Rahul Dravid, the captain, says India will have to play out of their skins to qualify for the Super Eights following their shock defeat to Bangladesh. Dravid blamed the batting for the loss and said they were 30 to 40 runs short as Bangladesh chased down the required 192 to win by five wickets.The chase was fashioned by half-centuries to the young brigade of Tamim Iqbal, Mushfiqur Rahim and Saqibul Hasan. “Our backs are up against the wall,” Dravid said. “We didn’t get enough runs on the board. I thought 240 would have been a good score but the wicket surprised us.”Their bowlers kept it really tight and they didn’t let us get away. We know we’ve got to win two games now. We’ve got our backs to the wall and have got to fight pretty hard.” India now have to beat both Bermuda, on Monday, and Sri Lanka, on Friday, to avoid the risk of elimination.He also defended his decision to bat first on a pitch which had plenty of bounce and movement, which was fully utilised by the Bangladesh seamers, Mashrafe Mortaza and Syed Rasel.”I don’t know if we can regret it,” he said. “We could have just batted a lot better. The ball did seam around a lot more and for a bit longer than we had expected. The wicket had a pretty dry look about it.”Dravid’s counterpart, Habibul Bashar, was upbeat and gave due credit to the bowlers who set up the victory. After losing the toss, Mortaza picked up two early wickets, before the spinners made life difficult for the middle order. Mortaza picked up two further wickets in his second spell to clean up the tail and restrict India to less than 200.”The boys did a terrific job – it was a good toss to lose,” Bashar said. “When I saw the wicket I was in two minds. Because we only played with two seamers we knew we needed to take a wicket early and Mashrafe did that. Playing against a team like India you have to work hard – and this will give us a fair chance to qualify for the second round. It’s a great day for Bangladesh.”

Scorecard
Points TableCentral Zone earned a consolation 123-run win over East Zone at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai. Half-centuries by the Central lower order propped the total to 302 for 7, and the bowlers then sent East Zone crashing to 179 in just 38 overs.Central, choosing to bat first, made full use of the conditions as the openers Praveen Kumar and Siddharth Joshi added a whirlwind 87 in just under 11 overs. The introduction of offspinner Saurasish Lahiri pulled things back for East as he picked up three wickets and kept things tight in his ten overs. Ravikant Shukla (72) and Piyush Chawla (60) consolidated with a stand of 102 for the sixth wicket and Jai Prakash Yadav’s late surge – 21 off 10 balls – took the score past 300.Central’s opening bowlers RP Singh and Shalabh Srivastava made early inroads, reducing the opposition to 35 for 3. Rohan Gavaskar and Manoj Tiwary kept East in the hunt with a stand of 102. Tiwary’s dismissal, caught at the boundary by Shukla, proved to be the turning point as East collapsed. Yadav proceeded to dismiss Gavaskar, Deep Dasgupta and Lahiri in the space of just four balls to seal the win.Both teams are out of contention for the trophy – Central has eight from four games while East with just two points. Both are way behind West Zone, on top with 14 points. North Zone, currently on four points, have an outside chance with another two games to play.

Mark Shields, the deputy commissioner of Jamaican police, said he had to allow the Pakistan team to leave Jamaica in order to avoid a diplomatic incident in the aftermath of Bob Woolmer’s murder. Speaking to , Shields said the police did not have sufficient evidence to detain any team member and doing so “would have had an extremely adverse effect on the World Cup”.Shields was concerned there would have been an uproar “if I had started holding people against their will”. Woolmer was found dead in his hotel room on March 18.Part of the investigations include analysing the video tapes from the CCTV on the 12th floor of the Pegasus Hotel, where Woolmer had his room. Shields said the footage could provide the police with the breakthrough they needed. “I am very optimistic,” he said. “If the quality is as good as I hope it is they will help us significantly in our investigation of who went on to the 12th floor that Sunday, or Saturday night.”Door keycards of every room in the hotel were also being checked to figure out movements inside the hotel leading up to the time of Woolmer’s death. “It’s a huge task,” Shields said. “But when we do that we get the time of death.” Police are also examining Woolmer’s laptop for clues.Shields said the police were yet to eliminate anyone as a suspect. “Everybody at the moment is a witness, but we do not have more suspicion about one person over another,” he told the paper. “Murder is not solved in 45 minutes like it is on TV. In reality it’s not like that.”According to an report Shields said that although the doors to each room could not be viewed through the cameras, the ends of the corridor were visible. “[It] will give us an indication who was on that floor,” he said.He also dismissed rumours the players had argued with the coach after Pakistan’s defeat against Ireland. “As far as I’m aware at the moment,” he said, “the players and officials were very subdued and there was no heated exchange.”All members of the Pakistan team were questioned and later asked to provide DNA samples. Inzamam-ul-Haq, the Pakistan captain, and Mushtaq Ahmed, the assistant coach, were interviewed a second time before the team was allowed to leave Jamaica on Saturday. An inquest has also been ordered into the murder and Woolmer’s body will remain in Jamaica until the proceedings are over.Dalawar Chaudhry, a Pakistan official who organised the team’s stopover in London, said the players were very low. “I have had a word with all the boys and they have lost someone very near and dear to them,” Chaudhry told AFP. “A father figure has been lost … They haven’t been sleeping well. It’s been a very emotional time.”

Vaughn van Jaarsveld, one of South Africa’s brightest batting prospects, is looking to combine playing at home for the Highveld Lions with a Kolpak career with Warwickshire. And his Johannesburg-based employers are not overly pleased with the idea.According to , van Jaarsveld is currently playing for the Warwickshire seconds on trial, “with a view to signing the talented South African left-handed batsman as a Kolpak player for next season”.van Jaarsveld is 22 and has been selected for an emerging players tour of Australia next month as part of South Africa’s high performance program. But after that he may make himself unavailable for national teams if he can get a Kolpak contract for the 2008 English season.Highveld Lions coach Gordon Parsons, the former Leicestershire and Warwickshire seamer, said Van Jaarsveld’s reported intentions were concerning, not just for the player’s future, but South African cricket as a whole.”I know that Leicester were interested in him because they’re looking for someone to bat at No. 4. Their overseas player has gone home or something. But Vaughn has not spoken to me at all about a Kolpak contract and I would be very disappointed if he didn’t speak to me about it. I would advise him not to do it at the moment.”But if he does get a Kolpak contract, that wouldn’t really affect his status with the Highveld Lions. But it would be a disaster for South African cricket because Vaughn’s a quality player. We’re not talking about older players here that are coming to the end of their careers – like a Lance Klusener, but a young player. Someone needs to do something about it because you’ve already got Jacques Rudolph going Kolpak, Ryan McLaren’s over there and now maybe Vaughn’s looking,” Parsons said.

Sharad Ghai, the ousted Kenyan Cricket Association chairman, has said that he will not go to court to try to overturn the government’s decision to dissolve the board and replace it with an interim committee. There had been reports that he was intending to take the matter to court, as he successfully did in 2002 when the government attempted a similar manoeuvre.On Saturday, the embattled Ghai dismissed the government’s action as being unconstitutional, and insisted that the board was still in charge. But less than 48 hours later, he said that he would respect the government’s decision and hand over office to Ochillo Ayacko, the sports minister. “If you are out, you are out,” he was quoted as saying in a local newspaper. “But this should have been done in a dignified manner.”One senior administrator said that the he believed Ghai had decided to accept the move because, unlike in 2002, he had almost no remaining support within Kenyan cricket. Nevertheless, he admitted that it came “as a big surprise to me as Ghai is a person who would never cave in”.On Sunday, police visited the offices of the KCA at Ruaraka and put locks on all the doors. Employees of the board were unable to gain access when they reported to work on Monday.About the only voice to have spoken out in support of the old regime has been Joshua Okuthe, the chairman of the Kenya National Sports Council, but opponents have dismissed his involvement as being little more than cronyism.It has also emerged that last week the KCA was refused permission to use Nairobi’s Gymkhana ground, the country’s one international-class venue, for the forthcoming visit of the Nertherlands. The move came after months of disputes between the Gymkhana Club and the KCA over non-payment of debts. The venue was only freed for use during last summer’s A-team tournament after Ghai issued a personal cheque to pay for some of the arrears. The KCA has repeatedly refused to respond to request for arbitration, and one club official admitted: “I don’t see how Gymkhana will recover their money, as I do not think there would be any left in the bank during the handover.”The KCA is reported to be in serious debt, and with no sponsors and its only income coming from the ICC, he might well be right.

Sharad Ghai, the ousted chairman of the Kenyan Cricket Association, continued to protest his board’s innocence in the light of comments from Ochilo Ayacko, the sports minister, that senior members of the KCA could be charged in relation to their running of the association.Opposition to the board claim to have unearthed evidence of misappropriated funds, but Ghai denied any wrongdoing, accusing the minister of accepting the word of the Nairobi Provincial Cricket Association, a bitter opponent of the KCA, as the “gospel truth”. He asked for an opportunity “to meet the minister so that if there are unclear issues, we answer them to the satisfaction of all Kenyans.”Ghai also denied that the KCA had been blocking elections – none have been held by the board since 1997. “The KCA have always called for elections only to be blocked by court orders issued either to Coast Cricket Association (CCA) or NPCA,” he insisted. This is true, but opponents point out that the elections were blocked as the KCA were trying to use a new and unauthorised constitution which weighted the votes in their favour.”As the public is aware,” Ghai concluded, “we have no option under the rules of civilised society to defy judicial authority.”Meanwhile, the government-appointed Normalisation Committee will not take charge of Kenyan cricket until the court order suspending its powers for 21 days has been heard of overturned. The KCA obtained a stay last Tuesday following Ayacko’s decision to oust the existing KCA executive and replace it with a committee embracing many of Kenyan cricket’s stakeholders.

Current and former West Indies players were thoroughly impressed with the talent on show after the first day of the Digicel coaching clinic at the 3Ws Oval.More than 30 youngsters, including members of the Barbados Under-13s, were given coaching and guidance from Chris Gayle, Kenny Benjamin, Keith Arthurton and Ronald Straker along with Ramnaresh Sarwan, Denesh Ramdin and Lance Gibbs.”There is a lot of talent here and this is a good sign for the future,” Gayle said. “Hopefully we can nurture these young talented cricketers, groom them as we go along so that we do not lose them in the future, they need the right guidance, proper training and good facilities.”It was a very good and pleasing start, everyone enjoyed the day’s activities, the kids got a run around and to socialize a bit as well.”The young cricketers were taught a number of innovative fielding techniques in the first half the session before being taken to the indoor centre for various batting drills. Gayle was a particular attraction, in a fielding game he called ‘the weakest link’; players were split into two sides, and the team to drop the first ball was penalised with some strenuous physical exercises.Matthew Greaves, a 12-year-old fast bowler who impressed the coaches, and who is a member of the Barbados Under-13 team, was thrilled with the day.”It was a good experience working with the coaches and West Indies players,” he said. “They taught me a lot about how they play and how to get better than them and I learnt a lot of new drills, different techniques and they taught me the basics of cricket.”The next clinic begins in Trinidad on July 26, with further events in Jamaica, Guyana, St Vincent and Antigua.

Canada and Bermuda lived up to their pre-tournament favourites’ tag by scoring convincing victories in their Americas Under-19 qualifiers in Toronto on Tuesday. Canada beat Argentina by nine wickets while Bermuda won their second match in a row by beating Cayman Islands by seven wickets.Canada bowled out Argentina for 64 in 28 overs and then raced to victory in 9.5 overs for the loss of one wicket, ending Argentina’s chances of qualifying for the U-19 World Cup. Asif Manjra, Usman Iqubal and Pratik Patel took three wickets each and opener Ruvindu Gunasekera ensured a healthy run-rate by scoring 35 off 33 balls.Bermuda, who had crushed Bahamas by 195 runs on Monday, restricted Cayman Islands to 165 in 48.2 overs after asking them to bat. Cayman Islands captain Ramon Sealy once again top scored with 67 off 126 balls that included five fours. He had scored an unbeaten 76 against Bahamas. Malachi Jones picked up 4 for 38 for Bermuda while Stefan Kelly took 2 for 13.Bermuda reached the target in only 30.4 overs for the loss of three wickets. Jones backed up his excellent bowling performance with an unbeaten 41 from 27 balls with six fours and one six. Jones added 79 for the fourth wicket with captain Rodney Trott (37 not out) after Bermuda were reduced to 87 for 3.The tournament winners qualify for the Under-19 World Cup in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, next February.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni has said he will need to balance caution and aggression when he leads India in the Twenty20 World Championship.”It’s different being an aggressive batsman and an aggressive captain. Of course, that instinct will be there but you need to balance both,” he said. “A lot depends on how the team responds to your leadership.”Dhoni said he has gained experience serving as deputy to Rahul Dravid in England. “His [Dravid’s] ability to stay calm and cool under pressure … As a captain you got to be in control even when things are not going your way. It helps if you keep your nerves in a tense situation and avoid doing things in a rush.”When asked if he was a natural when it came to leadership, Dhoni said, “That’s for you guys to decide. But I am a natural. I like to do things my way and I take my own decisions in whatever I do.” However, Dhoni, the first India player from the state of Jharkhand, said he never even expected to make the grade as a player, let alone being the captain. “To be honest, I never dreamt of playing for India. I just played the game for the love of it. So just to play for India was like a good fairytale.”To be named captain is a bit more special because I’m just three years old in international cricket. It’s a big opportunity. It’s a big responsibility given to me and I’ll give it my best shot.”In the absence of Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly, Dhoni would be leading a team with experienced players such as Virender Sehwag, Ajit Agarkar, Harbhajan Singh and Yuvraj Singh, along with newcomers such as Yusuf Pathan and youngsters such as Piyush Chawla and Rohit Sharma.”It’s a nice blend of youth and experience. It’s nice to have a bit of experience to deal with a tight situation because they have been there and done that before. Then it’s always good to have some young blood, players who are keen to prove themselves. Twenty20 cricket will be extremely demanding. It’s a fast-paced game and fielding will be extremely important aspect of the game. Fresh legs will be an asset to the team.”He said the team had two dangerous batsmen in Sehwag and Yuvraj, who could match up with the best in the world. “Viru [Sehwag] is a proven performer, still one of the most feared strikers around in the game. Yuvi [Yuvraj] has been batting brilliantly and performing consistently in recent years. They are as good as any other player from other teams.”Anyway, it’s not about comparisons. It’s about a team, about how well you gel as a group to get the desired result. If you play well as a team, you win.”Dhoni also shrugged off concerns that India lack enough experience in Twenty20. “We beat South Africa in South Africa in our only Twenty20 international in the middle of a disastrous one-day series [in 2006]. Although we definitely haven’t played this game as much as England or Australia, we know what it’s all about. I am an eternal optimist.”On key players to watch out for, Dhoni said, “There are lots of them – Adam Gilchrist, Ricky Ponting, Kevin Pietersen and so many others I can’t name right away. There are plenty of good bowlers and batters who can do well. I also believe that spinners will have a role to play.”Dhoni also felt that Twenty20 was not loaded against the bowlers as it was made out to be. “Not really, otherwise the Australians wouldn’t have picked the almost the same team they had for the World Cup. It is about how fit you are because you need to give more than hundred per cent every time. It will require high energy levels and it will take a lot out of you.”

Despite the success of the World Twenty20, the ICC has insisted that it will not replace the 50-over format and that the limit of seven Twenty20 matches per Test-playing nation each year will still carry on despite its popularity.”We are committed to the Champions Trophy in 2008 and 2010,” Malcolm Speed, the ICC chief executive said. “We have a problem of fitting Twenty20 into the international calendar.”What we have now is a new phenomenon to go along with 50-over cricket. We need to make sure we blend the two and the pie gets bigger rather than [it remaining] the same size, but is divided among the three forms of the game. Our priority will be to preserve Test cricket. We need to make sure that Test cricket remains strong and that is the iconic form of the game. And 50-over cricket is the financial driver of the game.”It’s one of the challenges we face to make sure the three forms of the game remain vibrant. It’s a terrific problem.”With regard to the World Twenty20, Speed said that everyone was delighted at its success. “We thought it would be well received in South Africa, and the reception by the public, the media and the players has exceeded our expectations.The Twenty20 version has, however, appealed to a wider fan-base and has been widely covered in both USA and China, according to Speed. “It’s the perfect vehicle for cricket to develop in new countries. This gives us another opportunity, a different vehicle to go after those different markets. “Cricket is already a niche sport in the USA. There are lots of Indians, Pakistanis, Sri Lankans, West Indies playing cricket, so we can build on that. Twenty20 is a great opportunity to do that.”

According to Speed, the success of Twenty20 and the shorter duration has already had an impact on the scheduling of the 2011 World Cup which, at this stage, is to last between 35 to 40 days. “I don’t agree with much of the criticism about the last two World Cups,” he said, “although some of it is valid. But in any event we’re very pleased that we’ve had a very successful event.”The next Twenty20 tournament is to take place in England in 2009.