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Monday,
January 13, 2003, Chandigarh, India  
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India trounce Afghanistan Lanka face England today Kiwi players lacking in intensity Tour has exposed Indians: Hudson
Anand draws opening game |
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Serena Williams keen to stay undefeated Hyderabad, January 12 West Zone scored a resounding six-wicket victory against North Zone and picked four points in the one-day Deodhar Trophy cricket match played at the Gymkhana Grounds here today. North 360 for 8
Mumbai 224 for 8 against Punjab Top players for Futures Tennis Railways, Haryana wrestlers dominate BSNL meet results Selection trials
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Dhaka, January 12 India, who suffered a shock 0-1 loss against Pakistan on Friday, made light work of an inexperienced Afghanistan with Ashim Biswas and Alvito D'Cunha scoring a brace each. In another match, Pakistan ensured themselves a berth in the last four stage of the competition with a 2-1 win over Sri Lanka. Afghanistan, who returned to international soccer after a long time, struggled to keep the rampaging Indians at bay despite the presence of four Germany based players in their ranks. The holders led the first half 1-0 in a match where Afghanistan failed to put up any real resistance. Ashim Biswas, opened the Indian scoring in the 30th minute tapping an Jo Paul Anchery back header from a close distance. It was the first international goal for the young Tollygunj Agragami striker, who made his debut only in the previous match. The 19-year-old also scored the second goal in the 63rd minute with a spectacular header off a long throw by Abhay Kumar. Alvito, coming in as a substitute in the 72nd minute for Venkatesh then scored twice. The midfielder scored the goals in the 77th and 85th with lethal left foot finishes. PTI Results: India 4 (Ashim Biswas 30th, 63rd, Alvito D’Cunha 77th, 85th) beat Afghanistan 0. Pakistan 2 (Zahid Newaz 48th, Sharfaraz Rasul 85th) beat Sri Lanka 1 (S.K. Weerasinghe 89th).
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Lanka face England today Sydney, January 12 Tomorrow’s match will be the first time Hair and controversial spin bowler Muttiah Muralitharan have met this summer. Hair, who no-balled Muralitharan for throwing during the Boxing Day Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in 1995-96, has been confirmed as Zimbabwean Russell Tiffin’s umpiring partner for the encounter. Jayasuriya shrugged off the appointment, saying Muralitharan was more concerned about returning to his best in time for the World Cup than Hair’s appearance in the middle. “No problem, it’s no problem,” Jayasuriya insisted. Jayasuriya also claimed Muralitharan was unconcerned about sections of the crowd yelling “no ball” when the 30-year-old off-spinner bowled against Australia in Sydney on Thursday, in his first game after a hernia operation. “That doesn’t bother him any more,” Jayasuriya said of the taunts. “We don’t bother about whatever the crowd says because we know he has proved himself as the number one bowler in the world.” “That is what matters to us. He just wants to enjoy his cricket. He’ll always give the Sri Lanka team 100 per cent all the time. “That is all he wants to do.” Muralitharan has 437 wickets from only 78 Tests, and 299 one-day wickets from 201 appearances. He is third and fourth on the all-time Test and one-day bowling lists respectively and he was recently voted Wisden’s best Test bowler of all time. But his remarkable rise has been accompanied by accusations of throwing. The International Cricket Council has cleared him, but opinion remains divided about the legality of his action, especially his top-spinner. There is a school of thought that umpires don’t report him any more because they fear they will lose their careers if they do. Hair was the first to no-ball Muralitharan. Later in the 1995-96 season, he was called by Tony McQuillan and Ross Emerson in a one-dayer against West Indies in Brisbane. His most recent visit to Australia in 1998-99 also turned ugly when Emerson called him at Adelaide Oval. As a result, there were fears Muralitharan would not tour Australia again, but he is trying desperately to get ready for the World Cup one-day contests starting next month in South Africa and Zimbabwe. “He’s just started and needs more time bowling in the nets and in matches,” said Jayasuriya. “He bowled pretty well the other night (against Australia) and he will get more and more useful in time. “When he comes in it gives a lot of confidence to the boys, he means as much to us as Shane Warne does to Australia.” Jayasuriya said Sri Lanka’s dramatic form reversal, resulting in a 79-run win over world champion Australia, was explained by a return to unabashedly attacking cricket. “What we discussed was that we need to play our natural game, especially myself,” said Jayasuriya, who belted 12 fours and four sixes in Sri Lanka’s total of 343 for five wickets. A win over England would keep Sri Lanka in the hunt to become the first side to reach the tri-series finals after losing their first three matches. “What we needed was one win to change the whole thing and we did that the other night,” said Jayasuriya. “That’s a big thing if you win against Australia. It gives you a lot of confidence because that’s the best team.” Jayasuriya said Australia and South Africa deserved favouritism for the World Cup, but warned any side - his included - was capable of a boilover simply because of the unpredictable nature of one-day cricket.
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Kiwi players
lacking in intensity The scoreline in the series has changed from 4-0 to 4-2 over the last one week and that is something we are not too happy about in the Kiwi camp. I have to admit that the boys are a little bit lacking in intensity over the last couple of games and the accuracy and focus that characterized our performance in the Test and first four one-dayers is missing. To be fair to the guys, this was bound to happen since a sense of fatigue does set in after one’s goal has been reached. Our goal was to win both the Test and one-day series. Now that our mission has been achieved it is indeed tough to keep the momentum going. All this does not take away from the fact that the Indians are playing some very good cricket. I would not like to make excuses and take anything away from the way India has come back to restore some pride. Virender Sehwag’s century in the last game is among the best you would ever see in not-so-ideal conditions. And on the bowling side it was really amazing to see Zaheer Khan keep going in spite of the successive setbacks his team has faced. While both Zaheer and Javagal Srinath are bowling quite well, our batting has not been too good. The conditions continue to have a huge impact on the cricket and both sides are still struggling in the batting department. It has been a war of attrition with the Indian batsmen also finding the going tough in both Wellington and Auckland, which is why the games were won by two and one wicket, respectively. The Hamilton games is important fur us because as the home side we would like to end the series on a winning note. This is the flip side of having a series decided in an early game, you have to keep manufacturing the pressure and the desire to win. Hopefully, this last game will have something in it for batsmen. The pitch looks quite brown — a far cry from the green-top we had for the Test at the same venue — so I hope we will have a more traditional kind of one-dayer to end the National Bank series. We have also had our share of niggles at the end of a long season. Nathan Astle is out of the side and we thought of trying Chris Harris at number three. It is something we would like to try again in the Hamilton game. Harris is a very affective batsman at
five or six, so we were wondering how he would fare at one-drop. I’m quite confident he will take up the challenge and make a fist of it on Tuesday. Chris Cairns has also made a quiet but promising return to top-level cricket. He is progressing nicely and has even given a go at bowling in the nets. The support staff is monitoring his bowling closely and we expect him to play as an all-rounder at some point in the World Cup. I would like to thank Sourav Ganguly for his supportive comments regarding questions about Kyle Mills’ action. We’re not experts here, but Kyle has been playing top-grade cricket for
some time now, and no one has had problems with his action. He has never been called and I don’t think he will have any problem at the World Cup either.
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Tour has exposed Indians: Hudson Durban, January 12 “Until recently, I gave India a chance of making the last four, but the New Zealand tour has exposed them. “I also gave England a thought, but I think they too will struggle in our conditions,” Hudson said in an interview to the Sunday Tribune here. Hudson predicted that hosts South Africa, Australia, Pakistan and New Zealand would make it to the final four with the final being an Australia-South Africa affair. Hudson, who played in the 1992 and 1996 World Cups, however, cautioned Shaun Pollock’s men against “over optimism”, saying, “historically, this tournament has not favoured the home side, and the same could be this time around.” “Judging from the records, we have a very difficult task ahead of us, even though we have a very strong 15-member squad. The class players will need to come to the party, not for one game, but virtually every match,” he said. Gary Kirsten would play a vital role in his side’s chances for cricket’s most coveted prize, Hudson said, adding it was important that the opener played an anchor role. “It’s important for Kirsten to play an anchor role. He is best suited to this, and then Herschelle Gibbs could be set free to play an attacking role,” he said.
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Anand draws opening game Wijk Aan Zee, January 12 Stealing day one honours was world champion Anatoly Karpov of Russia who won the public prize for the best game of the day by crushing Polish GM Michal Krasenkow. The only other victory of the day was also scored by a Russian as defending champion Evgeny Bareev put it across world champion Ruslan Ponomariov. In the Grandmasters group ‘B’ event being organised simultaneously, GM Koneru Humpy held GM Jan Van Der Wiel of Netherlands to an easy draw with black pieces. Impressive in this section was defending champion Dutch GM Friso Nijboer who defeated former world junior champion Peter Acs of Hungary. There were as many as five drawn results out of seven in the main event but all the games were fought hard and, some, till the last nail. Anand is playing a classical time control event after a gap of nearly one year, the only exception being a couple of games he played against Karpov enroute to his victory in the Eurotel Trophy at Prague in the Czech Republic. Many hail Teimour Radjabov as future world champion and he did not disappoint his fans in the first game of the first major classical event in his career. Taking his chances in the MacCutcheon variation of the French defence with black pieces, Radjabov had little troubles in securing an easy half point. Anand could not do much in the opening and conceded a balanced middle game to Radjabov after fighting out the intricacies of black’s minor weaknesses on the King side. Successfully guiding his king to safety on the queenside, Radjabov maintained a level position and the draw was agreed to in 28 moves. Karpov, 51, is fresh from a grand victory over world’s highest rated player Garry Kasparov — once his arch-rival — in a rapid chess match and his hunger for more victories was eminent the way he handled the black side of a queen’s Indian defence. Krasenkow, winner of the group ‘B’ event last year, had no answers to a brilliantly attack unleashed against his king and fell hook, line and sinker against the senior-most competitor in the fray.
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Serena Williams keen to stay undefeated Melbourne, January 12 Both suffered injuries on the eve of the 2002 Open. That wiped out any chance of Agassi winning three Australian Opens in a row and, as it turned out, of Williams winning all four Grand Slam tournaments in one calendar year. After twisting her right ankle chasing a drop shot in a warm-up tournament in Sydney last January, Williams became the dominant player on the women’s tour. She lost only one set - to Australian Open winner Jennifer Capriati - on her way to winning the French and US Opens and Wimbledon. In the two weeks starting Monday, she is trying for a “Serena slam,” which would make her the reigning champion of all four major tournaments. The last woman to do that was Steffi Graf, who added the 1994 Australian title to her victories in the other majors in 1993. Graf also is one of only three women who have won all four in one calendar year. She did that in 1988, following Maureen Connolly in 1953 and Margaret Court in 1970. Serena wants to be the fourth. “I want to be undefeated in 2003," she said. That well could mean more victories against elder sister Venus, her victim in three Grand Slam finals last year. If they meet here, it also would be in the final since Venus, who has won four Grand Slam tournaments, is seeded second. Neither sister has reached an Australian Open final. Serena’s best result was reaching the quarterfinals in 2001. Venus reached the semifinals that same year. After playing well in the USA’s victory in the Hopman Cup a week earlier, Serena skipped this year’s Sydney tournament. In contrast, Agassi went right back to the Kooyong Classic exhibition, where he hurt his right wrist in losing last year’s final to Pete Sampras. He won the Australian Open after winning at Kooyong in 2000 and 2001, and he won at Kooyong again Saturday, beating Sebastien Grosjean 6-2, 6-3 in the final. “This week I felt real good, a lot better a lot sooner than I was even hoping,” said the 32-year-old American, oldest among the seeded men players in the Open. Despite his early setback, Agassi finished last year ranked No. 2 behind Lleyton Hewitt. His best Grand Slam result was losing to Sampras again in the US Open final. A victory here would be Agassi’s eighth in Grand Slam tournaments, putting him in a tie for sixth place with Jimmy Connors, Ivan Lendl, Ken Rosewall and Fred Perry. Sampras, who leads the list with 14 Grand Slam titles, is skipping this Australian Open. Hewitt, meanwhile, is trying to become the first Australian winner of the home tournament since Mark Edmondson in 1976. Last year, weakened by chicken pox, he lost in the first round. “I feel sort of fine with that pressure, that expectation of sitting up there and being the No. 1 Australian. I don’t have too many problems with that,” he said. Last year’s runner-up Marat Safin, seeded third, hurt his right shoulder last Wednesday at Sydney, but expected to be back in shape for the Open. Defending champion Thomas Johansson is out with a knee injury. Also among the missing are No. 9-ranked Tim Henman and fellow Briton Greg Rusedski; No. 11 Tommy Haas; and Chile’s Marcelo Rios, runner-up in 1998. Women absentees include three-time winner Martina Hingis, 1999 runner-up Amelie Mauresmo, and No. 9 Jelena Dokic, who is boycotting after a fallout with tennis authorities in Australia. But Capriati is back to seek a third consecutive Australian title. Another contender is No. 4 Kim Clijsters, who became the first woman to beat both Williams sisters in the last two rounds of a tournament on her way to winning the WTA Tour Championships last November. Venus limped out of that loss with a lower leg strain and has not played a tournament since. Clijsters warmed up for the Open by winning the Sydney tournament, beating 2000 Australian winner Lindsay Davenport 6-4, 6-3 in the final Saturday. On the men’s side at Sydney, Lee Hyung-taik became the first South Korean winner in ATP Tour history, upsetting the Australian Open’s fourth-seeded player, Juan Carlos Ferrero, 4-6, 7-6 (6) 7-6 (4) in the final. He joins an Asian challenge at the Open that also includes Thailand’s Paradorn Srichaphan, seeded 11th after a year in which he won two titles, reached two other finals and moved up 110 places in the rankings to No. 16. Three-time French Open champion Gustavo Kuerten comes into the Open fresh from victory over Dominik Hrbaty in today’s final of the Heineken Open in Auckland, New Zealand.
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Islamabad, January 12 |
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Six-wicket win for West Hyderabad, January 12 Chasing a target of 231, West romped home comfortably with 11 balls to spare as skipper Hrisihkesh Kanitkar scored a run-a-ball 80 while Robin Morris compiled a patient 74. West Zone, who restricted North to 230 for nine, lost opener Connor Williams for one run but Morris paired with Vinayak Mane (27) to add 31 runs for the second wicket. Skipper Kanitkar joined Morris and added 128 runs for the third wicket before Kanitkar was dismissed by A Bhandari for 80 which included one six, and seven fours. Morris carried the team to the last lap but was run out for 74 laced with three fours, and one six. Kale and Damani completed the formalities of getting the score to 231 in 48.1 overs to give West a convincing win. Earlier, put into bat North Zone scored 230 with the help of a run-a-ball knock of 61 by Mithun Manhas. The 57-run fourth-wicket partnership between Pankaj Dharmani and Mithun stablised the innings with Akash Chopra and skipper R Sodhi contributing 29 and 22 runs, respectively. Dharmani was dismissed for 32 by spinner Powar. Manhas was caught behind after a breezy knock of 61 (1x6 4x4). Speedster Irfan Pathan and spinner Romesh Powar claimed two wickets apiece for West. SCOREBOARD: North Zone: Chopra b Powar 29, Gambhir c Kanitkar b Trivedi 4, Sodhi c Mewada b Morris 22, Manhas c Mewda b Kanitkar 61, Dharmani c Mane b Powar 32, Amit run out 14, Ratra b Pathan 29, Sarandeep c Williams b Pathan 7, Uniyal run out 11, Bhandari not out 2, Mishra not out 1. Extras: (lb-5, w-12, nb-1) 18 Total: (for 9 wkts in 50 overs) 230 Fall of wickets: 1-15, 2-44, 3-90, 4-147, 5-172, 6-175, 7-197, 8-227, 9-227. Bowling: Irfan Pathan 10-1-42-2, Siddharth Trivedi 9-1-36-1, Robin Morris 5-0-29-1, Ramesh Powar 10-0-48-2, Sairaj Bahutule 10-0-40-0, Hrishikesh Kanitkar 6-0-30-1. West Zone: Williams c Sodhi b Uniyal 1, Morris run out 74, Vinayak run out 27, Kanitkar c Ratra b Bhandari 80, Kale not out 46, Dhamani not out 0. Extras: (lb-1, w-2) 3. Total: (for 4 wkts in 48.1 overs) 231 Fall of wickets: 1-1, 2-32, 3-160, 4-221. Bowling: Amit Bhandari 10-0-44-1, Amit Uniyal 7-0-25-1, Sarandeep Singh 8-0-35-0, Amit Sharma 5-0-37-0, Amit Mishra 7-0-45-0, Ritinder Singh Sodi 8-0-36-0, Mithun Manhas 3.1-0-8-0.
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North 360 for 8 Rohtak, January 12 Resuming their overnight score of 123 for two, the unbeaten pair of Shikhar Dhawan and Vikram Dhariwal added another 40 runs before being
separated. Shikhar made 71 in 251 minutes off 180 balls with the help of ten hits to the fence whereas Vikram was dismissed after making 24 off 44 balls in 60 minutes with the help of four boundaries. The pair added exactly 50 runs for the 3rd wicket in 60 minutes after facing 99 balls. After their dismissal, two more partnerships above 50 runs flourished to strengthen the North Zone innings. Scoreboard: North Zone (Ist innings): M. Bisla c H. Dass b Sarkar 17, Shikhar Dhawan c Mohanty b Tushar 71, Salil Oberoi lbw Tushar 44, Vikram Dhariwal lbw Sarkar 24, Deepak Sharma run out 5, Sachin Rana c Behra b Nayak 59, Kuldeep Rawat lbw Nayak 19, Pankaj Thakur batting 49, Abhishek Sharma c sub (Jahangir) b Amber Roy 28, Aparajit Singh batting 5,
Extras: (b-18, lb-9, nb-10, w-2) 39. Total: for 8 wickets (in 109 overs) 360.
Fall of wickets: 1/38, 2/113, 3/163, 4/169, 5/182, 6/239, 7/269, 8/331.
Bowling: Saurav Sarkar 27-6-94-2, Amber Roy 15-1-68-1, Rakesh Mohanty 19-4-53-0, Niranjan Behera 19-7-44-1, Pravat Nayak 13-0-49-2, Tushar 16-5-26-2. |
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Mumbai 224 for 8 against Punjab Kanpur, January 12 In the other quarter-final match between Karnataka and Bengal, Karnataka were all out for 320 after adding 29 runs in their first innings. Only 11.4 overs could be bowled due to bad light. Resuming at the overnight score of 291 for nine, Karnataka’s last wicket pair of Ryan Ninan (21) and Umesh Karvi (11) added 43 runs for last wicket stand. For Bengal Amit Banerjee captured one more wicket today to take his tally to six wickets for 97 runs. In the Mumbai-Punjab match, only 50 minutes of play was possible in inclement weather as Mumbai could add just 19 runs while losing one more wicket. Mumbai skipper Rakesh Kannaujia (24) and Shoaib Saikh resumed at the team’s overnight score of 205 for seven in the afternoon. But soon Shoaib (22) was dismissed when he was trapped leg before off Gurpreet Khera. Arif, batting on 6 and Kanaujia, 39, ensured there was no further setback for the team. Punjab took the new ball after completion of 100 overs but only one bowl had been bowled when Mumbai batsmen appealed for play to be stopped as there was poor visibility. For Punjab Gurpreet Khera claimed four wickets for 61.
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Top players for Futures Tennis New Delhi, January 12 Almost all the top players of India, barring of course Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi, like Harsh, Rohan and Sunil Kumar are participating in the tournament, which has assumed added significance in view of India’s Davis Cup tie against Japan, to be played at the same venue from February 7 to 9. The foreign challenge will consist of Russia’s Mikhail Elgin and Dmitri Valsov, Ukrainian Orest Tereshchuik, Satoshi Iwabuchi of Japan and Kong-Hyun Kim of Korea. Harsh Mankad had won the third and final leg of the $10,000 ITF men’s singles tournament at Davangere, Karnataka last year. With the tournament getting bigger with an enhanced prize money of $15,000 for the first time, keen competition is expected. Meanwhile 20 foreign players and 33 Indian players contested in the qualifying rounds here today. Twelve Indians crossed the first hurdle to remain in contention for berths in the main round.
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Railways, Haryana wrestlers dominate Ranchi, January 12 The MTNL female wrestlers won four gold and a silver to collect 63 points while Haryana with 58 points secured the second position. The gold winners for MTNL were Kamini Yadav (51 kg), Shinu Jain (55 kg), Alka Toma (59 km) and Kiran Sihag (67 kg). While Sonika kaliraman (72 kg) and Sumel Khan (48 kg) got silver in their respective weight categories. In the men’s championship the Railway Sports Promotion Board (RSPB) wrestlers domination in the free style category was total as they collected 63 points against the second best team Uttar Pradesh’s 42 points. For RSPB Kirpa Shankar (55 kg), Sujeet Man (74 kg) won gold. Janardhan Yadav (84 kg) and Shokender Tomar (66 kg) won the silver, while Satender Dalal (120 kg) got the bronze in their respective weight categories. In the men’s free style section, Uttar Pradesh collected 42 points to finish second with Jagdish Kaliraman winning the gold in the 120 kg category. In the men’s Greco-Roman, Railways wrestlers dominated with Mukesh Khatri (55 kg), Ravinder Patil (66 kg) and Virender Singh (120 kg) winning the gold and Krishan Kumar (96 kg) winning bronze in their respective weight categories, to collect 57 points for their team. Haryana finished second in men’s Greco-Roman with 47 points. For the host state Jharkhand, Anand won the gold in the 60 kg class and Yeshbir got the silver in the 55 kg class in the Greco-Roman style for men.
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BSNL meet results Kurukshetra, January 12 The detailed results, which were released here today, are as follows. 56 kg:
J.P. Singh, Uttar Pradesh East (140 points) 1, Vinod Kumar Chaudhary, MTNL Delhi (120 points) 2 and Shaik Fayeem, Madhya Pradesh (117.5 points) 3. 62 kg: C.G. Harish, Kerala (165) 1, G.R. Kumar, Andhra Pradesh (145) 2 and S. Babu, Tamil Nadu (130) 3. 69 kg: U.R. Janardan, Tamil Nadu (182.5) 1, Suraj Pal Singh, MTNL Delhi (175) 2 and G. Tangia, Andhra Pradesh (167.5) 3. 77 kg: B. Satayanarayan, Andhra Pradesh (190) 1, K.L. Dey, West Bengal (187.5) 2 and A. Sharma, MTNL, Delhi (170) 3. 85 kg: M. Satyanarayan, Andhra Pradesh (205) 1, Manik Tamrakar, Chhattisgarh (182.5) 2 and K. Gunasekharan, Tamil Nadu (180) 3. |
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Selection trials Shimla, January 12 Stating this here today, a spokesman of the Youth Services and Sports Department said these trials would be held for girls in the age group of 13 to 19 in the disciplines of athletics, hockey, volleyball, basketball and judo. He said interested girls should report at the sports complex, Dharamsala along with their original certificates regarding age, qualifications, sports achievements and necessary sports kit for the trials. |
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