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* Harbhajan aims to be an all-rounderHaving proved his bowling credentials, Harbhajan Singh is nowconcentrating his energies on improving his batting too in order tobecome a potent all-rounder. The Indian off spinner, who earned arecord 32-wicket haul in the home Test series against Australia, hasmade the headlines on the current Zimbabwe tour for different reasons.Despite being the second highest wicket-taker for India in the Testseries, it was his gutsy contribution with the bat in both the Teststhat was more acknowledged. And Harbhajan, who turns 21 on July 3,himself knows his batting only too well.”I think my footwork is not very good but my eyesight is very good. Ican spot it (the ball) early,” he told PTI in an interview inBulawayo. He said his crucial knock in the Chennai Test againstAustralia had given him the confidence that he can get some runs too.”The point is if you bat well in an international series once, youhave the confidence to do it again. (After the knock againstAustralia) I said to myself: ‘If you can get it against Australia, youcan get it against any team’.”* Vengsarkar is MCA selection committee chairmanFormer Indian captain Dilip Vengsarkar has been appointed chairman ofthe senior selection committee by the Cricket Improvement Committee(CIC) of the Mumbai Cricket Association (MCA) for the 2001-2002season. The decision to appoint Vengsarkar was taken by the MCA at itsmeeting held in Mumbai on Thursday, an MCA release said. The othermembers of the committee include Raju Kulkarni, Abdul Ismail andSudhir Naik.The Under-19 and MCA Colts committee includes Abdul Ismail as chairmanand Ranjan Baindoor, Sanjay Patil and Deepak Jadhav as members. AbeyKuruvilla has been appointed chairman of the junior selectioncommittee. Bharat Nadkarni, Tukaram Surve and Pradeep Kasliwal havebeen appointed as members.While Lalchand Rajput has been appointed as coach for the Ranji Trophyteam, Subhash Bandiwadekar and Chandrakant Pandit are the coaches forthe under-22 and under-19 teams respectively, the release said. DineshNanavaty has been appointed coach for the under-16 team and SuruNayak has been asked to coach the under-14 team.* BCCI yet to decide on Super Challenge SeriesThe Indian cricket team’s participation in the three-match limitedovers series against Australia in September was yet to be approved bythe Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).BCCI secretary JY Lele, told PTI in Mumbai on Thursday that a decisionwhether to accept the invitation from the Australian Cricket Board(ACB) to play would be taken at the Board’s working committee meetingto be held in the third week of July.”We had asked for a change in the dates from the ACB as they clashedwith the Asian Test championship tie with Pakistan from September13-17 and the ACB has acceded to our request,” he said. “However, thefinal decision whether to send a team for the series rests with theworking committee,” Lele said.

Celtic are interested in a deal to bring promising young defender Luke Graham to Parkhead.

What’s the talk?

That’s according to a report by The Courier, who claim that Ange Postecoglou’s side, as well as Arsenal and Rangers, sent scouts to watch the 18-year-old in action for youth side Lochee United on Saturday.

The centre-back has also caught the eye of Sheffield United, so much so that the Dundee FC starlet linked up with the Championship side on a week-long trial on Monday.

The next Jack Hendry

Considering the sheer amount of interest there currently is in the teenager, it is clear that expectations surrounding the defender’s future in the professional game are extremely high.

Indeed, Dundee U18 coach, Scott Robertson, said of the left-footed centre-back prior to his switch to Sheffield United: “It will be a great experience for him, no matter how it goes.

“Luke has only been in full-time for a year and, through challenging circumstances with [the pandemic] and all that brings, has really progressed. He’s come on physically, mentally, tactically – everything we want to see. It’s credit to him how far he has come. He’s been making real strides recently.”

And, while Graham is yet to make his professional bow for the Dark Blues, it would seem that there are already very clear comparisons that can be drawn between the 18-year-old and another former Dundee starlet – Jack Hendry.

Indeed, both Celtic and Rangers were also interested in the 22-year-old back in February 2018, before the Hoops splashed £1.5m in order to secure the signing of the promising defender.

However, while the decision to loan the Scotland international out to KV Oostende with a £990k option to buy clause ultimately proved to be something of a mistake on the part of the Bhoys – as the centre-back is now valued at £5.4m and is highly impressing for Club Brugge – the fact remains that Celtic initially identified the defender’s talent while playing at Dens Park.

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As such, with the early signs appearing to suggest that Graham could be just as talented as Hendry – if not more so – it would indeed appear a very wise move for Postecoglou to do all he can to land the teenager ahead of the other interested parties this summer.

AND in other news: Sold at £18m, now worth £7.2m: Celtic hit the jackpot on “desperate” £25k-p/w disaster

	Tim Southee celebrates his first Test wicket. the second followed almost immediately © Getty Images

Debut of the day
New Zealand like to blood their cricketers young. Maybe not as young as the subcontinental nations, but they’ve still had five 18-year-old debutants in their history, including the current captain, Daniel Vettori. Therefore at 19 years and 102 days, Tim Southee was an old sweat by comparison, and he bowled like one as well, with guile, accuracy and stamina, and at a waspish mid-80mph pace that gave all of England’s batsmen the hurry-up. At the recent Under-19 World Cup in Malaysia, he took 17 wickets at 6.64, and today he didn’t alter his mindset one iota despite the apparent step-up in class. Within his first three overs, he had claimed the wickets of two England captains, Michael Vaughan and Andrew Strauss, and then struck again with his second delivery with the new ball to remove none other than Kevin Pietersen.Innings of the day
Pietersen has been in the doldrums of late, his mindset seemingly muddled by his side’s ongoing failings. He hadn’t passed fifty in any of his previous ten innings of the winter, but today he ended his drought in the most emphatic manner imaginable. This time, his hand was forced by the chaos going on around him. England were 4 for 3 in the blink of an eye, so rather than mope around in a repeat of his Hamilton dirge, Pietersen decided to cut loose on what – contrary to appearances – was a superb batting track. At the time of his dismissal, his superb 129 from 208 balls had comprised 62% of the team total, which placed it on a par with Graham Gooch’s famous 154 not out at Headingley in 1991. Its ultimate place in the annals will be decided by the manner in which England respond over the next four days.Shot of the day
Pietersen’s six count has been on the wane in recent years. He’s managed a meagre eight in 18 Tests since the start of the Ashes in 2006-07, which is fewer than he’d managed in any single season before that. But when he does decide to take the aerial route, they really do stay hit. Daniel Vettori discovered that in the 80th over of the innings, when Pietersen dropped to one knee and belted him onto the roof of the Western stand. With the new ball looming large, it looked as though there might be two ball changes within the space of an over, but up jumped a useful chap from the groundstaff to retrieve the errant missile from its resting place.Debut of the day Mk 2
There can’t have been many occasions in recent Test history when, as an attacking option, the wicketkeeper has stood up to a genuine medium-pacer inside the first 20 overs. But such was the luxury granted to Grant Elliott, the other debutant in New Zealand’s ranks. As Jacob Oram has spent the last two Tests demonstrating, defence is the best form of attack against this England line-up, and so Elliott proved with a probing maiden spell of 5-1-10-1. He offered the batsmen nothing as he adopted Oram’s wicket-to-wicket approach, then claimed the scalp of Ian Bell with arguably the first hittable ball of his spell. Bell completely muffed the shot, however, as his eyes lit up like a starving man, and two newbies had made vital incisions of the opening morning of the match.

Tom Moody is waiting to make his next move © AFP

Ric Charlesworth, the former Western Australia batsman, has rejected an approach to coach South Australia and believes a return to his former state is blocked by the imminent appointment of Tom Moody. Charlesworth, who guided the Australian women’s hockey team to two Olympic gold medals, is currently New Zealand Cricket’s high performance manager, but he has plenty of domestic and international vacancies to consider.Charlesworth told the West Australian he was approached by Rod Marsh, the South Australia high performance manager, last week but was not interested “at the moment”. “There are a range of options,” he said. “I’m not sure what I’m going to do.”While Moody has said he would not make a decision on his future until he spoke to the Sri Lankan board, Charlesworth said he talked to Western Australia officials and “Tom is going to do that job”. “That would have been the better option for me as it’s closer to home,” he said. “I think Tom is the right choice. They have done very well to get him.”The paper reported Moody was due to announce his plans to head back to Perth last week, but he delayed the decision when Sri Lanka made the final. It said he was likely to wait until after a welcome home reception in Colombo on Thursday.Greg Chappell, Dav Whatmore, John Buchanan and Bennett King stepped down after the World Cup to open up three international vacancies while the Australian Centre of Excellence also has a post available after Tim Nielsen’s promotion to the senior set-up. Wayne Phillips resigned from the South Australia job at the end of the Australian season and Wayne Clark stepped down from Western Australia.

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Malcolm Speed: ‘I have no intention of walking away from my position because of the issue’ © Getty Images

I read with interest on Saturday morning a story in the media reporting I had been sent a letter from stakeholders within Zimbabwe’s cricketing fraternity calling upon me to resign as CEO of the ICC over the organisation’s handling of that country’s cricketing problems.I have not yet received the letter but even if and when I do I have no intention of walking away from my position because of the issue. On the contrary, I am determined to use my role to try and ensure the matter is resolved in as satisfactory a way as possible for all sides.In relation to the letter, it is worth pointing out that the reports indicate it appears to emanate from a group of people currently outside the current Zimbabwe Cricket set-up. Their disenfranchisement may help to explain why they appear to have an axe to grind and I am a convenient target but their accusations against the ICC are wide of the mark.Those accusations ignore the make-up of the organisation. The ICC is not simply Malcolm Speed or Ehsan Mani [the president]. It is made up of 96 members, all of whom are charged to run cricket in their respective countries or territories without interference from the centre.From those 96 members come ten Full Members, of which Zimbabwe is one, and the representatives of those ten members, as well as three further delegates from the Associate and Affiliate members plus the chief executive, president and vice-president make up the Board of Directors.That group is charged with overseeing the running of the game on the world stage but it is not the ICC board’s responsibility to dictate how each individual member runs its own affairs. That would be impractical and would also be likely to provoke widespread opposition among members.Nevertheless, we have recognised the problems that exist within cricket in Zimbabwe and, within our framework, have endeavoured to help resolve them.I have previously travelled to Zimbabwe to discuss the situation with the chairman of Zimbabwe Cricket, Peter Chingoka, and players and their representatives. And as an organization, the ICC has consistently urged all disputing parties to get together and resolve any differences they may have.The ICC has welcomed the decision of Zimbabwe Cricket to step back from Test cricket while it tries to address its problems and has also endorsed the action points issued to its interim committee by the Zimbabwe Sports and Recreation Commission.These include dealing with allegations of financial mismanagement, ensuring disputes between players and the board are effectively addressed and providing certainty for other ICC members that the strongest possible Zimbabwe cricket team will be able to fulfil future international commitments.The ICC will continue to urge the interim committee to address the action points in an open and transparent manner and looks forward to hearing back from Chingoka with the results of that work at the meeting scheduled for October.In the meantime, the Zimbabwe team is performing competitively in its current ODI series against the West Indies but the ICC recognises that restoring the side to one that is competitive at Test level will take some time.As CEO I will do all I can to assist in that process and I have no intention of shirking the task.

Cricket Australia has said that it has no immediate plans to start playing Twenty20 matches, although it will continue to monitor the situation.James Sutherland, CA’s chief executive, said that the absence of any formal international competition meant it did not demand integration into an already-packed summer schedule.”We’re not wanting to jump into it,” Sutherland explained. “I guess one of our observations of it is that Pura Cup and ING Cup have talent development functions for the Australian cricket team. There’s no international cricket that’s played in the 20-over format so in some ways we’re reluctant to tinker with what is a tried and true format, that works really well for the success of our national team.”Twenty20 cricket has been a massive success in England where crowds have flocked to games. In July, more than 28,000 watched Middlesex play Surrey at Lord’s in a zonal match. It has also been successfully launched in South Africa, and other countries are adding it to domestic programmes.Australia are scheduled to play the first international 20-over game in New Zealand this season, and one against England during the Ashes tour in 2005.

Until the end of the Indian tour of Pakistan, we will be running a daily Paper Round of what newspapers in India and Pakistan, and from around the world, are saying about this series. This is what the media had to say today:Cometh the hour, cometh a pronouncement from Shoaib Akhtar. A year after being savaged by Sachin Tendulkar in a World Cup encounter at Centurion, Akhtar preached the team mantra while looking ahead to the forthcoming series. “The media may bill it as a `Shoaib vs Tendulkar’ contest but this series is much more than that,” he said in an interview to . “We have to go at all the Indian batsmen if we want to win the series. If we play as a team we will win. Cricket is definitely a team game although individuals might dominate it.”He was philosophical about the Centurion hiding. “I think I am a more improved, controlled and focused bowler after that game,” he said. “Both teams have to prove themselves once again … I think it would be a case of how our bowling fares against their strong batting. Because while their bowling is inexperienced our batting is a bit inexperienced.”* * *Hanif Mohammad, the subcontinent’s original Little Master, took a walk down memory lane in the pages of . Speaking about the 1954-55 series, characterised by stifling defensive cricket, he gave insight into a time when winning wasn’t quite everything. “The matches were keenly fought but there was nothing called sledging,” he said. “In fact, during those times bowlers would give way to the batsmen as they ran between the wickets. And if they’d be caught in the middle, they’d apologise. The camaraderie was brilliant.”Hanif, who also remembers being flummoxed by Subhash Gupte’s flipper, suggests that relations between the sides off the pitch were also cordial. “My mother, who was from India , was a cricket buff,” he said. “She insisted that we host a banquet for the Indian team. We used to live at our Garden Road residence at that time. Getting someone who could cook Indian food was a big problem. But after much struggle, we found a cook in Karachi. He prepared delicious Indian food, and mind you separately for the vegetarians in the team.””The party was great fun with dance, music and jokes,” he added. “I still have a picture with my mother, brother Wazir, bhabhi posing with Indian cricketers like Naren Tamhane, [Vijay] Manjrekar and Gupte. That’s a treasure for life.”* * *Polly Umrigar’s view of that same tour is a little different. “Then, as now, there was a fear psychosis about touring an unfriendly country,” he told . “Some players were scared to go, but I wasn’t. There was security. When we went to a cinema there would be cops all around us. But we came back having enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. The culinary fare laid out was straight out of Arabian Nights, biryani with badam, pista and all. There was a marked difference in the hospitality as we moved northwards [in Pakistan]. The south was not so friendly.””When we reached Lahore, there were people taking us to some homes and pointing out `these are yours’ — homes from where the Hindus had fled during Partition. Rickshaw-wallahs would not take money from Indian fans. `Hamare bhai aaye hain’ [our brothers have come], they would say.”Umrigar had mixed memories of events on and off the field. “The warmth was mixed at the ground as well,” he said. “There was no hooting by the crowds, no jeering. There was no cheering when we hit a four. But we didn’t mind. At Lyallpur, the team had to stay in a railway bogey as the city had no hotels. It was quite upsetting to some players. But there were good hotels in the other cities.”Nostalgia isn’t always about rose-tinted glasses though. Never one to mouth empty platitudes, Umrigar went on to say that the cricket played on the tour “tended to be boring”.

CLEAR White Ferns, captain Emily Drumm was “hugely relieved” to beat Australia at the Bert Sutcliffe Oval in the fourth game of the Rosebowl series today.Drumm, who compiled 88 of New Zealand’s 196/9, later went to hospital for x-rays on an injured thumb sustained after being hit by a shot from fellow captain Belinda Clark when fielding at short mid-wicket.However, the 27-year old told CricInfo, “That’s the least of my concerns right now,” after being given the all clear to play tomorrow.”You are very pleased to come away as winners because when you lose back-to-back games it breaks confidence. There was a lot of pressure today when TV and the public expect us to play like the World Cup,” said Drumm.New Zealand’s first win over Australia since the CricInfo Women’s World Cup final in 2000 was achieved by the narrow margin of 22 runs.Nevertheless, the home side had the game wrapped up well before Therese McGregor and Cathryn Fitzpatrick, who is doubtful for tomorrow with a calf strain and batted with a runner, added an unbeaten 41 for the last Australian wicket.This seemingly insignificant stand decided the fate of the Rosebowl, which will remain in Australia as New Zealand failed to separate the final pair before they passed the threshold of 157 that prevented a bonus point being won.The reason that Australia was in such a poor position was due to effectiveness of Aimee Mason’s off spin on her home One-Day International debut.She took four for 33, including the breakthrough wicket of Karen Rolton when the score was 81/1 in the 22nd over and another regulation Australia win was looming. After having Lisa Sthalekar and Julia Price caught by the immaculate Rebecca Rolls with successive deliveries, Mason removed Julie Hayes six balls later with the arm ball coach Mike Shrimpton taught her at the Academy last year.Earlier, the 19-year-old Central Hinds bowler attacked to make 34 off 36 balls with two sixes, one over square leg and one over long on. She regards herself as a “bowler who bats” and had previously scored just one 50 for CD, but as one who likes “to give it a bit of a go,” she took on the Australian bowlers.It was Mason’s partnership of 58 for the sixth wicket with Drumm that set up New Zealand’s best total of the series, and then, after Clark (43) and Rolton (26) had added 60 for the second wicket, it was Mason again who turned the game.The Australian batsmen’s failure to reach 50 emphasised the importance of Drumm’s knock on a good wicket on a rare hot and sunny Lincoln day.”I took quite a few risks in my innings. I believe in calculating to hit off the stumps to square and behind. They are shots I practice a lot to get them to bowl outside the off stump to try and get runs on the off side,” Drumm revealed.She continued, “Playing Australia, they’re the team you want to beat – these guys are really good.” Drumm missed the final stages of the match while in Christchurch Hospital, but returned to Lincoln in time to celebrate the success.The jubilant skipper concluded, “I couldn’t be more pleased to have helped the team to victory. We are a very young side who obviously coped without me. To did what they did when I wasn’t here shows that we don’t have to rely on certain players.”

* Murali and South Africa clinch CEAT awardsStar Sri Lankan spinner Muthiah Muralitharan has been named the CEATInternational Cricketer of the Year 2000-01. Murali headed the CEATRatings with 111 points and comfortably edged out his compatriotMarvan Atapattu, who finished runner-up 16 points behind. The SriLankans completed a clean sweep of the top three positions as Murali’sskipper Sanath Jayasuriya ended third with 93 points. Jacques Kallis(87) and Sachin Tendulkar (85) took spots four and five respectively.The annual CEAT Ratings which were instituted in 1995/96 aresupervised by a panel comprising three of the game’s gray eminences,Clive Lloyd, Ian Chappell and Sunil Gavaskar. They take into accountall the cricketing action between May 1 and April 30. InterestinglySachin Tendulkar has never won the award in the six years since itsinception. His CEAT Efficiency Quotient (CEQ) of 3.04 was however thehighest among the leading contenders for the Award. Previous winnersinclude Brian Lara (1995-96), Venkatesh Prasad (1996-97), SanathJayasuriya (1997-98), Jacques Kallis (1998-99), Sourav Ganguly(1999-00).South Africa clinched the CEAT Team of the Year award with a tally of98 points, which included 57 from the 14 Tests and 41 from the 26 ODIsthey played during the year. Pakistan (1996-97), Australia (1997-98and 1999-00) and South Africa (1998-99) were the four previousrecipients.* Chinnaswamy stadium pitch being relaidThirty years after it was first laid, the square at the Chinnaswamystadium in Bangalore is being relaid. Under the supervision of GKasturi Rangan, the chairman of the pitches committee of the BCCI,work on the relaying has already begun.”The idea behind the reconstruction is to have hard, firm wickets,”says Kasturi Rangan. “We have told other associations to provide truewickets and if we make a start here, then we can set an example forthe rest to emulate,” he says. According to Kasturi Rangan, theentire surface will be playable within 50 days. In all, there will beeleven strips, one centre wicket and five wickets on either side. Thecost of the entire exercise is estimated at Rs 10 lakh.India is scheduled to play a Test match at Bangalore against Englandlate this year and the new surface is likely to provide a hard andbouncy track. Bangalore staged its first Test match against WestIndies in November, 1974.* Patel, Hazare join NCAMedium pacers Rakesh Patel of Baroda and Swapnil Hazare of Mumbai havereported at the National Cricket Academy in Bangalore a couple of daysago.Patel, who was inducted into the NCA after the first set of 20 nameswas announced last month, was in the camp for the probables for thetour of Zimbabwe in Bangalore. However he was out of action for sometime due to a knee injury. which he sustained during the Ranji Trophyfinal against Railways in April. Hazare was forced to miss a month’straining at the NCA because of his college exams. The NCA will take aten day break from June 16 before the inter-zonal acadmies tournamentcommences on June 28.

Ange Postecoglou’s Celtic head into Sunday’s Premiership showdown against their Glasgow arch-rivals in an exceptional run of form, with the Bhoys remaining undefeated in their last 25 league outings, winning 21 of those.

As such, confidence within the 56-year-old’s squad will be extremely high, but with Giovanni van Bronckhorst’s outfit also having lost just two Premiership games all season, the Hoops manager will be well aware that his team simply must be at their best if they are to leave Ibrox with all three points this afternoon.

Will Postecoglou make any changes to the team which started the 4-0 win over Ross County last time out? Here’s how we think Celtic could line up against Rangers today, along with the latest team and injury news…

With Postecoglou revealing in his pre-match press conference that both Kyogo Furuhashi and Tom Rogic will be available for selection on Sunday after recovering from their respective injuries, we predict that the Hoops boss will make three changes from the side which started the victory over County.

The back five remains unchanged, with Joe Hart starting between the sticks and Greg Taylor, Carl Starfelt, Cameron Carter-Vickers and Josip Juranovic making up the defensive quartet.

In the middle of the park, despite Rogic’s availability, it is the 22-year-old David Turnbull – who Alan Hutton claimed is playing with his chest “puffed out” this season – given the nod alongside Callum McGregor and Reo Hatate in the Bhoys’ three-man midfield.

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In attack, the £52.5k-per-week Kyogo’s recovery from a long-term injury sees him take the place of Giorgos Giakoumakis up top, while Liel Abada also returns to the starting XI on the right, with Daizen Maeda dropping to the bench and Jota switching back to his preferred role on the left.

AND in other news: £3m wasted as Celtic had a shocker on £7.9k-p/w “loner” who rinsed Desmond for 129 weeks