seal the seven-match series 4-1.Andrew Symonds hit an unbeaten 107 runs in 88 balls, with nine fours and four sixes, as his team totaled 317-8 in its allotted 50 overs.

In reply, Sourav Ganguly got 86, Sachin Tendulkar 72 and Robin Uthappa 44 as India could only total 299-7. Left-arm spinner Brad Hogg took 4-49.

The opening match in the series was abandoned because of rain.

Gibson appointed England fast bowling coach

LONDON (Reuters) – Ottis Gibson has been named as England’s new fast bowling coach, the England and Wales Cricket Board announced on Sunday.

The appointment of the 38-year-old West Indian follows England’s 3-2 win over hosts Sri Lanka in the five-match one day international series which has just ended. Gibson was Durham’s leading wicket-taker this season with 80 wickets and is the current PCA player of the year.

In a statement on the board’s Web site , Gibson said: “I am delighted to be a part of the England team in a full-time capacity as bowling coach. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed working with the team over the past few weeks in what has been a successful ODI tour of Sri Lanka.

“I’ve been involved with the ECB fast bowling programme for a number of years now and as a level four qualified coach who’s worked with both the senior England bowlers and several younger England bowlers, I feel I’m well equipped to take up the position as fast bowling coach.”

He added that the future looked bright for England’s bowlers. Peter Moores, the England team’s head coach told BBC Five Live on Sunday: “We know we are getting a great bowling coach and it has come at the perfect time.

“He had a great season with Durham and the time has come for him to hang up his boots and move into coaching. He can influence the bowlers and talk about some of the things he feels are important to be successful.”

Gibson’s decision will disappoint Durham, however, who hoped he would play for them again next season after they finished second in the county championship table.

Former South African fast bowler Allan Donald had worked with England from May until September, but rejected the opportunity to take on a full-time role.

Flintoff’s future in balance

THE ODDS on Andrew Flintoff ever being a force again at Test level have lengthened with the news that he has undergone further surgery on his left foot. He has in effect been ruled out of England’s Test series in Sri Lanka before Christmas and the tour of New Zealand in the new year. If that proves to be the case, he will have missed five Test series out of six.

This was the 29-year-old allrounder’s fourth operation in less than three years. What is particularly worrying about this latest development is that it occurred so soon after an operation to clean out an area on the left side of his foot in June.

Since then he has bowled only 82.2 overs in competitive cricket. On previous occasions, surgery on his landing foot followed heavy periods of bowling.

What is also a concern is that the keyhole surgery in Holland on Friday, conducted by Dr Niek van Dijk, a leading specialist, found further fragments of bones at the base of the ankle.

Flintoff’s first operation, in 2005, was to remove a bone spur; his second operation last year also detected bony particles.

This suggests that there may be a chronic deterioration in this area of the foot that no surgery can arrest.

Even before this latest operation, Kirk Russell, the England physiotherapist, conceded that Flintoff’s ankle would never be the same as it was. And by extension, he will never be the bowler he once was.

The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) issued a statement yesterday saying that Flintoff would resume full training in the new year with a view to regaining complete fitness ahead of the 2008 domestic season. England’s first match of the summer is a Test at Lord’s against New Zealand starting on May 15.

“The operation involved the removal of extra bone, including fragments, from the front and back of the ankle which were causing bony impingement and compression of a tendon in the back of the ankle,” the ECB statement read.

“The nature of these bone changes was such that there were additional difficulties in the normal functioning and stability of the ankle . . .

“The surgery was performed successfully and, at this stage, the surgeon is optimistic that he has addressed the underlying root of the problem. The decision to carry out further surgery was taken following extensive consultation with leading specialists including those from the UK, Australia and the United States.”

Flintoff’s absence has caused England to revise their plans for the Sri Lanka Test series. They will now take 16 players rather than 15, made up of seven batsmen, five fast bowlers, two spinners and two wicketkeepers � an admission that Flintoff cannot be replaced by one player.

The main attention will be on whether Andrew Strauss and Steve Harmison, both of whom were awarded new England contracts last month, can secure places and whether Mark Ramprakash can sneak an international recall at the age of 38 after two Bradmanesque seasons in county cricket.

There are good reasons for leaving out Strauss for the first time since he broke into the Test side in 2004. His record against Muttiah Muralitharan is sketchy. His form overseas has been poor for two years, since his domestic situation changed with the birth of his first child. And Strauss’s absence would allow Michael Vaughan to resume his best position as an opener and make room for Owais Shah, an excellent player of spin.

Perhaps significantly, Hugh Morris, the new managing director of the England team, said recently that he was willing to see leading players left out of occasional tours. But even if Strauss doesn’t go, the best Ramprakash can hope for is to be placed on standby.

Harmison will need to convince the selectors that he has fully recovered from his hernia operation and torn muscles in his lower back, which have kept him off the field for much of the past four months.

His rehabilitation has been heavily monitored by the ECB and he may look to prove his fitness by playing provincial cricket in South Africa before leaving for Colombo in mid-November.

The identity of the two wicketkeepers will also be hotly discussed. The uncapped Tim Ambrose is favourite to act as understudy to Matt Prior, another who knows he needs to raise his game.

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Cricket fights for talent as footy entices teens

MATTHEW Wade reckons that when you are a wicketkeeper, you have to keep your options open, pick your moment and then grab it.

It is the reason the 19-year-old is making his debut for Victoria today, having sniffed the breeze when his native Tasmania won the Pura Cup last season with Sean Clingeleffer behind the stumps and Tim Paine in the wings, and glanced north.

It is probably also the reason he is playing cricket, and not football, the sport that continues to claim the country’s multi-talented youngsters and offer them a career and life that most sports will struggle to match, at least while they’re teenagers.

In truth, cricket is probably lucky Wade was not a few centimetres taller and, by his own admission, not a superstar, when the football scouts came across him in Tasmania. Wade represents a rare victory for the summer game. Not only did he choose cricket over football, he did it knowing that to break through he had to claim one of six wicketkeeping spots in the country. One of the AFL’s most powerful attractions is that it offers more than 600.

Moreover, Wade chose cricket from a football pedigree; his father, Scott, played 12 games for Hawthorn in the early ’80s (he is now the general manager of AFL Tasmania), and Matthew had talent of his own.

Hamish Ogilvie, the former Tassie Mariners coach turned Adelaide recruiter, remembers the former onballer as a “brave, tough and dirty” little player who would always give his all, and may have played at a higher level had he not been so destined for cricket teams. “He was one of the toughest kids … mentally strong, competitive,” Ogilvie said. “He was the most competitive kid I ever coached and he was a bit like Sam Mitchell; he was little, but if he’d been completely devoted to footy I reckon he would have got there.

“He never did a pre-season so he couldn’t keep himself fit, but he would definitely have captained Tassie in the VFL. For a long time. And I reckon he would have found his way to the AFL if he had been able to give it everything. He would have made it in the end, because he was just so good.”

Instead, Wade, who continued to represent his state in the VFL while on a rookie cricket contract with Tasmania, is very much the exception to a rule that continues to perplex cricket administrators. It was only last season, when Tasmanian cricket offered him a full contract, that he made a firm decision to spend his sporting life in whites. Then Victoria came calling, too.

“That made the decision a bit easier,” said Wade, who has a light, 170-centimetre wicketkeeper’s physique. “I was pretty lucky. If you are an out-and-out superstar, then they push you pretty hard to play football, but in my case I was just on the edge of being drafted. They let me do my thing. I think if you are a top pick, that becomes really hard. Footy will push you and it will pretty much take up all your time.”

The decision to move to Victoria was also a pragmatic one. “I would have been starved of opportunities down there, I reckon, so I thought I would have a crack and come over.

“You have to look around. Everyone is looking for that Aussie spot. I suppose (Brad) Haddin will get it (when Adam Gilchrist retires) and then it’s open slather. I didn’t want to sit back and wait. I wanted to … make an opportunity.”

Wade played cricket at Clarence with Justin Sherman, Brisbane’s third pick in the 2004 national draft. South Australia had Shannon Hurn, an outstanding middle-order batsman, in its squad knowing he would be lost to the AFL as soon as he reached draft age. Hurn was taken by West Coast at pick 13 in 2005.

Jonathan Brown’s potential as a cricketer was underlined this year when he appeared on The Footy Show bowling chin music at Ricky Ponting. And Brownlow medallist Jimmy Bartel, a gifted batsman, was in the AFL system almost before he realised there was a choice.

“The football system tends to claim you before cricket and almost leads you to the decision,” Bartel said. “And in cricket, one mistake and your day can be over. Cricket is all about timing, being in the right place at the right time.”

Western Australia, which has a proud history of producing fast bowlers, has had to import four quicks from interstate or overseas as budding pacemen are instead turned into ruckmen and power forwards.

In Victoria, efforts are being made to bring back to cricket the footballers who didn’t make it on to AFL lists, or didn’t stay on them. It is perhaps an acknowledgement that football’s young superstars will almost always choose the sport that can offer them the most, earliest.

Cricket’s rookie system was devised to get more young people playing state cricket, where the older players are hanging on for longer. Every state must have between three and eight rookies, aged under 23, on its list. But the minimum rookie contract this year is worth only $11,000.

AFL rookies earn about $25,000, but a first-year draftee can get up to $100,000 with match payments. Of course, if a young cricketer takes the long-term view, there is the possibility of travelling the world, but it is a long-term option indeed.

“As a draftee you are going to earn a lot more than you will as a rookie in cricket. If they’re playing football, we can only show them that cricket is a great sport that offers longevity and the door is not shut at 23 or 24 years of age,” said Tim McCaskill, Cricket Victoria’s high performance manager.

“Kids see the draft as being a window that will close very quickly, and it seems to consume everything they do. They don’t look beyond, what if they don’t get drafted?”

McCaskill can think of three cricketers who played in the national under-17 championships three years ago, gave the game away while they played TAC Cup footy and missed out on the draft. “None of them are playing cricket now. The unknown for us at the moment is how many are dropping out at 15 and 16,” he said. “We’re going to invite a lot of the former ‘pathway’ cricketers, the kids we know were talented cricketers but have moved away and are on VFL lists and things like that, and have a day at the MCG where we try to get them back into our system.”

With EMMA QUAYLE