More than anything, it was the combined wisdom of Pakistan’s experienced cricketers that tilted the scales in their favour at the Sharjah Cricket Association stadium. Zimbabwe, slumped to yet another defeat in the Khaleej Times Trophy, losing by 29 runs. Two stalwarts – Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis worked their magic when it was needed the most and outclassed Zimbabwe. But spare a thought for Zimbabwe, an inexperienced side with a new captain, and they did not disgrace themselves. The loss means that Zimbabwe have no chance of qualifying for the final.When Waqar Younis won the toss and elected to bat first on a featherbed Sharjah wicket, he would have hoped to put more than 261 on the board. Especially after Shahid Afridi played an amazing innings first up, smashing the ball to all parts of the park. Hitting the ball cleanly over the infield, Afridi picked his spots well, either going over the onside with fierce power or carving the ball over extra-cover with impeccable timing. In a 36-ball essay that yielded 58 runs, Afridi struck six sixes and just one boundary. Easily the fastest half-century of the tournament, the innings brought the crowd alive.Following Afridi’s early blitz and some sensible, steady batting in the middle order from Yousuf Youhana (41) and a good half-century from Younis Khan, Pakistan managed to post 261/9 off 50 overs. Younis Khan’s innings was well paced and had the right mixture of aggressive and defensive strokes. With just two boundaries in his 58, Younis Khan had to do a lot of running and the effort began to tell. It was a tired shot that caused his downfall, coming after almost 100 minutes spent in the hot, humid conditions out in the middle.After starting well and threatening to bat Zimbabwe out of the game, Pakistan lost six wickets in the last 10 overs, adding just 56 runs to the total in the process.As it turned out, Pakistan had enough runs on the board. Waqar Younis, pumped up and running in with great rhythm knocked the stuffing out of the Zimbabwe top order. In the 8th over of the day, Waqar sent back both Trevor Gripper and Stuart Carlisle. Although Gripper would like to forget that particular moment, Waqar Younis will remember it for a long time to come as the wicket took him to 350 wickets in his 115th ODI. That’s a strike rate that would make anyone proud. After an initial burst of 6-1-16-2 that left Zimbabwe reeling at 13/2 Waqar took himself and Akram out of the attack.The second string of Pakistani bowlers, Abdur Razzaq and Azhar Mahmood are nowhere near as imposing as the men they took over from. The Zimbabweans too thought so, and the Flower brothers took full toll of this. Putting their heads together, Grant, with his booming drives and Andy with his delicate touches put together a partnership that gave Zimbabwe just a glimmer of hope. Stroking the ball freely into the gaps, the pair put on 146 for the third wicket before Wasim Akramstamped his authority on the game.Brought back to bowl the 31st over, Akram sent down a maiden over, changing the tempo of the game. In his very next over, the 33rd, Akram deceived Andy Flower (48 runs, 60 balls, 3×4) getting the left-hander to chip back a return catch. A good diving catch in his followthrough saw Akram complete catch. Not content with removing Andy Flower, Akram sent Dion Ebrahim packing just two balls later. Welcoming Ebrahim to the crease with a quick yorker, Akram slipped in an away swinger next ball and induced the edge. Reacting extremely quickly, Rashid Latif snapped up the ball diving full length to his right.Akram’s burst had done the trick for Pakistan.The matter was laid to rest well and truly when Azhar Mahmood stuck his hand out to field a drive from the blade of Douglas Marillier. Grant Flower backing up at the non-striker’s end could only watch in dismay as the ball brushed Mahmood’s hand and ricocheted onto the stumps. Falling just nine short of a well deserved ton, Grant Flower had spent 159 minutes out of the middle and struck 11 boundaries.Using the old fashioned long-handle to good effect Marillier tonked the bowling around for 37 (43 balls, 1×4, 2×6) but could only delay the inevitable. As entertaining a knock as any played on the day, Marillier’s innings showed that the lad had more than a bit of fighting spirit in him.Returning to complete his spell at the death, Akram accounted for Brian Murphy, having the Zimbabwean captain caught behind. This took his figures to 9-3-19-3, a sterling effort. Fittingly, the end of the Zimbabwean innings came at 232 when a strong throw from Akram found Henry Olonga short of his ground.The Akram-Waqar pair between them ended with the analysis 18.2-4-60-6. That made all the difference.

Part 1: India celebrate in New ZealandThe wide disparity between India’s home and away record is not a newphenomenon. It is something that goes back to the early days of IndianTest cricket. From June 1932 to February 1968, India had played 104Tests, of which 43 were abroad. And India had not won even one Test inEngland, Australia, West Indies and Pakistan. All of India’s tenvictories till then had been achieved at home.

There was some hope however that India would break the ice on theirmaiden trip to New Zealand in 1968, where the national team proceededto after their disastrous tour of Australia on which India had lostall four Tests. Not because the Indian team was particularly strong,but because the weakness of the New Zealand team was well known. NewZealand were the only team below India in the Test standings of thetime, even if there were no official rating system as is prevalentnow. Moreover, on both occasions that New Zealand had visited India,they had lost the series. If there was one country against which Indiadid enjoy the psychological advantage it was New Zealand. But thenIndia at the same time had to overcome the psychological disadvantagein that they had not won a single Test outside their own country andNew Zealand could proudly point out that they had drawn the last twocontests played in their own country, each a three Test series againstSouth Africa and England.The Indian team, after a poor start in Australia, seemed to be cominginto their own towards the end of the tour and so were not entirelybereft of confidence when they landed in Dunedin for the first Test.And yet it was not until the New Zealand second innings got underwaythat India asserted itself and put itself on the road to victory.Graham Dowling’s 143 and his record second wicket partnership of 155runs with Bevan Congdon (58) saw New Zealand get 350. Consistentbatting down the order saw India gain a first innings lead of nineruns. This was one of the rare occasions when all the Indian batsmenreached double figures and the scores ranged between 12 and 80. But itwas the last wicket stand of 57 between No 10 Ramakant Desai (32) andNo 11 Bishen Bedi (22) that really proved vital for it enabled them totake the lead. Desai, playing in the last of his 28 Tests, put up abrave show. Early in the innings, his jaw had been fractured by a ballfrom Dick Motz. But he continued batting and put on India’s best tenthwicket stand against New Zealand. In the second innings, ErapalliPrasanna (6 for 94) proved too strong for the home team batsmen andrestricted them to a total of 208. Left with a target of 200, Indiathanks chiefly to Ajit Wadekar (71), Rusi Surti (44) and their thirdwicket partnership of 103 runs, coasted home early on the finalmorning. Whatever the opposition, it was a victory to rejoice for noone could take away its historic aspect.The Indian team however suffered a setback a week later when, againstall expectations, they lost the second Test at Christchurch by sixwickets. A mighty 239 by the new captain Dowling ­ New Zealand’s bestscore in Tests ­ saw the home team rattle up 502 and India were thenalways struggling to stay in the game. The inability of any Indianbatsman to match Dowling or even come up with a century was a factorin the ultimate defeat for in the two innings, the top scores were 67and 63. India were all out for 288, and in the follow on hardly didany better getting 301. New Zealand knocked up the required 88 runsfor the loss of four wickets to register their first victory overIndia.Recovering quickly, the Indians showed New Zealand that they were thebetter team and in the next two weeks scored victories by eightwickets and 272 runs to take the series by a comfortable 3-1 margin.Prasanna (5 for 32) bowled out New Zealand for 186 in the firstinnings of the third Test at Wellington and then Wadekar played theanchor role to perfection in getting 143, his only Test century. Indiaobtained a first innings lead of 141 and then Nadkarni (6 for 43) ranthrough the New Zealand second innings in his penultimate Test. Aninadequate total of 199 left India with only the formality of getting59 runs to go ahead in the series again. The Indians displayed theirsuperiority in no uncertain terms in the final Test at Auckland. Eighthours and 20 minutes of playing time were lost on the first two daysbut the visitors took this in their stride. Though they wererestricted to 252, the Indians with Prasanna (4 for 44) again in fineform got a stranglehold early on the fourth morning by dismissing NewZealand for 140. Tey then consolidated their position by declaring thesecond innings at 261 for five on the fifth morning. Surti, out for99, was destined never to get a Test hundred. A victory target of 374was purely academic and the only interest was whether New Zealandwould save the game. Prasanna (4 for 40) and Bedi (3 for 14) made sureof a third Indian victory by dismissing the home team for 101. It notonly signaled India’s maiden series win abroad, but was also the firsttime that India had won three victories in any rubber. Prasanna’sbowling, which gave him 24 wickets, was the main highlight of theseries.

India’s 2001 tour of South Africa came to an end four overs after lunch on the final day of what, at this stage anyway, remains an unofficial Test match – a five-day international friendly, if you will. The match, the tour and, some would still argue, the series finished when Jacques Kallis trapped Deep Dasgupta lbw to give the home team victory by an innings and 73 runs.The final setback for India was the inability of their last two batsmen, Javagal Srinath and Venkatesh Prasad, to come to the crease. Srinath has a fracture finger, Prasad a pinched nerve in his neck and the Indian innings closed at 261 for eight.It was not, then, a tour and a series that will be remembered with fondness by India, either for performances on the field and the events that surrounded it off the pitch. At the end of it all Shaun Pollock reiterated his views offered after the first day’s play that South Africa had not regarded the game as a proper Test.Pollock tends to be careful when he speaks in public, but he did offer the thought that if nothing else the Denness affair has underlined the need for the ICC to standardise its disciplinary regulations and procedures. If players knew that this penalty would be imposed for this offence and that penalty for that offence, he said, then players would at least know where they stood.The implication is that as a result behaviour might improve. This may seem blindingly obvious, but the match referee system has been in place for a decade during which time standards of behaviour have fallen and at the end of which a match referee has plunged the game into serious crisis.As has been the case for almost the entire tour, the Indians were unable to withstand the South Africans on the last day even though the tourists were supposed to be treating the match as an official Test while the South Africans were playing a practice game.Rahul Dravid took three fours off Nantie Hayward’s first over and was then bowled by a snorter that angled in and then held its line to take off stump and India were off to a poor start.Sachin Tendulkar was dropped by Gary Kirsten at gully off a dolly of a catch, spanked it around a bit before being bowled for 40 by Makhaya Ntini as he failed to offer a shot and VVS Laxman clipped Ntini straight to Herschelle Gibbs at point to be caught for 23.Thereafter the Indian innings subsided gently. There was, in truth, very little fight left in the tourists. They have been systematically unravelled by a tough South African team, a fair bit of ill-fortune and, in the end, the controversy that has swirled around their heads. It is difficult to imagine a better-equipped, mentally more resilient side faring much better.South Africa, then, took the series 2-0 (or 1-0, if you wish, the ICC seems to be having difficult making up its mind about this) which is a fair reflection of the difference between the two teams in South African conditions.Indian coach John Wright acknowledged as much even as he had to tread the official line that India had played the game as a real Test."We lost," he said. "We got beaten. We did not approach the game in any other manner than as a Test match."Pollock was named man of the match for his unbeaten 113 while Herschelle Gibbs, who scored hundreds in both the first two Tests, was named man of the series.

Zimbabwe successfully recovered from their chastening 38 all out on Saturdayto defeat a West Indies side that looks ill at ease after a spate ofinjuries, disciplinary problems and a three-Test drumming by Sri Lanka.The four-wicket victory, played out in front of empty Sinhalese Sports Clubstadium, ended a 28-match run stretching back 10-months in which Zimbabwehad not beaten any team bar Bangladesh.Indeed, so lackluster does the West Indies team now look, that one wouldfear for them in a series against Bangladesh. Their batting was sloppy,fielding nervy and bowling unthreatening, which was hardly unexpected aftertheir best two bowlers, Dinanath Ramnarine (side injury) and Mervyn Dillon(disciplinary reasons), had been sent home.West Indies – unsurprisingly asked to bat first when Zimbabwean captainStuart Carlisle won the toss for the first time all tour – failed tocapitalise on an easy-paced pitch that had long since lost the moisture thathad assisted Chaminda Vaas yesterday, as they were bowled out for 173 byZimbabwe’s makeshift spin attack and plodding seamers.Zimbabwe too looked short of confidence and edged towards the winning targetwith the uncertain air of a side too used to failure. However, thanks to achancy 30 from Grant Flower, a responsible 47 from Carlisle and an unbeaten48 from Andy Flower, they eventually secured victory with 1.5 overs tospare.West Indies batting faltered right from the start as Chris Gayle recordedhis fourth duck in consecutive international matches; a slump that stretchesback to the second Test in Kandy. This time, though, it wasn’t his techniquethat was at fault, but his running, as Dion Ebrahim threw down the stumpsfrom backward point.Heath Streak then managed what the Sri Lankans have failed to do all tour:dismiss Brian Lara cheaply. The star left-hander walked across his stumpsand was trapped lbw for two (nine for two).Ramnaresh Sarwan and Daren Ganga rescued the innings with a forthright 57run partnership for the third wicket. Ganga went on to score 59, his fifthone-day fifty, but Sarwan, uncharacteristically, threw away his wicket withan ungainly swipe across the line to be clean bowled for 36 (66 for three).Carl Hooper was then run out for five after Ganga tried to nudge a quicksingle on the off-side, only to see his plan anticipated by the energeticHenry Olonga, who fielded in his follow through and knocked down the stumpswith an underarm flick (77 for four).Ganga partially made amends in a 60 run stand with Marlon Samuels beforeGrant Flower’s innocuous looking spinners swung the match firmly towardsZimbabwe, as Samuels (32) chipped a catch to mid-wicket and Ganga was caughtand bowled (152 for six).Thereafter, Zimbabwe’s fast bowers chipped away at the lower order. RidleyJacobs tried to rally but, running out of partners, was eventually last man outfor 20 as Streak took a smart, juugling catch on the mid-wicket boundary.Zimbabwe’s start didn’t engender great confidence, as Dion Ebrahim wastrapped lbw for his second consecutive golden duck to the first ball of theinnings.But Grant Flower, missed on 19 when wicket-keeper Jacobs should have divedin front of first slip and on 26 when Ganga dropped a dolly at mid-on, added59 with Carlisle to steady dressing room nerves.Those nerves started to fray again when Carlise was third man out for 47 (96for three) as Craig Wishart (12), Douglas Marillier (5) and Tatenda Taibu(0) were dismissed cheaply.However a calming innings from the prolific Andy Flower, coupled with somesolid lower order support from the experienced Heath Streak (19*), saw theZimbabwean’s home.

The dateline might have changed but there wasn’t too much difference in the look of the scoreline as openers Justin Langer and Matthew Haydencombined to hand Australia early command of the Third Test against South Africa in Sydney today.Exactly as they had been through the final five months of 2001, Langer (126) and Hayden (105) were emphatically on song at the start of 2002,hoisting Australia toward a mark of 5/308 by stumps on the match’s opening day.In adding 219 for the opening wicket after captain Steve Waugh had won the toss on another warm morning in hazy, bushfire-charred Sydney, thepair remarkably raised a fourth double century stand for the summer. It now means that no opening pairing in the annals of Test cricket hasregistered more partnerships in excess of the 200 mark. And there certainly hasn’t been any in history that has scored as many within the space ofjust nine appearances as a combination.The home team’s position was weakened nonetheless when a hard-working attack hit back to claim all five of the day’s wickets in the final session.It was in that period that Hayden edged a Shaun Pollock (2/64) delivery to slip and Langer played off bat and pad to silly point fieldsman NeilMcKenzie from the bowling of the sparingly used Nicky Boje (1/25). In between those dismissals, Ricky Ponting (14) – not the first time in thisseries – was run out after Langer had pushed a ball to cover and set off the stroke. Later, Steve Waugh (30) also succumbed, beaten as he playedoutside the line of a Pollock off cutter with the second new ball. And Mark Waugh (19) then complicated matters in the very last over, perishing ashe cut errantly at Allan Donald (1/64) and edged a catch to wicketkeeper Mark Boucher.Yet Langer and Hayden’s efforts ensured that this was again a day largely owned by Australia.There was a nervous period for the twin left handers through the opening half-hour as both Pollock and Donald extracted notable seam movementwith the new ball. Langer’s outside edge, in particular, was beaten more than once and he later played two shots over the slips cordon and onethrough it in the air.Accordingly, it wasn’t an opening partnership based on the sort of total domination of the attack that has characterised some of their previousefforts. But it was pretty darn impressive all the same.Langer’s 12th Test century – and an astonishing fourth for the 2001-02 summer alone – was typically full of well-crafted strokes, many of themreleased from off the back foot.For its part, Hayden’s seventh Test century – also a fourth for the season – was raised more slowly and its arrival was not accompanied by quite thesame degree of exuberance. But it was similarly punctuated by a series of powerful strokes, with one crunching cover driven boundary off Donaldbefore tea even staking claim to be classed as the shot of the entire Test summer.Through a wretched middle session, the South Africans’ woes were further compounded as Boeta Dippenaar’s penchant in this series for ending onthe wrong side of catches continued. With the total at 168, Dippenaar dropped a comfortable waist-high offering at square leg as Hayden (on 68)miscued a sweep at Claude Henderson (0/28). Therein it extended a run of misfortune that has seen the young South African spill three chances inthe series and fall to three barely conceivable catches when it has come his own turn to hit balls in the air.Worse was to come just before tea when Boucher failed to grasp an outside edge as Langer – on 102 – pressed half-forward at Boje.Confirmation from national selector Graeme Pollock on ABC Radio that the team originally chosen to play in the match was vetoed overnight by the United Cricket Board of South Africa (UCBSA) failed to ease the sense of calamity either.The UCBSA adopts a policy that at least one coloured player should always be part of its eleven, and accordingly chose to supplement Herschelle Gibbs’ presence with the inclusion of young all-rounder Justin Ontong in the side ahead of batsman Jacques Rudolph.But it still represented something of a shock move, albeit that Ontong was by no means the Proteas’ worst player on a day when he bowled two tidy overs and orchestrated the departure of Ponting.

Future use of technology will be placed on the agenda for the International Cricket Council meeting to be held in Christchurch on February 10-11.New Zealand Cricket’s chief executive Martin Snedden commented after yesterday’s controversial moment in the New Zealand-South Africa VB Series match in Hobart when umpire Daryl Harper made a wrong call on a Chris Cairns appeal for a caught and bowled dismissal in the vital last overs against South African batsman Mark Boucher.Harper indicated he thought the dismissal was a bump ball but the television replay, which Harper was not entitled to check with the third umpire, clearly showed Boucher was out.Following an incident in the first New Zealand-Australia Test in Brisbane when Justin Langer was given not out from a bump ball after a third umpire opinion, the ICC ruled that such matters could not be referred to the third umpire.Snedden was aware of the changed ruling and for this reason would like to see more discussion from the ICC’s Cricket Committee Management, or all the chief executive officers of the ICC, in Christchurch.”My view still is that if the technology is 100 per cent accurate and quick then we should use it.”New Zealand is more inclined to say, ‘Let’s use the technology’ but other countries are not quite so concerned and have conflicting views,” he said.

The England and Wales Cricket Board has described the practice facilities currently provided for the tourists in Kolkata as unacceptable.The England coach, Duncan Fletcher, has complained about the state of the nets provided at the Kolkata Sports and Cricket Club, but Indian officials claimed they would not be treated any differently if they were touring England.Fletcher is unhappy about the standard of the wickets, lights and the time allotted for practice at the nearby ground.”It’s not the right way to treat an international side who have come out herefor an important one-day series because you have to prepare properly for anyseries,” Fletcher said.”It’s dangerous in the nets because if you hit a leg-side shot in the firstnet, it shoots through to the other net and could take someone out. How can you concentrate when that’s going on?”When you pitch up somewhere you expect decent practice facilities, where they are we don’t really care. The wickets have not been conducive to good one-day practice. At the moment you can’t play shots you would play in one-day international cricket.”You’re basically playing defensive cricket because the ball’s doing too muchand the nets were wet yesterday and dangerous. You would expect nice flatwickets so you can practice your cricket and bowlers can learn to bowl on flatwickets.”The ECB’s Chief Executive Tim Lamb and Director of Cricket Operations John Carr have been engaged in a lengthy dialogue with their counterparts at the BCCI, secretary Niranjan Shah and president Jagmohan Dalmiya.They had requested a switch to Eden Gardens, the venue for Saturday’s opening one-day international, but a spokesman for the cricket association of Bengal, who maintain Eden Gardens, insisted England would only be allowed a single practice session there as previously scheduled on Tuesday.”It isn’t possible for England to practice there because we’re busy preparing Eden Gardens for the one-day international,” claimed the spokesman.”We can only make it available for training as decided earlier. I’m sure ifthe Indian team had landed for a match at Lord’s or some other top Test centrein England, they would not be allowed access to the main arena.”The England camp say they have been given several other reasons why Eden Gardens is unavailable. Fletcher was told it was because of security concerns, but the police claim it would be easier to patrol the team there.The current problems follow lengthy discussions about the forthcoming one-day series, during which India threatened to withdraw from next summer’s final Test at the Oval if England did not agree to play a five-Test series in 2003-4.England eventually added a further one-day international to the five already scheduled, and switched their warm-up sessions from Mumbai to Kolkata, where the first match was to be played.It has left England with just one warm-up game and five more days practice before they play the first one-day international in front of an estimated 100,000 crowd on Saturday.”The home Board has a responsibility for providing good net facilities tovisiting teams and there is no excuse for failing to do that,” Lamb said.”It is totally unacceptable to be provided with facilities like this and wehave protested strongly to the BCCI and will continue to do so.”Once we had made the decision to warm-up in Kolkata and then only had eightdays to practice, it was obviously very important to be provided with goodfacilities, and that hasn’t happened.”

New Zealand’s prospective players for next summer’s World Cup have been put on notice by selection convener Sir Richard Hadlee.With the National Bank Series tied up at 2-2 going into Tuesday’s series decider at Carisbrook in Dunedin, Hadlee told CricInfo today that the side’s performances had been disappointing.”If we had made the progress we thought we had then we would have nailed England at Napier and made it 3-0,” he said.”But at least we are finding out some things about players,” he said.The selectors had not made any changes to the team as they felt with another round of domestic games starting tomorrow there was little point in taking a player from those games to effectively be 12th man in Dunedin.New Zealand’s failure to develop some consistency had been of concern to the selectors, especially after winning four out of five games in Australia, then losing five in a row, winning two against England, and then losing two.”Realistically, we’ve won two out of our last nine games,” he said.Hadlee was not concerned that New Zealand was running short of time before the World Cup to sort out the final side.”We’ve got plenty of time,” he said.There was the Sharjah tournament, the Pakistan series, the West Indies series, the ICC Knockout tournament and New Zealand’s home series against India next summer.”There are lots of competitions available to us.”But some players are not helping themselves,” he said.England had improved during the one-day series but Hadlee backed England captain Nasser Hussain’s comment that two bad matches don’t mean you are a bad team.”New Zealand are still good enough to turn it around,” he said.Hadlee also said that he expected all members of the one-day side to play the next round of State Championship matches, “unless they have a very good reason not to.”Some of the players needed to take part in those games to work on their form to be ready for what was shaping as a pretty tough series, he said.He said the first Test team to play England would be named four or five days before the Test which starts in Christchurch on Wednesday, March 13.

England’s World Cup match against Zimbabwe in Harare on February 13th will go ahead as planned after the International Cricket Council revealed that there had been no formal motion tabled by the England and Wales Cricket Board to have the fixture moved.According to the ICC as neither England nor Australia or the Netherlands – the other countries that had expressed concern about going to Zimbabwe – had requested a change of venue, no decision had to be taken by ICC. New Zealand had requested that their fixture in Nairobi be switched but the ICC said that it was felt “there were not sufficient reasons to move the game.”In making the announcement at a press conference in London, ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed said: “On the issue of Zimbabwe, no country sought to have the matches moved, so no decision was required.”Concerns have been raised by England, Australia and Holland over scheduled matches. We need to sit down with these countries to see if adequate security is in place. No one went to the stage of requesting a formal motion.”The fact that the ECB delegate, new chairman David Morgan, had not formally requested a change of venue was a major surprise. However, the ECB issued a statement immediately after the announcement in which it said Mr Morgan did “make strong remarks to the board about the broader issue of safetyand security at all matches.”Whether that will satisfy the players remains to be seen, but the ECB statement made it clear that the captain, Nasser Hussain was fully briefed by the chairman last night on the approach he was going to take.Morgan gave his account of what happened during the meeting. “It was clear from the mood of the teleconference that there was an implacable and overwhelming feeling that the recommendations of the report should be accepted,” he said.On the question of being seen to be out of step with the expressed views of the players, Morgan added: “I want to put the broader issue of the possibility of civil unrest and the threat of terrorism into very stark perspective.”If there are demonstrations and rioting in Harare during the England versus Zimbabwe match this is not just an issue for the two countries directly concerned, it is an issue for all the countries taking part in the World Cup.”We should all be concerned about this matter, just as we should all be concerned about any safety and security concerns in Kenya affecting New Zealand, Kenya and Sri Lanka.”The security risk at all matches will, of course, vary according to where the match is being played and which countries are taking part in the match.”In that sense, the risk factor at each match must be individually assessed and evaluated.”If there are significant security and safety problems, it will blight the whole 2003 World Cup with an indelible stain.”It will reflect very badly on cricket and, indeed, everyone associated with the World Cup. No one will escape blame. We will all have to bear collective responsibility.”If, in the next few days/weeks, there is a discernible deterioration in safety and security surrounding particular matches then decisions must be urgently reviewed and, if necessary, matches moved. We must all reserve our right for this to happen.”The ICC’s decision was taken after lengthy consultations with all boards, player representatives, the diplomatic corps, the World Cup organising committee which takes responsibility for all security matters, and from the respected security consultants, Kroll, who had been asked for a report on the situation.The Kroll report, according to the ECB statement, was “categorical in its ultimate assessment that it is safe and secure for all six matches in Zimbabwe to proceed as planned.”This is the same organisation that reported to the State Department in Washington, advising United States citizens: “The Department of State warns US citizens of the risks of travel to Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe is in the midst of political, economic, and humanitarian crises with serious implications for the security situation in the country.”All US citizens in Zimbabwe are urged to take those measures they deem appropriate to ensure their well being, including consideration of departure from the country.”The Professional Cricketers’ Association, which had called for England’s game in Harare to be relocated to South Africa, tonight expressed “significant disappointment” at the ICC’s decision.Dealing with the point about New Zealand’s match against Kenya in Nairobi, Mr Speed said: “New Zealand sought to have the game relocated. This was opposed by Kenya.”New Zealand provided a report into the security situation, but the decision the board made was there were not sufficient reasons to move the game from Kenya.”New Zealand Cricket has threatened to boycott the fixture if it does go ahead, but the findings of the ICC board – a body dominated by cricket politics – is unlikely to be the end of the matter.As from next week, the conduct of the event passes to the World Cup Organising Committee. Among the personnel on that committee are Malcolm Speed, another Australian in ICC commercial director Campbell Jamieson and World Cup director Dr Ali Bacher. They are joined by two former players in Sunil Gavaskar from India and Michael Holding from the West Indies and a member of the South African board, Brian Basson.It could well be that part of the ECB’s strategy is to register its concern, as it has done, now and then put its trust in the World Cup Organising Committee to act within its safety and security mandate to have the matches switched. Such a move might not have been possible in the tense political climate of the ICC board meeting and, even if cricket is not shown up in a good light for the time being, the end result might well justify a strategy that will undoubtedly attract widespread criticism now.

JOHANNESBURG – West Indies manager Ricky Skerritt made a telling observation on his team following their World Cup defeat against New Zealand at Port Elizabeth four days ago."It was a very good test for the lads and perhaps a reminder that we haven’t gone as far forward as we would have liked to have gone," he noted.Skerritt was not taking a swing at anyone, but rather touching on the point that the West Indies team still needs to be more analytical in their approach and clinical in the execution of their duties.The West Indies let the Kiwis off the hook at the death of the innings, and then could not find the resolve to reach what was a challenging but not insurmountable target."We have the opportunity still to show we can do well in this competition and we now have the real test ahead," Skerritt added.Many observers believed the West Indies turned the corner from their barren run when they played brilliantly on recent tours of India and Bangladesh.With the return of Brian Lara and the excellent win over South Africa in the opening match, the Windies announced themselves as a good bet for at least the semifinals.The manager noted that the team is mentally very strong and the defeat against New Zealand served as a reminder that the other sides are very competitive and hard work must be put in to gain the necessary results.Some of this hard work was put in yesterday morning when the team had an intense three-hour net session at the Woolmore Stadium in Benoni, 20 kilometres outside Johannesburg.The only worry is a back complaint to left-arm fast bowler Pedro Collins, and he is being well looked after by physiotherapist Suzette Liebenberg, who has been hired on contract for the World Cup.She is the wife of former South African wicket-keeper Gerhardus Liebenberg and has worked with the Free State team for the past six years.The West Indies also have other South Africans in their camp. Russell Metzer, a young business graduate who is pursuing a degree in physiotherapy and who has worked with Eastern Province, was hired as massage therapist for the duration of the World Cup. An architect is the baggage officer and a business manager is liaison officer.Today, the team goes to Actonville for a coaching clinic with junior players from Guateng, but it will be Tuesday’s match against Bangladesh at Benoni which will be foremost on their minds.