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Clive Hitchcock, ICC Event Manager for ICC Trophy 2001 will follow MikeCorley into Toronto for a follow-up series of meetings with the CCA andmembers of the ’01 Committee and venue managers. Mike Corley, Ground Consultant to the CCA and the ICC recently paid his firstvisit to Canada to assess and to start final preparations on the grasswickets for the ICC Trophy 2001. Mike Corley who was also the GroundConsultant for IMG/TWI’s Sahara Cup series of Games between Pakistan and India was also responsible for the installation and maintenance of wickets at Ajax, Maple Leaf C.C., G. Ross Lord and Sunnybrook and at Malton C.C’s Wildwood Park in Mississauga.The University of Guelph’s internationally renowned Turfgrass Institute has provided invaluable technical support and assistance.Special thanks must also go the municipalities of Mississauga, Toronto, Ajax and King City for their outstanding previous and for their future support.The staging of the largest cricket tournament in the world with 24 countries will set the stage for the further rapid development of Canadian and Americas cricket. Of course three of the participating countries will qualify to take part in the 2003 World Cup in South Africa.The 800 million people in the Americas are a natural base of support for this great game. Can cricket supplant or successfully compete with Olympic sports like soccer, track and field and basketball?We can and we must do so in the shortest possible timeframe. The alternative is to face even more competition with other sports entities like NHL Hockey which are widely televised and emerging sports like ringette. We must generate more market exposure.

Lymington’s Ben Craft and Charles Forward, the hard-hitting Old Tauntonians & Romsey left-hander, made hay in the sunshine, cracking big centuries in the respective Southern Electric Premier League Division 2 victories.Craft flayed the Hambledon attack for 139 as Lymington swept to a second consecutive win, while Forward made 136 in OTs victory over United Services.The lanky Craft lashed three 6s and 12 fours in his 139 as Lymington rattled up 277-9 (Brian Clemow 47) before dismissing Hambledon for 197.The Don’s responded well at 103-1, but fell apart against the penetrating spin of Glyn Treagus (5-44) and Daniel Peacock (3-19).Forward led the way with 136 as OTs piled up 286-5 (Ian Tulk 55) against United Services in a match cut to 46 overs because the heavy roller broke down on the square before the start of play.South African teenager John Geoghan thumped an impressive 64, but apart from Damien Carson (35), received little support as the subtle left-arm spin of Nick Wood (4038) sent US sliding to 207 all out.An undefeated 95 by Tim Richings carried Sparsholt to a five-wicket win over Old Basing – a victory that was not without its problems.Chasing Old Basing’s 190 (Mark Richards 76), Sparsholt were plunged into trouble at 35-4 by Mark Andrews (5-59).But Richings found a reliable partner in Carl Nichols (54), whose century fifth-wicket partnership turned the tide in Sparsholt’s favour.Title favourites Portsmouth also got themselves out of jail, Raj Maru’s side collapsing to 70-7 before Paul Dew’s crucial 63 not out secured a two-wicket win over Trojans at St Helen’s, Southsea.Marvin Sandiford (4-35) single-handedly cleaned out Portsmouth’s star studded top order, removing Hampshire’s Lawrie Prittipaul (4) and former county pair Lee Savident (0), Matthew Keech (2) before having South Africa Under-19 starlet Stephen Cook (25) caught behind.Portsmouth, responding to Trojans’ 140-8 (Nigel le Bas 36, Mike Durand 25), rallied when Maru (20) joined Dew in a key 50-run eighth-wicket stand, which lifted the city club to 120-8.Pete Hayward added a further 20 with Dew to see off the disappointed Trojans.Newly promoted Easton & Martyr Worthy were put in a spin by Cove pair Matt Smith (5-22) and Joe Ashton (4-13) at Cockets Mead.The spin duo sent Easton sliding to 86 all out – and a 91-run defeat – after Hampshire Under-19 left-hander Neil Randall (43) had top scored in Cove’s 177-8.

India always seem to do spectacularly well in must-win situations – round-robin games needed to be won for qualification, matches needed to keep a series alive, targets to be obtained to maintain a qualifying run-rate. On all of these occasions, they manage to find one man to carry the team. On Saturday at Hyderabad, that man was Yuvraj Singh.Freshly drafted, along with Murali Kartik, into the squad for the final two one-dayers, Yuvraj was coming off a booming double century in the Duleep Trophy, an innings resounding with trademark strokes at trademark strike-rates. With that kind of streak, he must have been disappointed that he could not slip into gloves and pads straight away, having to first field for 50 overs as Stuart Carlisle won the toss and opted to bat.India’s opening bowlers responded with aggression to a two-paced, unpredictable pitch, with both Zaheer Khan and Ajit Agarkar maintaining tight line and length. Agarkar struck first, removing the in-form Alistair Campbell caught off a nippy delivery in the slips. Three balls later, Agarkar again delivered surprising pace, this time Travis Friend gloving a bouncer to Ajay Ratra.Dion Ebrahim and a freshly returned Andy Flower settled down after the early blows to sedately milk the bowling, but controlled medium-pace from Sourav Ganguly proved the downfall of the former. Attempting to hit the Indian skipper over mid-wicket, Ebrahim (38, 74b, 5×4) only presented Dravid with his second catch of the day.Andy and Grant Flower did some consolidation of their own, running well between the wickets and resorting to the boundary only when needed. Grant made 45 (58b, 4×4) before he hit Harbhajan Singh down Dinesh Mongia’s throat. Andy, on his part, proceeded calmly to reverse-sweep as to the manner born, punishing Kartik in particular. Zaheer Khan finally removed the southpaw caught behind for 89 (107b, 6×4), but Carlisle hurried to 40 (33b, 3×4) in helping Zimbabwe reach 240 for eight. For India, Agarkar’s analysis of 12-2-32-4 was the defining factor in restricting their opponents.But even that target seemed distant when Douglas Hondo had Ganguly caught by Grant Flower for just seven. Dinesh Mongia, who has been in good form during this series, has not been able to convert starts into big scores. Here again, presented with an opportunity to do his reputation and record reams of good, he fell after an attractive 30, hitting five fours in his 32-ball innings.VVS Laxman, playing an international match in his home ground for the very first time, looked to serve up a sizzling display of batting for his loyal supporters, but, two fine boundaries later, he was tamely caught behind off Friend for 13 (21b). Suddenly, at 56 for three, Zimbabwe looked menacing under the lights of the Lal Bahadur Shastri stadium.Dravid and Mohammad Kaif put on 76 runs for the fourth wicket, with the former blocking resolutely when needed and turning the ball off the square for singles otherwise. Kaif, however, was the real revelation; after his fighting knock at Kochi, he gave further evidence of his level-headedness. Even when Dravid was bowled by Grant Flower for 32 (56b, 3×4), Kaif fought on. The stage, however, was not his any more from that point onwards.Hailed by many as the future of Indian cricket after his blitzes at Kenya against Australia, Yuvraj slipped thereafter in form and consequently national reckoning. But on his return to the one-day team, he played with an aura that was at once nostalgic of Nairobi and futuristic in execution.Boundaries flowed at will as Yuvraj cut, pulled and drove both slower and faster bowlers; Grant Flower could only watch as one delivery was dispatched with contempt for six. The Punjab youngster raced along to catch up with Kaif, who, every time he was on strike, sensibly ran a hard single so that he could watch the histrionics at the other end.One misjudged run ended Kaif’s innings on 68 (101b, 3×4), but with less than 20 runs to get at that stage, India were clear favourites. It may have been Agarkar who hit the winning boundary in the first ball of the 49th over, but Hyderabad applauded Yuvraj Singh (80, 60b, 8×4, 1×6) all the way to the pavilion.

New Zealand, having been one of the beneficiaries of the bonus points system in this summer’s VB Series in Australia, now believe there is little benefit in continuing with the use of bonus points in One-Day Internationals.That’s the view the NZC operations manager, John Reid, has been putting to the ICC Cricket Committee – Playing in Cape Town.Because of the early lead it gained in the VB Series, New Zealand was able to milk the points system by conceding a bonus point to South Africa to shut Australia out of the finals.”The bonus point system can be manipulated and provide an incentive not to win an individual game.”Cricket must be seen to be ‘squeaky clean’ in terms of integrity of matches and must not be open to manipulation by teams.”The opportunity to lose a game to qualify for a final or win a series must not be provided,” Reid said.While New Zealand used the system in Australia, the Australians had tried to use the carry-over points structure to their advantage to deny New Zealand a place in the Super Six of the last World Cup.”New Zealand’s recent experience of the bonus points system during the VB Series in Australia demonstrated it had little benefit in encouraging positive play and instead revealed the significant downside of a team being encouraged to play less than its full potential in order to advance further in the competition.”NZC have not yet decided the fate of bonus points in the State Shield competition and will consider the matter in their end of season review.NZC also wants to see the extension of new technology to include bump balls.This had resulted in several bump ball incidents during the summer resulting in incorrect decisions.”Technology in each instance would have clarified the issue. It seems sensible to provide the umpires with support when often they and the players involved are not able to be certain about the ball’s trajectory,” he said.

The United Cricket Board held a very productive meeting today with formerplayers, administrators and current players to evaluate the state of cricketin South Africa. Key issues on the agenda related to the management of thenational team, coaching, team leadership, discipline and the question oftransformation.Discussions also ranged around the performance of thenational side against Australia in the recent series to matters of selectionand planning for World Cup 2003.UCB CEO Gerald Majola, who convened the meeting, told delegates that the aimof the exercise was to “allow for introspection and to begin a process thatwould enable the UCB to prepare adequately administratively and on the fieldfor the World Cup”.”We want a plan in place to win the World Cup and to set up a process thatwould take cricket beyond the tournament. We want to make South Africa thenumber one side in the world,” Mr Majola added.Mr Majola stressed that the views that the participants had expressed on awide range of issues affecting South African cricket would inform the UCB inits strategy for the tournament.The meeting was split into two sessions, with the first group made up offormer players – including Pat Symcox, Peter Kirsten, Omar Henry, CraigMatthews, Hugh Page, Eric Simons, Andrew Hudson and Fanie de Villiers.Alsoat the morning session were the former Managing Director of the UCB, Dr AliBacher, and some provincial coaches.The afternoon session consisted ofcurrent players, Shaun Pollock, Jonty Rhodes, Gary Kirsten, Makhaya Ntini,Steve Elworthy, Ashwell Prince and Mark Boucher. The national teammanagement and selectors also took part in the afternoon workshop.Both sessions were characterised by a healthy exchange of ideas in apositive and constructive atmosphere.The workshop decided to ask the UCB General Council to consider theestablishment of a National Cricket Committee to assist the UCB to plan andstrategize cricket issues for the World Cup.The composition of thecommittee will be determined by the UCB General Council. Its primaryfunction will be to provide advice on the management of the national teamand to develop a cricketing strategy for the team – with a primary focus onthe 2003 ICC Cricket World Cup. Mr Majola will table the matter at the nextCouncil meeting on Saturday.Commenting on the meeting, Mr Majola said: “It’s no easy task to get afocussed set of proposals from such a wide ranging group of individuals. Butwe are united in our desire to ensure the World Cup is ours and all thosepresent agreed to do whatever necessary to make that happen. We recognisethe importance of rallying the nation behind the national team and hope thatwe can move forward in unity from now on.”Mr Majola added his thanks to everyone who participated in the sessions. “Iwas impressed by the openness, the preparedness and the effort whicheveryone put in, as well as the fact that they gave so much of theirvaluable time to South African cricket.”In tribute to Walter Masimula, the Gauteng cricketer who passed away inEngland last week, there was a minute’s silence at the meeting.Media Contact:Bronwyn WilkinsonCommunications Director