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Andrew Leipus, who was replaced by John Gloster as the Indian team’s physio in February, has yet to be paid for the last five months of his tenure with the Indian team. Since his contract was worth US$50-60,000, the money owed to him is US$21-25,000. This revelation, by the , is the latest in a series of blows to the BCCI’s reputation in matters of finance.SK Nair, the secretary of the board, parried the issue to Jyoti Bajbai, the treasurer. “I distinctly remember that two weeks back I had cleared the payment,” said Nair. “The treasurer’s office usualy transfers the amount from the bank account in Kanpur to Andrew’s bank. We usually pay him in three instalments because of the RBI regulations.”Maybe,” Nair added, “the money is in transit.”Bajpai admitted that there had been a delay and said he was yet unclear about the payment. “I will have to check up. I am not quite sure about the payment. But, yes, there has been a delay.”The same newspaper stated that John Wright, who looks set to end his tenure as coach after Pakistan’s tour, remained unpaid for seven months last year, that the Indian team was yet to receive the Rs50lakh (approx. US$114,000) bonus they were awarded by the board after the series win in Pakistan, and that the first of the graded payments were still to be made to the team.

Matt Prior says he will be ready to step in as a batsman – and not just a wicketkeeper – should England require him to do so on their tour of Pakistan in November. Prior, Sussex’s wicketkeeper-batsman, knows he has been included in the Test squad as an understudy for Geraint Jones, but he says he would be able to replace a frontline batsman, too. He does not, however, expect to play if the first-choice players are fit.”I want to make sure that if anyone slips up – and it doesn’t have to be Geraint Jones, it could be one of the batsmen – then I will be 100 per cent ready to come in and perform,” he told , a Brighton-based newspaper. “I’m completely prepared for the fact that I might go there and not play a single game. At the moment I’m more prepared for that than actually playing.”But Prior, 23, promised to seize any opportunity that comes his way. “This might be my one chance and if I don’t get another one then I want to be able to look back, say I gave it 100 per cent and that I couldn’t have done any more. If I don’t play then that’s because the team has done well. But I don’t want to come home with regrets. I just want to work hard and when I think I can’t work any more I will work even harder.”England squad Michael Vaughan (capt), James Anderson, Ian Bell, Paul Collingwood, Andrew Flintoff, Ashley Giles, Steve Harmison, Matthew Hoggard, Geraint Jones (wk), Simon Jones, Alex Loudon, Kevin Pietersen, Matt Prior (wk), Andrew Strauss, Chris Tremlett, Marcus Trescothick, Shaun Udal.

ScorecardGaurav Dhiman, the Karnataka allrounder, caught the eye as India Under-19s eased to a comfortable 46-run victory over England, in the first one-day international at the Maharaja Bir Bikram College Stadium in Agartala. Dhiman blazed his way to 43 off just 30 balls as the Indians piled up 299 for 9, and then dismissed both openers as the English challenge faltered in the first 20 overs.With M Tewari also smashing 46 from 37 balls, the India Under-19s didn’t lack momentum. Mayank Tehlan provided the solidity with a dogged 84-ball 51, and there were contributions right down the order, with Piyush Chawla thwacking three sixes in his 32 from 17 balls. Mark Lawson’s legbreaks fetched him 2 for 46, and although David Griffiths took two wickets they cost him 48 from four overs.In response, the English side slumped to 81 for 6, not helped by two early run-outs. Moeen Ali (57) and Tom Smith (56) spared them an absolute hiding by striking half-centuries, but the result was never in doubt, and the Indians wrapped it up with 20 balls to spare. Dhiman finished with 2 for 58, while Kuldip Sharma (2 for 20) and Andimani Pradeep, the offspinner from Andhra Pradesh (2 for 45), were also among the wickets.

Harbhajan Singh has warned opposition batsmen to expect a new “magic ball” when they face him next time. Talking to the media during the Indian team’s fitness camp in Bangalore, Harbhajan said: “I have been working on a magic ball. I won’t tell you [anything more on that]. You will see it definitely … it is going to be a surprise.”Harbhajan hasn’t played competitive cricket for more than six months due to a finger injury which cut short his tour of Australia. However, he said that he was now fully fit after following a rehabilitation programme under the guidance of Andrew Leipus, the team physiotherapist. “I have started bowling since the last one month or so. I am feeling confident the way it’s going. I have been working on fitness. Let’s see how it works. I just can’t wait getting into the middle.”Talking about his prolonged absence from the game, Harbhajan said: “[Missing out on the series in] Australia was the most frustrating. I wanted to do well there. Unfortunately, I could not play the full series. I just played one Test and got injured,” he said. “It was frustrating to sit out and watch.”Harbhajan also indicated that he would play a few matches for Indian Airlines, his employer, to gain match-practice before the start of the international season.

The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) may ask the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to pay damages up to $1.5 million for losses the ECB incurred because of the cancellation of the fifth day of The Oval Test. In the next few days the PCB is likely to receive formal notification from the ECB on this matter, reported.After Pakistan refused to come out of the dressing room to resume play following the tea interval on day four because of being penalised for unproven ball-tampering charges, the match was awarded to England. The spectators who turned up on day four have been refunded 40% of their ticket price and those who bought tickets for the fifth day have been refunded the entire ticket amount by the ECB.On their part, the Pakistan board feels that Darrell Hair, the umpire at the centre of the controversy, and not the PCB, is to blame for the abandonment of play at The Oval. “We consider it not our responsibility that this Test was abandoned in the way it was,” Shaharyar Khan, the PCB chairman told .Given the cordial relations that exist between the two boards it is unlikely that either of them would risk confrontation on this issue. Meanwhile, the PCB plans to ask the ICC that the charge of bringing the game to disrepute be brought upon Hair. This would make the ICC responsible for reimbursing the ECB for the monetary losses suffered.”The situation won’t be left as it is,” said Waseem Khokhar, of the Pakistan board’s lawyers DLA Piper. “There is the strength and resolve to see that the right course of action is taken. There is an immense amount of hurt and sense of grievance.”Earlier, after the ICC’s hearing into The Oval fiasco, Inzamam-ul-Haq, the Pakistan captain, said he would not seek legal action against Hair. “Our religion Islam teaches us to forgive and forget, so I forgive Hair and will not take any action against him,” Inzamam told AFP on Friday. Inzamam was declared not guilty on ball-tampering charges, though he was penalised for bringing the game to disrepute and placed under an immediate ban of four one-day matches.

England 285 and 422 for 5 (Vaughan 140, Trescothick 88) drew with West Indies 751 for 5 dec (Lara 400*) to secure a 3-0 series win
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Michael Vaughan produced a captain’s innings of 140, to put his personal seal on an historic 3-0 series victory in the Caribbean. On a soporific final day in Antigua, the game briefly sparked back to life when West Indies’ spinners grabbed three quick wickets with the final hour approaching, but Graham Thorpe and Geraint Jones stemmed the jitters and batted with enough common sense to force Brian Lara to call off the hunt.It was a peaceful end to a high-octane series, but nothing could dampen the spirits of the Barmy Army, who sang lustily to the bitter end, and no wonder. Only one other side in history has ever pulled off a 3-0 away win in the Caribbean – Ian Johnson’s 1954-55 Australians, whose team included such luminaries as Richie Benaud, Keith Miller, Ray Lindwall and Neil Harvey. It remains to be seen whether the likes of Steve Harmison, Andrew Flintoff and Simon Jones will be spoken of in the same breath.After Lara’s phenomenal unbeaten 400, England did remarkably well to avoid being crushed by his sheer weight of runs. Despite following on after a first-innings bout of vertigo, Vaughan and Marcus Trescothick had regained England’s composure by the fourth evening to close on 145 for 0, and that was the hard part done. It was always going to take something out of the ordinary for West Indies to wrest the initiative back from there.Both Trescothick and Vaughan were quickly into their stride as the day resumed, cutting and square-driving a West Indian attack that appeared resigned to its fate. The pair had been England’s missing links throughout the series, but by the time their partnership ended at 182, they had almost exactly doubled their tally from seven previous efforts.It took a bizarre dismissal to separate them. Trescothick had moved to within 12 of his hundred, when he played forward to a full-length slower ball from Edwards, and somehow squeezed a catch to Ramnaresh Sarwan in the covers. It was a puzzling end to a cathartic innings, and Trescothick was as bemused as any onlooker as he trudged off – had he not checked his shot, he would surely have played it straight into the ground.Vaughan, however, was determined to seal the series with a captain’s knock, and he crashed to his hundred with a gorgeous cover-drive off Edwards, and then followed up with another one in the same over, just for good measure. He had one scare on 99, when Tino Best skimmed his bails with an offcutter as he shouldered arms, but Vaughan would no doubt put it down to impeccable judgment. This was the third time in four English follow-ons that he had made a century, and it was his most significant batting contribution since a similarly backs-to-the-wall effort against Sri Lanka at Kandy last December.After lunch, and with Lara off the field, the game began to drift as West Indies’ spinners wheeled away and Vaughan moved effortlessly towards another milestone. But Sarwan, West Indies’ stand-in captain, brought himself into the attack and in his very first over, he rolled a legbreak across Vaughan’s bows for Ridley Jacobs to snaffle a faint deflection off the glove. Vaughan was gone for 140, and England weren’t entirely out of the woods just yet.

After their crucial contributions earlier in the series, Nasser Hussain and Mark Butcher were the perfect partnership to carry England to safety. Hussain, who was undoubtedly playing in his final innings in the Caribbean, bristled with attacking intent, with Best’s comeback over with the new ball disappearing for 11 runs. Butcher, meanwhile, sailed past his fourth fifty of the series – a metaphor for England’s serene progress.But it wouldn’t have been fair to let the series drift away without a final plot twist, and it was the innocuous spin of Ryan Hinds who sparked the final session into life. His first victim was Butcher, who had made 61 when he aimed a heave over midwicket and snicked a thin edge through to Chris Gayle at first slip (366 for 3). It was so thin, in fact, that Gayle wasn’t fully aware that he had made the breakthrough.Four overs later, Hinds struck again as Hussain swept ambitiously out of the rough and was bowled round his legs for 56 (387 for 4). At this stage, England still trailed by 79, and while Andrew Flintoff could have knocked that deficit off in a matter of minutes, he was determined to emulate his first innings and play sensibly. He wasn’t able to resist temptation, however, when Sarwan lollipopped up a rank full-toss, and Lara pocketed a simple miscue at midwicket (408 for 5).Lara quickly recalled his pacemen for one final victory push, but there was to be no fairytale ending for West Indies. Instead, as Vaughan held aloft the Wisden Trophy and England embarked on a lap of honour, they had to satisfy themselves with a reclaimed world record, and the belated recovery of their pride.

If Rahul Dravid’s partnership with VVS Laxman bailed India out of a tricky situation, then his 182-run stand with Sourav Ganguly shut New Zealand out of the contest, and ensured that the best result they could hope for was a draw. Ganguly’s innings was played out in three different parts: in the first session, he scarcely played a convincing stroke, scoring 19 from 73 balls. For much of that period, he made generous use of his pads.

The fluency started to come into his batting towards the later part of the afternoon session, when he scored 56 from 101 balls. As the table indicates, his footwork became more assured too. The 55 minutes after tea was when Ganguly was at his best, hitting 25 off 37 balls. Overall, Ganguly’s not-in-control percentage was 20 – that is, once every five balls he played-and-missed, edged, or was struck on the pads. For Dravid, that figure was only 12%, a figure which suggests the mastery which he displayed for more than a day and a half.

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When New Zealand lost four wickets in next to no time in the morning, Australia could have been forgiven for expecting a repeat of Faridabad, where the same batting crumbled from a similar position. Instead, thanks to Jacob Oram and Daryl Tuffey, Pune gave its cricket fans a much more climactic game, and although Andrew Symonds slammed Australia home by two wickets, New Zealand’s fielding lent more than a helping hand towards that result.Set 259 for victory, Australia needed four off the final over, and after two of those runs had been notched up, Brendon McCullum dropped Brad Williams’s wild slash. Symonds clouted the very next ball to Lou Vincent at short midwicket, and even as that was grassed, the batsmen ran the single needed. Had they been taken, either of those chances could have potentially reversed the result of this game and may even affect New Zealand’s chances of making the TVS Cup final.Vincent had already dropped Symonds once at short extra cover, and his wicket at that time would have dented Australia’s hopes severely. Chasemeister Michael Bevan departed shortly afterwards for 50 (204 for 6), and it was Symonds who nudged Australia steadily towards 259, taking 10 runs off the last two balls of the penultimate over and keeping a cool head throughout.Symonds’s final assault built upon a 108-run fifth-wicket partnership between Bevan and Michael Clarke (70), who came together with Australia in some distress. Daryl Tuffey had Adam Gilchrist caught at mid-off (34 for 1), Matthew Hayden caught at slip (40 for 2) and Damien Martyn bowled off an inside edge (54 for 3). Scott Styris then bowled Ricky Ponting, and at four wickets down for 54, some calm batting was urgently needed.Bevan had provided that so many times in the past that it was now almost second nature, but Clarke’s supply of it was a revelation. Displaying excellent hand-eye coordination and some canny shot selection, Clarke rotated strike easily, and displayed an array of strokes and a willingness to improvise. He used his feet regularly to Daniel Vettori, once coming down the pitch and dragging him from outside off for a mighty six over midwicket. At the other end, Bevan batted away with minimum fuss; even his six off Chris Harris over long-off bore the stamp of business rather than pleasure.After Clarke inside-edged Tuffey onto his stumps (173 for 5) and Bevan, uncharacteristically, made an error of judgement during the final phase of a chase by top-edging a pull, Symonds stuck it out relentlessly. Ian Harvey and Andy Bichel played their part by sticking to a run-a-ball formula.Earlier Brad Williams, having found at Faridabad a script that pleased him, took ball in hand with the sole purpose of creating a sequel. Consistently moving the ball either way in his opening spell, Williams trapped both Chris Nevin and Scott Styris lbw by getting some nip into the batsmen. In between, he induced Lou Vincent to jab an outswinger to slip, and when he bowled Craig McMillan through the gate (21 for 4), New Zealand had their backs to the wall.

After Bichel came into the attack, however, the pressure eased. The prodigious movement, which had so far worked against New Zealand, now started to contribute to the number of extras, and Cairns and Stephen Fleming had just started to mount a recovery when Bichel snaffled Cairns with the 10th ball of an over. After having delivered three wides and a no ball, Bichel got one to move into Cairns and trap him lbw (68 for 5).Fleming went into Test-match mode after that. He survived a difficult caught-and-bowled chance off Harvey, but his shield looked impenetrable until he skied a pull off Symonds to midwicket in a rush of blood (130 for 6).Harris soon slashed Williams to deep cover (151 for 7), but thereafter followed New Zealand’s best partnership – of 68 runs for the eighth wicket. Oram, using his height to good effect by striding forward and covering all swing, thumped bad balls for four and nudged singles otherwise. McCullum was content to turn the strike over repeatedly to Oram. A vicious six off Bichel over midwicket brought up the 200 for New Zealand, but soon after, Oram was struck on the ribs by a full toss that slipped out of Symonds’s hand. Although it was entirely accidental, it seemed to shake him up a little. Oram savaged 14 runs off the first five balls of that over, hitting cleanly and powerfully, but he moved to leg for the final ball – a full, straight delivery – and was bowled (219 for 8).Oram’s innings had wrested back the initiative for New Zealand, and McCullum and Vettori intelligently kept the scoreboard ticking over in the final few overs. Perhaps New Zealand could have used a few more slogged fours during that time, but more than anything else, they could have used their normally high levels of fielding, for if any game was lost by dropped catches, this one was.

Barbados 285 and 372 beat Trinidad & Tobago 265 and 146 by 246 runs
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Champions Barbados completed their seventh straight victory, crushing Trinidad & Tobago by 246 runs at Pointe-a-Pierre. T&T, 60 for 4 overnight, subsided for 146 on the final day, with only Gibran Mohammed, their wicketkeeper, holding Barbados up for long with an undefeated 39. Daren Ganga, the T&T captain, didn’t add to his overnight 16 before falling lbw to Fidel Edwards, and Edwards ended some last-wicket fun from Marlon Black, who clubbed 16, by having him caught behind to finish with 4 for 48.Close 3rd day Leeward Islands 190 and 76 for 1 need another 329 runs to beat Jamaica 200 and 394 for 3 (Gayle 219, Lambert 60*)
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Chris Gayle clattered 219 at St. Elizabeth and Jamaica raced to 394 for 3 at almost four runs per over. Maurice Kepple and Tamar Lambert helped themselves to half-centuries and Leeward Islands were set 405 for victory. They began their chase solidly, and were 76 for 1 at stumps with Wilden Cornwall unbeaten on 42.Close 3rd day Kenya 139 (Patel 59, M Nagamootoo 5-45) and 172 for 7 (K Otieno 70) trail Guyana 444 by 131 runs
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Kenya found themselves in a deep hole at Georgetown, as they crumbled to 172 for 7 after being asked to follow-on. They had collapsed in the first innings too, in the face of some fine legspin by Mahendra Nagamootoo. Beginning the third day 104 for 5, the Kenyan lower order didn’t offer any resistance. None of the last five batsmen reached double figures and Kenya followed on, still 305 runs in arrears. Kennedy Otieno anchored the innings with a fine 70 and Hitesh Modi chipped in with 44. But the rest didn’t improve on their first-innings efforts with Neil McGarrell, the left-arm spinner, snaring three wickets. Nagamootoo finished with 2 for 37 and only the final rites remained at the close of play.Close 3rd day West Indies B 197 and 175 for 6 (Richards 59) trail Windward Islands 427 (Smith 154, Sammy 61) by 55 runs
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Windward Islands were in a comfortable position at Grenada, as West Indies B were battling for survival. Having secured a 230-run lead, Windward Islands consolidated their position by reducing their opponents to 175 for 6 at stumps on the third day. Fernix Thomas (3 for 19) and Darren Sammy (2 for 31), the two opening bowlers, took all five wickets between them, as only Austin Richards passed the 25-run mark. All the other batsmen managed starts, but couldn’t kick on to a big score. Earlier in the day, Sammy had impressed with the bat with his 61 proving vital in propping up the Windward Island’s total. He got good support from Rawl Lewis (45) and Lindon James (36). Kenroy Williams was the most successful of the West Indies B bowlers and finished with 3 for 86.

The England Coach Duncan Fletcher has made the following decision regarding the availability of England’s contracted players to their Counties ahead of the 1st npower Test Match at Edgbaston on July 24th.Ashley Giles will be able to play for Warwickshire against Middlesex in a four-day game starting on Tuesday and Stephen Harmison will be available to Durham for their four-day game against Yorkshire, also starting on Tuesday.But England have asked Warwickshire to rest Giles from tomorrow’s NCL match against Surrey and next Saturday’s Twenty/20 Cup Final at Trent Bridge. Harmison will also be rested from Durham’s NCL match against Northamptonshire tomorrow.Four other members of England’s NatWest Series squad, James Anderson, Andrew Flintoff, Marcus Trescothick and Michael Vaughan will be rested from all County fixtures ahead of the 1st npower Test.Nasser Hussain will be available to Essex for their NCL fixtures this week against Glamorgan tomorrow and Gloucestershire on Thursday. Mark Butcher and Alec Stewart will be rested from Saturday’s Twenty/20 Cup Final at Trent Bridge but available to Surrey for their NCL match against Warwickshire tomorrow and three-day game against India ‘A’ starting on Tuesday.All of England’s non-contracted players who featured in the NatWest Series will be available to their Counties for tomorrow’s NCL matches – subject to fitness.