Following the withdrawal of Yorkshire’s Sue Metcalfe from the England training squad due to work commitments, the Sussex wicket keeper Mandie Godliman has been selected to take her place.Mandie has represented England A since 1994 v South Africa, India, New Zealand and Australia. She recorded her highest score of 183* for her club Redoubtables WCC this season in the ECB Cup.Mandie started playing cricket aged 12, encouraged by her PE Teacher who played for Middlesex Ladies and went on to Captain Thames Valley before joining Sussex. She was first selected for England training in 1993, but suffered a serious back injury which kept her out of the game for three years.Mandie is a Sports Development Officer for Mid Sussex District Council and is an ECB advanced coach, including coaching England U-21s. Born 5th April 1973.
‘Celtic should be gutted’ that they’re losing Ben Doak, journalist Kaustubh Pandey has said.
The lowdown
According to The Athletic’s James Pearce, Premier League giants Liverpool are ‘closing in’ on the signing of the 16-year-old. Celtic are apparently in line to receive only ‘minor compensation’ given that the player hadn’t signed a professional contract at Parkhead.
The Hoops have tried to persuade Doak to stay amid interest from a host of ‘top clubs’ by demonstrating that ‘a tangible first-team pathway’ exists, but the lure of working under Jurgen Klopp has proved to be too strong for the teenager.
The latest
Pandey, the editor-in-chief of Get Italian Football News, gave his reaction to the news after Pearce’s report was shared by his colleague Kieran Devlin, Celtic’s correspondent for The Athletic.
Pandey tweeted: “This is a fantastic move. Ben Doak has impressed me whenever he’s played this season and it again shows that Liverpool know they need to refresh a squad which will be ageing soon. Doak is an excellent signing, even though Celtic should be gutted.”
The verdict
If Doak goes on to realise his potential on Merseyside, perhaps Celtic will be left wondering what might have been. Regrettably, the same goes for Parkhead alumni Liam Morrison (snapped up by Bayern Munich in 2019) and Josh Adam (lured to Manchester City a year later).
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The 16-year-old is a player who, in the words of Pearce, possesses a litany of exciting attributes such as his ‘incredible pace and directness’, and it says a lot that he has played in two Scottish Premiership matches already, having only turned 16 last November.
In other news, read Kieran Devlin’s set-piece coach claim
History was made tonight when, three decades after Kerry Packer launched floodlit cricket in Australia, the lights were turned on at Lord’s for a day-night match. The fact that Middlesex beat Derbyshire by three wickets in a Pro40 match was almost incidental to the bigger story.The MCC, which is not nearly as conservative as its reputation, is looking ahead. The ground, while boasting the best facilities in the country, is under increasing pressure as other venues acquire international status. It needed lights and this game was a test case, more about placating the neighbours than the cricket itself.In that regard it will be deemed a success. Around 5000 turned out on a glorious late-summer evening, including several hundred of the MCC’s neighbours who had been given freebies. While those numbers might appear low, the fixture was only switched from Southgate last month and it probably suited the organisers to have a low-key curtain raiser. And while the temporary lights were not as powerful as more permanent ones would be, they were more than enough for a decent game to take place.As a further move to ease the worries of the locals, the match started 30 minutes earlier than usual for a day-night fixture and the public bars were shut an hour before the close. The music that accompanies boundaries and wickets was also more subdued.For the Derbyshire innings the pylons barely peeked out from over the top of the stands. At the break, they extended to their full height, and as the sun finally set, their impact was really felt. The general consensus was that the old ground was enhanced by being bathed in light.Over the winter the MCC will engage in consultations with residents and, all being well, there will be more floodlit matches in 2008.The long-term aim has to be the instillation of permanent lights, albeit ones that are likely to be retractable so as not to destroy the ambience of the ground and also to placate planners and residents. Those should be in place in time for the 2009 ICC World Twenty20, alongside ambitious plans to increase the capacity from around 28,000 to more than 35,000.The MCC will not only have to pay for the floodlights themselves; what last night did show was that the lighting in the stands and on the concourses will also need a major overhaul.But the experiment was a success and the first of a number of hurdles was successfully overcome.
India Blue suffered an embarrassing defeat at the hands of India Red, failing by 21 runs to chase down the target of 281 in the opening match of the Challenger Series for the NKP Salve Trophy. A solid score – thanks mainly to 110 from Gautam Gambhir and a half-century from Y Venugopala Rao – followed up by a thoughtful and incisive bowling display from VRV Singh and Murali Kartik sealed the deal for India Red.It was always going to be a tricky chase – 280 was a good score on a pitch characterised by decent bounce and good carry – but India Blue slipped into a familiar trend, starting well, faltering, and failing to apply themselves in the face of some sensible bowling. The manner in which Sachin Tendulkar began suggested to the 5000-plus crowd at the MA Chidambaram Stadium that 280- might just not be enough. Tendulkar, was in one of moods, and seemed destined for a big one. He played straight, leaning nicely into drives, punching rather than hammering the ball, but he too was not averse to unfurling the big hit when the bowlers erred in length, as Sreesanth did twice. The first was deftly pulled for six over deep backward square-leg, the second slapped back over the bowler’s head even as the little master gave charge.There was some drama as Sehwag seemed to twist his ankle when turning for a second run, but after much medical assistance, continued, without a runner, but visibly in discomfort. Sehwag should have gone just after, on 27, when he launched into a huge hit towards long-on, and the ball hung in the air for an eternity before it landed in, and popped out, of VRV Singh’s hands.The whole momentum of the innings shifted, though, as Rao brought on the spinners as early as the 11th over. Murali Kartik bowled beautifully, teasing the batsmen, hanging the ball in the air and using the extra bounce in the pitch to defeat the stroke. The runs stopped coming as freely as they had when the fast men were on, but it was a run-out that brought the first breakthrough, as Sehwag was slow to get back for a second, and the direct hit from the deep by Sreesanth from short fine-leg. Sehwag had made 28.Tendulkar pushed on, past the half-century mark, and it was a bit of clever captaincy, packing the off-side field and bowling a length just a touch short for the drive, that led to his downfall. Tendulkar punched Zaheer towards off, but was well caught by Rao at short cover, and was gone for 61.Then came the familiar middle-order story. Rahul Dravid missed an incutter that stayed a touch low and was out lbw, and Mahendra Singh Dhoni, after one superb cut for four, flashed outside off and edged to the keeper. VRV Singh had two quick wickets, and India Blue were 110 for 4Yuvraj Singh and Dinesh Mongia then put up a last-ditch effort that could have saved the day. They were still well within striking distance of the total, but it needed one or both to bat out till the end, and neither was able to do so. After a tight comeback spell from Zaheer, Rao once again tossed the ball to Kartik, and he snuffed out what life remained in the game.Mongia was the first to fall, teased out by a floating delivery, and his attempted big hit over the on side only got as far as VRV Singh. Yuvraj continued as best as he could, but when the runs became hard to come by, and he started playing the sweep as a get-out-of-jail shot, you sensed that the end might be near. It came when Yuvraj tried to break the shackles by whacking one over the leg side, but could not clear the infield, and was caught by Uthappa at midwicket.By the time the top was gone, the required rate had crept up sufficiently to take the task past even the ever optimistic whirling blade of Harbhajan Singh. He took his team desperately close, but 21 runs separated the teams when the last wicket fell, quite predictably Harbhajan holing out to midwicket attempting to hit the ball out of the ground.There are some players who need the biggest stage to thrive, and there are some who are comfortable at a certain middle-run, and succeed at every opportunity. Gambhir and Rao may have struggled at the international level because bowlers have exploited their weaknesses relentlessly, and denied them their favourite scoring shots. In the absence of bowlers of this calibre, though, they thrive, and that was very much the case here.India’s best bowlers were simply not disciplined enough, and a reprieve – Dravid dropped a sitter at second slip when Gambhir was on 8 – was all the Reds needed to capitalise. Gambhir began as shakily as ever, squeezing and slashing runs through gully and third-man, but once he settled, in the company of Rao, who was aggressively looking to keep the scoreboard ticking over, Gambhir unfurled some pleasing shots. Of particular beauty were his two controlled lofts over midwicket off the left-arm spin of Mongia, where he came down the pitch and did not hit, so much as coax the ball to the fence.Rao, for his part, was industrious and opportunistic, cashing in when the fast men offered width – cutting and square-driving – and when the spinners were too straight, sweeping hard. But Rao holed out to long-off on 67, when he could so easily have had more, and soon after Gambhir ran himself out for 110. But by then, with Rohit Sharma applying the finishing touches before the tail collapsed, India Red had managed to push the score on to a healthy 280. And in the end that proved more than enough.
India RedRobin Uthappa c Patel b Pathan 10 (15 for 1) S Badrinath c Jadeja b Pathan 15 (44 for 2) Y Venugopala Rao c Mongia b Pathan 67 (189 for 3) Gautam Gambhir run out 110 (227 for 4) Dinesh Karthik c Harbhajan b Agarkar 11 (244 for 5) Ramesh Powar b Patel 0 (249 for 6) Rohit Sharma c Tendulkar b Patel 33 (266 for 7) Zaheer Khan c Tendulkar b Agarkar 5 (274 for 8) Murali Kartik c Sehwag b Patel 12 (275 for 9) VRV Singh run out 2 (280 for 10) India BlueVirender Sehwag run out (Sreesanth) 28 (96 for 1) Sachin Tendulkar c Rao b Khan 61 (102 for 2) Rahul Dravid lbw b VRV Singh 1 (102 for 3) Mahendra Singh Dhoni c Karthik b VRV Singh 6 (110 for 4) Dinesh Mongia c VRV Singh b Kartik 26 (189 for 5) Yuvraj Singh c Uthappa b Kartik 53 (209 for 6) Irfan Pathan run out (Kartik) 19 (227 for 7) Ajit Agarkar c Uthappa b VRV Singh 6 (236 for 9) Ravinder Jadeja run out 11 (247 for 9) Harbhajan Singh c VRV Singh b Zaheer 15 (259 for 10)
Jacques Kallis and Makhaya Ntini were among five players named as South Africa’s Cricketers of the Year at a function in Gauteng on Monday. The other three chosen were fast bowler Andre Nel, so honoured for the second time, and batsmen Boeta Dippenaar and AB de Villiers, who were first-time nominees.Kallis and Ntini joined Shaun Pollock, Allan Donald, Ken McEwan and Clive Rice in being named a Cricketer of the Year for the fourth time.Colin Bryden, the editor of the , said both players were automatic choices following outstanding performances. Kallis has moved to the top of the South African all-time lists of Test runs and centuries scored. Ntini recently returned 13 for 132 against the West Indies in Trinidad, the best match figures by a South African in Test cricket.Nel, with his aggression and wicket-taking ability, had been able to complement Ntini and Pollock well. De Villiers, one of the most promising newcomers to Test cricket anywhere in the world, averaged 53.72 in his first season at the highest level.Dippenaar, who has been a member of the national team since the 1999-2000 season, finished the season on a high note when he was Man of the Series in the one-day games against the West Indies. Bryden confided that narrowing the candidates down to five was particularly difficult because many players had impressive performances.Among previous nominees, South African captain Graeme Smith finished the season strongly, while wicketkeeper Mark Boucher made a stirring comeback to the national side after being dropped early in the season.Ashwell Prince, Justin Kemp and Charl Langeveldt weren’t too far behind in terms of performances. At the domestic level Lance Klusener, Hashim Amla, Tyron Henderson and Adam Bacher had displayed fluent form.
England were dealt a double injury blow today with the news that Graham Thorpe will miss the final Test after breaking a finger at Old Trafford, while Mark Butcher has collected yet another muscle injury and will miss the game too.Thorpe broke the little finger on his right hand when he was hit by a screamer from Fidel Edwards while making his way to his 15th Test century. He will bat if needed in the second innings at Old Trafford, but will sit out the fourth and final Test, which starts at The Oval on Thursday (August 19).Meanwhile Butcher’s catalogue of woe, which started when he received whiplash in a car accident in London while on the way to see his physiotherapist, has continued. He has just recovered from a thigh-muscle pull, but strained his calf while jogging on Friday, and this latest injury will also keep him out of the fourth Test. It means that after playing 42 successive Tests up to the third one against New Zealand this summer, Butcher will have missed all four matches of the West Indies series with various niggles.All this means that there will be no Surrey player in the team at The Oval – unless the selectors decide to go for experience and call up the in-form Mark Ramprakash as a replacement. Ramprakash is 35 on September 5, and played the last of his 52 Tests in New Zealand in 2001-02, but he has scored five centuries in his last seven innings in the County Championship.A more likely replacement is Ian Bell, the uncapped 22-year-old Warwickshire batsman, who was averaging 80.83 this season before the latest round of matches.
Unbeaten pair Lymington and Old Tauntonians & Romsey are battling it out for supremacy at the top of Southern Electric Premier League, Division 2.The duo both extended their winning starts against newly promoted opponents – Lymington beating Gosport Borough by 64 runs and OT’s trimming last season’s Division 3 champions, Purbrook by a 46-run margin.Lymington simply out-batted Gosport on a Sports Ground shirtfront – all of the top order getting amongst the runs as the New Forest side posted a formidable 271-7 to plunge Gosport to a third successive defeat.Martin Hunt (42) was prominent in early partnerships with Glyn Treagus (29) and Dan Peacock (34), but it was Ben Craft’s 69, aided by an unbeaten 37 from Tom Peacock, which powered Lymington into a near invincible position.Gosport dipped to 65-5 (Andrew Watkins 31) before Pete Robson (61) gave their eventual 207 an air of respectability.A second second-wicket stand between Max Smith (86) and Raj Niak(54) powered OTR into the driving seat at Purbrook, where last year’s Division 3 champs were left chasing 262-7 (Jeremy Ord 38).Will Prozesky (78) launched Purbrook’s reply in style, but with Nick Wood taking 5-60, the ask was too great and they closed at 216 all out.Hampshire’s John Francis spanked 113 not out and shared a near double-century stand with Steve Shaw (106) as St Cross Symondians piled up a massive 285-2 at Hursley Park.Paul Edwards (65) and Sandeep Halder (35) gave Hursley token hope, but it was all too much as the Park slipped to 213 all out.Dave Birch continued his rich vein of form with an unbeaten 88 as Easton & Martyr Worthy cruised past Sparsholt’s 195-5 to win by nine wickets.Tim Richings (43), Nick Boxall (41) and Ollie Kelly (39) top scored for Sparsholt, but once Birch and Ashley Spencer (40) had established an 82-run start the writing was on the wall for the visitors.Birch and Shaun Green added an unbroken 114 for the second wicket.Neil Cunningham’s 68 got Burridge home by three wickets after United Services had posted 183-8 (Gary Hounsome 50) at Burnaby Road.Burridge wobbled at 143-6, but Phil Ransley’s 22 not out got them home.
Two of the Southern Electric ECB Premier League’s most exciting local young cricketing prospects – Bournemouth’s Chris Park and David Wheeler, the New Milton all-rounder – could be headed towards a career on the county circuit.The teenage duo have signed Academy scholarship contracts with First Class counties – Park, Bournemouth’s talented batsman/wicketkeeper, with Northants, and Wheeler at Hampshire.The pair will link up with their respective counties next month to begin a demanding winter programme, which involves all aspects of cricket development, including fitness and sports psychology.Spending the 2002 summer season with Northants is a dream come true for 18-year old Park, from Dales Drive, Wimborne.The former Queen Elizabeth School sixth-former scored over 400 runs and snapped up 30 victims behind the stumps in a sparkling debut season for Bournemouth in the demanding surrounds of the Southern Electric Premier League.Park went on to make three Minor Counties Championship appearances for Dorset, scoring a maiden half-century in Cornwall.”Being signed up by Northants is the perfect end to what’s been a terrific first season for me in senior cricket,” smiled Park, who has played regularly for Dorset youth teams in recent seasons.”It hardly seems five minutes ago I was playing village cricket for Kingston Lacey and now I’ve been given the opportunity to progress into the professional arena.”But Park, spotted by Northants when he represented Dorset in last year’s Jersey Youth Festival, knows the hard work is yet to begin.”It’s entirely up to me now. There’s a demanding winter schedule ahead and then the task of proving myself where it matters – in the middle next season.”This is an opportunity few youngsters get and I don’t intend to waste it,” he said.Park, who will probably play Northants 2nd XI and Colts cricket next summer, could hardly have chosen a better time to display his rich batting prowess than in Jersey last summer.”I scored an unbeaten 147 against them off 86 balls and then followed it up with a century against Yorkshire. It’s really gone on from there,” Park explained.Former England all-rounder David Capel, now the Northants Academy coach, said : “We were very impressed with what we saw in Jersey.”Chris looks a very, inspirational positive player, who shows total commitment. He always seems to have a happy smile on his face.”Wheeler, New Milton’s hard-hitting 6’3″ all-rounder, made an equally devastating impact in his debut season in Premier Division 3.He struck two centuries and passed the 50-mark on six other occasions in scoring 582 runs and took 22 wickets – no mean feat for a 16-year old !Educated at Highcliffe School, Wheeler has been playing at New Milton since he was eight years of age and been a regular representative player for both Hampshire Schools and the New Forest CA since he was 11.Wheeler, currently studying Sports Science at Brockenhurst College, hit the high spots last year, scoring 1,500-plus runs and taking 60 wickets in all cricket.”When David’s batting, he times the ball so sweetly. And his bowling action has such a high trajectory that he can get substantial lift and away movement,” explained Steve Watts, the New Milton captain.Wheeler had been earmarked to captain Hampshire’s Under-16 team this summer but was fast-tracked into the Under-17 side which reached the semi-finals of the ECB County Youth Championships.He was subsequently selected to play for an England Under-17 XI against the MCC at Uxbridge.Wheeler, who lives in Barton-on-Sea, is the only Hampshire-based youngster at the Rose Bowl Academy this winter.”David has got a great deal of potential and I’m looking forward to seeing him continue to develop in the Academy this winter,” said Hampshire 2nd XI coach Tony Middleton.Both Park and Wheeler have been nominted for the Southern Premier League’s Young Cricketer of the Year award, which will be announced at the presentation dinner on November 9.
Former Leeds United defender Danny Mills believes that Raphinha could be left of the Whites’ squad entirely for the Premier League clash with Norwich City this afternoon.
The Lowdown: Raphinha in a rut
The Brazilian has been a wonderful signing from Rennes, excelling over the past two seasons and standing out as one of Leeds’ best players.
Raphinha’s form has clearly dropped off in recent months, though, with only one goal and one assist since the turn of the year.
Not only that, but he has arguably cut a sulky figure as the Whites have been drawn further into the relegation mire, with a massive home clash against fellow strugglers Norwich coming up on Sunday.
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The Latest: Mills thinks Raphinha could be dropped
Speaking to Football Insider, Mills claimed that Raphinha could even be left out of the matchday squad at Elland Road, given his recent attitude. The 44-year-old fumed:
“With Raphinha, there was clearly one or two issues with him leading up to Marcelo Bielsa being relieved of his duties. He was taken off and then dropped for the Manchester United games.
“There has been murmurings all along he was looking for a move and there has obviously been a little bit of interest. Since Christmas, he hasn’t shown anywhere near the type of form that we’ve seen previously.
“Jesse Marsch will have to look at that. They are playing Norwich, it’s not a must-win but it is a must not-lose game, that’s for sure. Raphinha, even if he’s a little bit not quite at it, is he more likely to create and score? Possibly.
“Is it worth even taking him if he’s on the bench? His attitude hasn’t been the greatest. I know he came on and did well against Man United for 10 minutes. Sometimes players like that you might as well not bother taking him than putting him on the bench.
“It’s a difficult call for Jesse Marsch to make.”
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The Verdict: Still likely to start
While Mills makes a fair point in terms of Raphinha’s form, it would still be a huge surprise if the Brazilian wasn’t involved in some capacity today.
He is still someone with the ability to win a match on his own – he is comfortably Leeds’ top scorer in the league this season with nine goals – and a moment of magic could make all the difference against the bottom-placed Canaries.
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That being said, a massive improvement is required from Raphinha, both in terms of quality and attitude, with another poor performance likely to attract further criticism, especially if the Whites fail to pick up three points this afternoon.
In other news, one journalist has made a significant claim regarding Jesse Marsch. Read more here.
For the scores of cricket fans packed onto the London Underground this morning, there was a special message as the train arrived at their destination. “Our next stop is Oval,” announced the driver over the tannoy, “where I regret to inform you the forecast is for sun.” It was a droll reminder of how futile England’s predicament had become. On Friday their series prospects were marmalised by an Indian batting performance of stunning totality, and now all that remained was a three-day face-saving exercise.Even so, for professional batsmen – a selfish bunch by nature – the idea of batting for three days in perfect sun-blessed conditions should not really have been the chore that England’s top order made it out to be today. Their coach, Peter Moores, had even dangled the carrot in his comments on the previous evening. “Help yourselves,” was the gist of his message as he exhorted them to bat, bat and then bat some more. If they put their own interests first, he reasoned, those of the team would follow soon enough. If Brian Lara was an Englishman in this situation, he would have had designs on a third world record.Instead England’s response was nervy, motley and self-destructive. Massive totals can have that effect on opposing sides – every run that is scored sinks into the requirement like a footstep up a sand-dune – but it could not mitigate the culpability of so many of England’s dismissals. Andrew Strauss’s hook to deep square leg on Friday evening might have been excusable after two days of hard toil, but it was not intended to be a template for what followed.England were limp, as limp as they had been in Lahore two winters ago in a similarly hopeless situation. Alastair Cook, dropped twice while clipping off his pads to leg slip, made it third time unlucky by spooning a return catch to Anil Kumble off the back of his over-eager blade. Kevin Pietersen allowed his more watchful persona to dominate the first 106 balls of his innings, before his hubristic Mr Hyde let rip at Sachin Tendulkar’s very first delivery, and even Ian Bell, a man whose appetite for easy runs is unsurpassed in this side, could not resist a wild slash at a wide one from Zaheer Khan.The flashiness of their downfall made Tendulkar’s sheet-anchor single-mindedness on the first two days all the more admirable. He took no risks whatsoever at a stage of the game when many onlookers were questioning the value of such stodginess. England’s batsmen, by contrast, had been granted a rare opportunity to be lauded for a lack of aesthetic appeal, much as happened to Michael Atherton at Johannesburg in 1995-96. None of them showed much desire to do things the ugly way.Only Michael Vaughan, who was genuinely deceived by an excellent googly from Kumble, and Paul Collingwood – the latest victim of Ian Howell’s ignoble series – could be excused for the manner of their dismissals. But even Collingwood admitted a measure of culpability in the shot that got him out. Talking of England’s approach to such a towering total, he said: “You have to stick to the gameplan of picking on your strengths, which for me was the straight ball on the pads, hitting it to the leg side.” The fact that he missed out on his money shot was all the excuse that Howell needed.
The flashiness of their downfall made Tendulkar’s sheet-anchor single-mindedness on the first two days all the more admirable. He took no risks whatsoever at a stage of the game when many onlookers were questioning the value of such stodginess. England’s batsmen, by contrast, had been granted a rare opportunity to be lauded for a lack of aesthetic appeal…
India’s bowlers were good but far from excellent – they did not need to be. It was not until they took the new ball with England already ruptured at 288 for 5 that they finally found the same consistency and aggression that had carried them to victory in the last Test at Trent Bridge. Up until that point their swing – though prodigious – had been misdirected, with Mahendra Singh Dhoni lining himself up a foot to the right of the return crease. The uncertainty they created, however, was enough to break England’s resolve.”Generally you know exactly what the ball is going to do as it comes down, but it’s very hard to line bowlers up when they are swinging it both ways,” said Collingwood, who made it sound rather as if he had spent his summer facing Wasim Akram. “The control that they’ve shown has been excellent, but being brought up on Indian wickets, you have to have that variety. “Though the series is lost, Collingwood insisted that the match is not yet all over for England. “I think everyone in the dressing room thinks it can be saved,” he said. “Whether we can win it or not is a different matter, but there’s plenty of fight in there, and we’ve got two days to show that fight.” History suggests that it is not entirely out of the question. In 1990, England were baked by India’s batsmen to the tune of 606 runs, folded for 340 in their first innings, then batted to the close with David Gower leading the way. Gower, however, was playing for his career. England’s current incumbents cannot even play for themselves at the moment.