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Monday,
June 16, 2003, Chandigarh, India  
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FIRST
ONE-DAY LIBERO CUP Beckham deal Lack of genuine spinners ‘affecting balance’
ICC faces £ 50 m
compensation
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Miandad rakes up
match-fixing issue Furyk moves two clear; Woods fades
Federer wins grass court title
Prakash’s win adds lustre to Delhi leg
Car gifted to Kapil brought to Ahmedabad Nandita, Raman clinch titles Kulu defeat Nahan Mayank hits half
ton against HP
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FIRST
ONE-DAY LIBERO CUP Kolkata, June 15 After notching up a 5-3 victory against formidable East Bengal through tie-breaker at the knock-out stage, Tollygunge tamed Bagan 5-4 in the final of the four-cornered challenger in a similar fashion to lift the cup, much to the appaulse of the 50,000 strong crowd at the Salt Lake Stadium. Tollygunge, now under the stewartship of sacked Bagan coach Subrata Bhattacharjee, held Bagan 1-1 during the scheduled 60 minutes before winning the penalty shoot out (4-3), thanks to the heroic performance of custodian Chinmoy Banerjee. Displaying clear determination and planning in their game, the less glamourous outfit of Kolkata football raced ahead into the lead in the 16th minute when Amit Das, fed by a Ajay Singh pass from the left, fired in a left footer past Bagan goalie Imran Khan. The green and maroon brigade, however, staged a comeback in the second half after induction of ace striker Asim Biswas and drew parity in the 46th minute through a same-side goal by Tenjen Kaibong . As the match was stretched into tie-breaker, Tollygunge goalie Banerjee emerged as the key factor to decide the fate of the rivals. Banerjee, who was adjudged ‘man of the tournament, saved the shots of Hardeep Gill and Monitomba Singh to lead his team to victory. Tollygunge bagged Rs 2 lakh prize money as winners of the first-ever such high-profile one-day football tourney, organised by the Indian Football Association to warm up the Kolkata soccer buffs before the new season. The Mohun Bagan-Mohammedan Sporting match, however, was a clear test of patience for the jampacked stadium. With the lacklustre encounter ending goal-less in scheduled time, Bagan out-smarted Mohammedan by winning the tie-breaker 4-2 to move to the final. Palash, Sunil Chetri, Hardeep Gill and Monitomba scored for Bagan while Hussain Mustafi and Bungo Singh found the target for Mohammedan in the tie-breaker. Earlier, star-studded Kingfisher East Bengal were ousted in the opening match when they lost 5-3 to DTDC Tollygunge Agragami in the tie-breaker.
PTI
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Beckham deal LONDON: Financial watchdogs are probing the announcement by Manchester United that a conditional offer for England captain David Beckham has been accepted, the Sunday Telegraph reported. The Financial Services Authority (FSA) was examining whether the club should have made the news public through the stock exchange because the information could have affected its share price, the newspaper said. Manchester United’s share price rose on Tuesday afternoon after the announcement of the deal — apparently worth £ 30 million ($ 50 million). It was made known through the media.
DPA
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Lack of genuine spinners ‘affecting balance’
Chennai, June 15 Legendary Erapally Prasanna and L. Sivaramakrishnan said the Board had already moved in the right direction in search of spinners in the mould of the former Indian quartet. “After all, it took over two decades for India to find international-level medium pace bowlers. So the present action by the board is better late than never,” they told PTI here today. Prasanna said the BCCI had realised the need to provide spinners for the national side, which could be a reality in two or three years, as there was abundant talent available. These bowlers could then go out and prove themselves. They said Indian cricket had depended on spin bowling for over two decades. The lack of genuine spinners was now becoming a worldwide phenomenon, they said. Prasanna denounced the attitude of some captains, who set the field without consulting bowlers. He was also critical of other aspects like spinners coming on to bowl without a plan, which, he said, had led to the present situation. The duo, who are involved in honing the skills of trainees at the MAC Spin Foundation and V.V. Kumar, a former Indian spinner, who had coached youngsters at the MAC for over three years, said Indian spinners were more subtle, yet lethal. The quartet of Prasanna, Bishen Singh Bedi, B. Chandrashekar and S. Venkataraghavan could deceive batsmen at will. Their skills gave a different meaning to the branch of spin bowling during their heydays. A comparative study of the quality of spin between 70’s and 80’s and now, shows a steep decline, with the present day spinners hardly a potent force to win matches. The quartet ruled the roost with fielders crowding the bat and the wicket-keeper on his toes throughout the day. Batsmen used to be stranded yards down the wicket and were either stumped or caught by close in fielders, diving to pick the ball inches above the ground. This does not occur as frequently now a days. The four shared 849 wickets between them in Test matches. With contrasting styles, they were known to hunt in pairs to bag wickets and were part and parcel of the Indian team. No other cricket playing nation at that time had played three spinners. In fact, these four had played a Test match against England in Edgbaston in 1967. The 1980’s also saw them win matches for India on overseas tours. Both Prasanna and Sivaramakrishanan said present day spinners failed to excel in their art on all surfaces, since they were not attacking and controlling the game. “The astounding measure of craft in spin bowling with simple action is missing in the present lot. They lack the parabola and fail to wobble the ball in the air most often,” they said. The 70’s and 80’s were an eventful era, with one of the four shouldering the job of the others. Later, Dilip Doshi stood apart, with a strike rate of 114 wickets in 33 Tests in four seasons before he was shunted out. After the great quartet and Doshi left the scene, the selectors have tried out 28 spinners since 1979 to this day. Shival Yadav, who then became a member of the national selection committee, was equally good at his task, bagging 102 wickets in 35 Tests during 1979-86. The absence of the quartet was not felt as much when Ravi Shastri came on to the scene. The decline in quality was more deep after Shastri also faded away, claiming 151 wickets in 80 Tests during his 12-year career. With the emergence of Maninder Singh and L. Sivaramakrishnan there was some hope for cricket lovers. These two often hit the headlines for their wicket taking abilities and were thought to be a perfect spin combination. But they ‘burnt out’ rather too early. Later, Narender Hirwani, in the company of Hyderabad’s Arshad Ayub, won a Test series for India on home soil against a not so highly rated New Zealand. Hirwani had a record 16-wicket haul in the Chepauk Test in 1987, when he flummoxed West Indies, known to panic against the turning ball. Twenty two-year-old orthodox spinner Venkatapathy Raju was next to hog the limelight and was soon on two tours. But he too fell out of favour of the selection committee after an impressive haul of 93 wickets in 28 Test matches. Anil Kumble, not a classical spinner, but effective on bouncy wickets, who made his debut against England at Manchester in 1990, is still regarded as one who can trouble batsmen, particularly in one-day games. After Rajesh Chauhan served India for five years, off spinners Yogendra Bhandari and Aashish Kapoor showed a lot of promise, but their standards too dipped. Sunil Joshi of Karnataka hit the scene later, but could not stand up to the high expectations of selectors. He has played 15 Tests, claiming 41 wickets. While Kumble continued to be the ‘prima donna’ of Indian spin, Harbhajan Singh got the selectors nod to play for India in 1997, after his good performance in India ‘A’ side’s tour of South Africa. In between, bowlers like Sairaj Bahatule, R.L. Sanghvi, Nilesh Kulkarni, Nikhil Chopra and Vijay Bhardwaj came in but soon went out of recknoning. Utpal Chatterjee, Noel David, Gyanendra Pande and Sridharan Sriram were also tried out in one-dayers. Today’s spinners most often err in line and length and also have to bowl against batsmen playing with heavy bats, which help them whack the ball out of the ground, at times on mis-hits too. While one-dayers have taken over Test matches in terms of spectator support, Prasanna and Sivaramakrishnan feel there is a good future for spinners in India. A situation might arise when the management would be forced to field three spinners to win matches. “The future is bright, mainly due to the fact that the board has heeded to the suggestions of the selection committee to give thrust to training spinners in the national academy and make match winners for India,” they added. PTI
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ICC faces £ 50 m compensation
London, June 15 The ICC convenes here today a week-long annual meeting where the damage claims by the GCC and other issues will be discussed. The ICC conceded they would have to forfeit some money but were unhappy with larger sections of the GCC’s claim, the report said. The ICC has with held the guarantee money for the South Africa World Cup, held in February-March this year, due to England, New Zealand and India in anticipation of compensation claims. The ICC might be in the right to ask England and New Zealand to bear the costs after they refused to play in Zimbabwe and Kenya, respectively, but any such request might be contended by the Indian cricket board (BCCI). PTI
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Ehsan Mani Islamabad, June 15 “He is a very competent person who has been with the ICC for years now. We do not expect and would not want him to give Pakistan any preferential treatment in his tenure,” Zia said in Karachi on Saturday before leaving for London to attend the annual meetings of the ICC.
PTI |
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Rahul Dravid slams ton London, Jun 15 Displaying a tremendous array of strokes, Dravid hit 10 fours and three huge sixes during his 126 minutes knock to put Scotland in a comfortable position. Coming to the crease at the fall of John Williamson (0) Dravid added 117 runs with opener R Watson for the third wicket to take the score to 166 before the latter was trapped leg before by Simon Francis for 75. Putting behind the disappointment of a first-ball duck against the touring Pakistan side in a one-day match last week, which Scotland lost by one wicket, Dravid played with confidence to complete his century in 89 balls. He put on 100 runs for the fourth wicket with J Kent (48) to help his side finish on 296.
PTI
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Miandad rakes up match-fixing issue
London, June 15 In his autobiography, ‘Cutting Edge’, Miandad, no stranger to controversy, claims that concerns over the conduct of his team in the match on April 12, 1999, led him to resign as coach just a month before the World Cup. Now back in charge as the team coach and preparing for Pakistan’s three-match NatWest Series opener with England at Old Trafford on Tuesday, Miandad’s claim backs up allegations about the Sharjah game made earlier by current captain Rashid Latif. Pakistan lost to England by 62 runs — five days after thrashing them by 90 runs — and Miandad, the highest run-scorer in Pakistan’s Test cricket history, says in his book that he was “concerned that our performance may have had little to do with cricket”. According to a report in ‘The Mail On Sunday’, Miandad claims that during the interval between innings, he received telephone calls which suggested his players may have been bribed to lose the match. PTI
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Furyk moves two clear; Woods fades Olympia Fields, Illinois, June 15 Furyk, co-leader overnight with Vijay Singh, mixed four birdies with a bogey-five at the 444-yard 10th to lie at 10 under after 15 holes. Woods, who had been bidding for a third U.S. Open crown in four years, dropped out of contention with a five-over-par 75 after a fan put him off his second shot at the par-five first. Twice major winner Singh, his playing partner, was back in second at eight under yesterday, having surrendered a share of the lead when he dropped a shot at the par-four 12th. Australia’s Stephen Leaney, who reached the turn in three-under 33 before running up a double-bogey six at the 10th, was third at six under. Three-times major champion Nick Price, after a sizzling start featuring five birdies in the first six holes, stumbled round the turn but managed to birdie the last for a 69, finishing at five-under 205. “I got off to a great start and I just tried to hang in there,” the 46-year-old Zimbabwean said. “But on the back nine my driving let me down. It was tough out there today.” Defending champion Woods, four under overnight after a second-round 66, endured a frustrating day. His title hopes all but disappeared as he dropped six shots, with a solitary birdie at the par-four 14th, ending up at one-over 211. “I made nothing out there,” the world number one said. “When you don’t make any putts, you can’t get momentum. And then I missed a couple of par putts to compound the problem.” Woods had hit a perfect drive at the 576-yard opening hole but then pushed his approach into the right front bunker as the spectator whistled on his backswing. “It came on my downswing ... and you can’t stop that. I’ve no idea whether it was intentional,” he said. After growling in the direction of the offending fan, he splashed out to 15 feet but was unable to sink the birdie putt. He dropped his first shot of the day at the par-four fifth, where he hit his approach through the back of the green, another on nine, where he lipped out from six feet, and ran up his third bogey at the 444-yard 10th. He was never able to recover after that. Most of the early fireworks came from Price, who fired a five-under-par 65 on Friday to vault into contention. He hit approaches to eight and 10 feet on one and two, and then struck his second shot to six feet at the 389-yard third for birdie number three, tying overnight pacesetters Singh and Furyk for the lead. At the 164-yard fourth, he rifled his tee shot to eight feet, and coolly rolled in the birdie putt to snatch the outright lead. He salvaged his par from a greenside bunker on five and collected a two-putt birdie at the 555-yard sixth before running up his first bogey of the day at the 212-yard seventh, where his tee shot plugged in a bunker. Reuters
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Federer wins grass court title
Halle, June 15 Federer broke Kiefer on his first service game and then needed just 68 minutes to end the lopsided match against the unseeded German by sending a volley into the open court at the Wimbledon warmup. He bounced back from a first-round exit at the French Open three weeks ago, the latest disappointment in a Grand Slam for the world No. 5. It was also his tour best 43rd victory this season. “But lucky for this tournament, I had eight days off. I was optimally prepared,” Federer said. “I’m very proud to win this event.” The Swiss player won the eighth title of his career and joined 11 other active players on the tour in claiming wins on all four major surfaces, including hard courts, clay and indoors. “I believe if you can win on all four surfaces, that’s something special. Especially if you’re as young as I am,” said the 21-year-old. Federer, long regarded as a player with the talent to win Wimbledon, turned in some impressive performances on grass at the $ 940,000 event in preparation for the Grand Slam event starting June 23. The field, however, was depleted by the late withdrawals of players like French Open champion Juan Carlos Fererro. Kiefer, once the world No. 4, had won just two matches heading into the event in Halle, which is located just 80 km from where the German is born. Kiefer credited a vocal home crowd for pushing him to victory yesterday in a near three-hour marathon against Frenchman Arnaud Clement. But Federer silenced the 9,000 spectators by never giving the German a chance. He beat a nervous mistake-prone Kiefer both at the net and from the backline. In just 25 minutes, the Swiss player raced to a 5-0 first set lead. “I have no excuse. He was just better,” Kiefer said. Kiefer has lost the final two straight years, last year falling to Russia’s Yevgeny Kafelnikov. Federer won 113,000 euros, the German 66,400. AP
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Roddick
pockets title
London, June 15 The American, possessor of the fastest serve in tennis and conqueror of Andre Agassi in the last round, took just 59 minutes to wipe the Frenchman off the court. Roddick pocketed 94,700 Euros ($111,300) for the one-sided victory but more importantly it will serve as a major confidence boost with eight days to go before Wimbledon. A single break in the first set was enough for the American to clinch it on a scorching day at Queen’s Club. Reuters
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Prakash’s win adds lustre to Delhi leg New Delhi, June 15 The Amritraj siblings — Stepen Amritraj has been given a wild card into the main draw — will try to showcase the famous lineage of the Amritrajs, and though tennis tournaments at DLTA rarely attract spectators, barring a handful of faithfuls, the competition is expected to be intense. The best of the country’s tennis talent like Sunil Kumar, Vijay Kannan, Ajay Ramaswamy, Vinod Sridhar, Vishal Uppal and Mustafa Ghouse will try to measure up to Prakash, now that he has broken into the “big league” with his maiden title victory at Chandigarh. There are also a host of foreign entries, but India’s interest is to see how the youngsters live up to the pressure to bring out their best. The third leg will be followed by the masters, also to be held in Delhi, but the searing heat wave will not make things any smoother for the players, though the DLTA claims to have made the “best possible” arrangement for the event. With the once elegant tennis complex now boasting of a club for the “rich and the famous”, the focus seems to have shifted away from tennis with very few spectators coming out to watch the matches. The past few weeks witnessed a flurry a tennis activity at the DLTA, with the holding of the women’s and junior circuits here. But these events did not create even a ripple, and the players toiled away in unbearably hot conditions with the concrete stands sporting a bare look. Hopefully, the men’s circuit may be different, thanks to the presence of Prakash Amritraj and other talented youngsters.
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Car gifted to Kapil brought to Ahmedabad
Ahmedabad, June 15 A senior investigating officer of the CID (crime) told PTI today that the black Mercedes Benz, worth Rs 24 lakh, that was gifted to Kapil Dev was brought back from Delhi yesterday and is in its custody at present. “We are not sure if the cricketer would be questioned in this regard and it would be decided later by senior officials”, the officer said. He said the car was valued at Rs 24 lakh but was given to Zaheer to be gifted to the cricketer at a concessional rate of Rs 18 lakh. The official had said that when contacted, the cricketer was away on a shooting assignment, and agreeing to cooperate with investigations, allowed the police to seize the car given to him by Rana. He said the police was also investigating if Rana had gifted similar luxury items to other prominent personalities with whom he had been photographed during some functions. The team would visit Delhi soon to probe activities of other agents and offices of Remo marketing, he said. Rana, proprietor of Remo Marketing is accused of floating several bogus schemes like the “recharge for free dotcom” in the city, allegedly duping lakhs of people worth crores of rupees. PTI
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Nandita, Raman clinch titles
Bangalore, June 15 The 19-year-old second year Bachelor of Arts student from Siliguri posted a convincing 11-7, 12-10, 12-10, 11-8 win over Das (Petroleum Sports Promotion Board). Nandita made a good start and barring some anxious moments in the second and third set, never really allowed her rival to dominate the proceedings. In the men’s section, top seed and National Champion S. Raman (PSPB) lived upto his billing when he quelled a late surge from compatriot Sharat Kamal and beat him 11-3, 11-9, 12-10, 5-11, 10-12, 13-11 to win the title. Raman seemed to have it easy when he clinched three consecutive sets. However, Kamal, known for aggressive play, bounced back into the game and took the next two. Raman then banked upon a defensive strategy, ensuring that the ball never rose high for his opponent to take advantage and wrapped up the fifth set. Jubilant over his win, Raman said “It feels good to win. I want to do well at the international level too”. In the semi-final played earlier, Das beat compatriot T. Pradeep (4-3) 11-9, 11-7, 6-11, 7-11, 11-8, 6-11, 11-7 to move into the final, while Saha defeated Montu Ghosh (PSPB) 11-5, 13-11, 11-6, 13-11 to set up a title clash. In the men’s semifinals, Raman fought hard to beat Ranbir Das (RSCB) 7-11, 7-11, 11-6, 6-11, 11-4, 11-8, 11-5. Kamal outclassed S. Chakraborthy (RSCB) 11-6, 11-7, 12-10, 11-8 to sail into the final. PTI
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Kulu defeat Nahan Chamba, June 15 Nahan started their second innings but were all out for 102 in 30 overs. Pawan 35 and Rajesh 31 batted well while, Mike Soni took 6 for 33. Kulu, needing to score 28 runs for an outright victory, scored 28 runs without losing any wicket. Brief scores: Nahan (first innings): 127. Kulu (first innings): 202 all out. Abhishek (60), Sarang (45). Manik 5 for 75, Mohsin 4 for 57. Nahan (2nd innings): 102 all out. Pawan (35), Rajesh (31). Mike Soni 6 for 33, Rajesh Kaundal 3 for 26. Kulu (2nd innings): 28 for no loss. Karam Bhapa 20 not out, Abhishek 8 not out. |
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Mayank
hits half ton against HP Amritsar, June 15 Himachal Pradesh have come here on a seven-day tour and will play two two-day matches and a one-day match. For the hosts, Mayank Sharma scored the highest 55 runs, while Sumit Sharma and Saransh Thakur contributed 50 and 42 runs, respectively. For the visitors, Shakun Saini took the highest wickets, claiming two wickets for 45 runs in 20 overs. Sanjay Trama grabbed one wicket for 40 runs and Saurabh Rattan claimed one wicket for 75 runs. |
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