CALCUTTA, 17 September 2003 — Indian cricket chief Jagmohan Dalmiya said yesterday he hoped the national junior team’s upcoming visit to Pakistan would lead the way for a resumption of matches between the two nations at senior level.
“I’ve been getting positive indications from the government about resumption of bilateral cricket ties with Pakistan,” Dalmiya said, according to a Press Trust of India news agency report.
“The government is yet to give the final permission, but I think it may be round the corner,” he said after an Asian Cricket Council meeting here. Dalmiya said the junior tournaments could help in normalizing cricket relations between the two countries.
The Indian government last week cleared the national under-19 team’s visit to Pakistan to take part in a four-nation tournament in November, also featuring Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.
The government also cleared the Pakistan second-string team’s participation in a limited-overs tri-series in India in December. The series will also include Sri Lanka. A tour by India’s academy team of developing players to Sri Lanka this month to play matches against Pakistan and the hosts was also cleared.
The junior tournaments will be the first clash between Indian and Pakistani cricketers in the subcontinent since the senior teams met in the Asia Cup in Bangladesh in May 2000.
The Indian government later banned bilateral cricket matches with Pakistan due to political tensions, but allowed them to meet in multination events such as the World Cup. The Pakistan Cricket Board has invited India for a Test series in March next year.
Pakistan Cricket Tour Up
to South Africa Government
A South African delegation said yesterday in Islamabad it was satisfied with Pakistani security arrangements for the Proteas’ upcoming tour but a final decision on the series would only be made by government and cricket officials in Johannesburg. “Our job was to inspect security arrangements for the South African team starting from the airport to hotels and the grounds. And I can say that we are satisfied with them,” Ian Smith, spokesman of the three-member delegation told reporters here.
“We will submit a detailed report on the security here to the United Cricket Board of South Africa (UCBSA) and to the government and it is up to them to take a final decision,” said Smith, also a commercial director of the UCBSA.
“The Pakistan cricket board (PCB), police and rangers have put up a great display of arrangements for us and we hope the same will be done for the team as well.”
Pakistan has suffered a cricket drought in the past 18 months, with foreign teams refusing to tour the country following two suicide bomb blasts in Karachi during Test series in May and June last year.
Pakistan was forced to play two of its home series matches against the West Indies and Australia at neutral venues last year as both teams refused to tour the country. UCBSA had demanded that the PCB relocate matches scheduled for the violence-prone southern port city of Karachi and the northwestern border city of Peshawar, bordering Afghanistan, over security concerns.
The South African delegation which also includes UCBSA security director Bob Nicholas and Director of South African police services Ben Van Denter visited Karachi and Peshawar on Monday and also held a meeting with South Africa’s High Commissioner in Islamabad yesterday.
Vaughan Wants County
Games Reduced by Half
England captain Michael Vaughan has called for the number of county cricket matches to be cut in half in a drastic bid to boost standards in the domestic game and produce better Test players.
In an interview with the launch issue of The Wisden Cricketer magazine, published on Friday, Vaughan proposes reducing the number of first-class counties from 18 to 16 playing in two divisions of eight.
Each team will then only play their rivals once a summer, as opposed to twice as presently.
“For England to improve and the gap to close between domestic and Test cricket those higher up have to do something about a county structure which contains too much cricket,” Vaughan said.
“You only have to watch county cricket to see the enthusiasm levels drained out of the players. Jon Lewis, of Gloucestershire, said after the Headingley Test (which England lost to South Africa) that he had played 21 out of 24 days - that simply can’t be right.”
Vaughan also wants four-day games to take place at fortnightly intervals to allow players to recover from one fixture and prepare for the next by working on their technique.
They will also be planned around the Test program to allow England players a chance to turn out for their county side. Vaughan’s predecessor as England captain, Nasser Hussain, meanwhile has been voted the best England captain since Mike Brearley was in charge in the late 70s and early 80s.
In a survey of English cricket fans carried out for The Wisden Cricketer, Hussain was rated above the likes of Mike Atherton, Graham Gooch, David Gower and Tony Greig.
Among post-war captains only Peter May, Ray Illingworth and Brearley were judged to be better leaders than Nasser Hussain.
The survey also produced some other surprising results:
— Cricket fans are largely immune to soccer mania with seven out of 10 saying they would prefer to have a drink with rising England pace bowler James Anderson than with David Beckham.
Eight out of 10 would prefer their daughters to marry a cricketer rather than a soccer player.
— A huge majority (92 percent) support the idea that umpires should be treated more like players, with those consistently making poor decisions being dropped.
— Seven out of 10 believe corruption still affects world cricket, despite assurances to the contrary from the games authorities.
— According to more than half of respondents, sledging is acceptable at the highest levels of the game, although two thirds say it is unacceptable for local club players.
— Australian legend Richie Benaud is overwhelmingly regarded as best cricket commentator on television
— Only half of England followers believe their team has any chance of winning back the Ashes in 2005.
