Brisbane, March 4
It was a story of all's well that ends well for Indian skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni as he described the tour of Australia as "the best" in his cricket career after the Men in blue clinched their first-ever tri-series victory.

Dhoni scripted history by leading the young Indian team to a nine-run win in nerve-wrecking second finals of the tri-series at the Gabba today.

"This is the best tour I have been on. It cannot get better than this as we played the world's top two teams Sri Lanka and Australia and then beating them to win convincingly in two successive finals," said Dhoni.

The one-day captain, who had also led India to Twenty20 World Cup glory last year, said the win was specially significant for his young team.

"It is a building up stage for my team with most of the young blood in the absence of the seniors," he said and gave credit to the youngsters for proving their detractors wrong. The youngsters had come under fire after India failed miserably in their one-off Twenty20 game against Australia immediately after the Test series and before the tri-series.

He also gave credit to seniors like Sachin Tendulkar who contributed to the team at crucial junctures. — PTI

Brisbane, March 4
Admitting that his team was ''outplayed'' in the CB Series final, Australia captain Ricky Ponting congratulated Team India on their victory.

''All credit has to go to MS Dhoni and the Indian team for the way they've played over the last week,'' Ponting told Sky Sports.

''They've certainly outplayed us in the two finals and they thoroughly deserve to go home with the CB trophy.''

Ponting praised young medium pacer Praveen Kumar who claimed the Man-of-the-Match prize in the final.

''Praveen has done a terrific job for them in the last two games, has got them wickets up front and got our middle order in their relatively early and that's where we've lost the momentum in both the finals,'' Ponting said.

The Aussie skipper was disappointed with his team's showing in the best-of-three finals.

''I was disappointed with the way we played in Sydney the other night, but I'm actually quite proud of the way we fought the game out tonight. It ended up being a terrific game of cricket.''

''There's no excuses. I think our level of cricket over the last week has dropped off we haven't played as well in the final as we have in the lead up games and we did the same last year,'' he added.

Asked by former Australian captain Mark Taylor if the off-field controversies had affected the team, Ponting said that in the last week or so things had quietened down and still the team had lost.

"All that (off-field controversies) had gone down last to last week. But we played our worst cricket in last couple of games," he said.

Ponting said Ishant Sharma and Praveen Kumar did an outstanding job for their team. — Agencies

Chandigarh, March 4
Three matches in the Commonwealth Bank series, two Man of the Match awards - one in the series decider — and 10 wickets! Praveen Kumar has emerged as the man with the Midas touch for Team India Down Under.

Given the new ball in the absence of an injured Ishant Sharma today, Praveen exceeded all the expectations, jolting world champions Australia and getting rid of the dangerous trio of Adam Gilchrist, Ricky Ponting and Michael Clarke in a jiffy paving the way for India’s historic win.

With the game again in the balance in the slog overs, the 21-year-old all-rounder from Meerut returned to send back hard-hitting Brett Lee, when a couple of meaty blows from his blade would have taken the game away from India. But the wily Praveen acquitted himself like a seasoned campaigner. Bowling a slower one, he completed flummoxed Lee to shift the momentum in India’s favour.

In the first final at Sydney, he had proved to be the nemesis for Gilchrist and Ponting.

When he got his first game of the tri-series against Sri Lanka at Hobart - a virtual do-or-die affair, Praveen was again in the thick of action. He got the crucial breakthroughs snaring the wickets of Kumara Sangakarra, skipper Mahela Jawardene and Chamara Silva in the first spell before sending back Muttiah Muralitharan in his second spell. With four wickets in his kitty, Praveen was the obvious choice for the Man of the Match award.

Praveen Kumar has been a revelation. He goes about his job in a clinical fashion, never betraying any emotion on the field. Be it the new ball he is given to open the bowling for the team or bowling at the death, Praveen has shown an uncanny knack of being bang on target.

What makes Praveen a tough customer with the ball is his control. Accuracy being his hallmark, Praveen makes life tough for batsmen with his stock delivery that come in sharply to the right-handed batsman, while getting occasional outswingers as well.

Praveen, the most successful bowler in Ranji Trophy matches for Uttar Pradesh last season, has the reputation of being a hard-hitting batsman besides being a good fielder.

Earlier, in the Test series, Ishant Sharma caused quite a stir with the scorching pace he generated. Then in the tri-series, swashbuckling Gautam Gambhir with two centuries under his belt - the lone batsman to achieve this feat in the tri-series - proved what a match winner the Delhi batsman could be for the country.

Now, Praveen Kumar, with two Man of Match awards in three outings, makes one believe that more will heard of this crafty all-rounder in the days to come!

Bangalore: BCCI President Sharad Pawar today announced a cash prize of Rs 10 crore for the triumphant Indian cricketers and support staff.

Announcing the award while felicitating the U-19 World Cup winning Indian team, he said the selectors of the senior and junior team would get Rs 1 crore each for their great work.

Pawar said the Indian team would arrive in Mumbai tomorrow and would be given a grand reception in New Delhi on March 6. — UNI

Bangalore, March 4
Williams Sisters - Serena and Venus - registered their first win on Indian soil defeating Romanian and Thai pair of Andreea Ehritt and Tamarine Tanasugarn 7-6, 6-4 to enter the doubles quarterfinals of the $600,000 WTA Tier II Bangalore Open here today.

Venus and Serena took just 94 minutes to send home packing their rivals, who played better in the first set forcing tie break.

In the first set, taking time to settle down, their rivals conceded three points (0-3) but Serena had a quick break and taking advantage of a double fault opened the account (1-3) and went ahead not only to equalise but also to take a one point lead (4-3).

However, the Thai and Romanian duo succeeded in equalising (4-4).But Serena's superb aces combined with Venus's backhand shots, shattered the hopes of their opponents. The sisters led 6-5.

Results: first round (singles): Vera Zvonareva (Russia) b Monica Niculescu (Romania) 4-6, 6-3, 6-1; Anastasia Rodionova (Russia) b Sun Tiantian (China) 4-6, 7-6, 6-4; Agnes Szatmari (Romania) b Isha Lakhani (India) 6-2, 6-2; Peng Shuai (China) beat Anne Kremer (Luxembourg) 6-1, 6-2; Sanda Mamic (Croatia) b Chan Yung-jan (Taiwan) 6-2, 6-2; Olga Savchuk (Ukraine) b Katie O'Brien (Britain) 6-4, 2-6, 7-5; Tzipora Obziler (Israel) b Angelika Bachmann (Germany) 6-2, 6-3. — UNI

At the outset, I must admit that Austria surprised us and though we went on to win 7-3, I must thank our opponents for waking up our team from a slumber. The early goal that Austria scored against us in the Olympic qualifying tournament on Sunday night did shake us up.

It was the kind of a match that we needed as we now focus on our next game against Mexico on Tuesday and then Great Britain on Thursday before we round off our league campaign on Saturday when we face hosts Chile. Of course, on Sunday, there will be classification matches, but that is a long way off.

I thought we started off against Austria on a tentative note. I admit that our midfield play was rather shaky and we just did not cut off the long balls that the Austrians used to launch their breakaway moves. And the Austrian goal in the very second minute was a direct result of our failure to intercept a long ball.

The early setback upset our game plan and rhythm. Our deep defence made some silly mistakes and that brought pressure on us. But then, I never lost faith in our team for I knew we had the attack to beat the Austrians. It was just a question of putting our game together after conceding an early goal.

As the match progressed, I thought it was best to reorganise the midfield so that the Austrian moves could be checked at the centerline rather than allowing them to develop into threatening attacks. I strengthened the midfield, but it took a while to get things moving and by that time, we were into half-time, sharing four goals.

The first 15 minutes of the second-half was a decisive phase and during the half-time, I instructed the midfielders not to play so closely with the forwards, but focus on cutting off Austrian moves. The strategy worked wonders and once our forwards got going, there was no stopping them.

It was a wake-up call for our team. After the fairly easy outing against the Russians on Saturday, perhaps we needed a tough match and the Austrians, who played typical European style hockey, gave us a good run in the first-half.

For the first time in this tournament, our deep defence came under pressure and I was able to pinpoint the areas of weakness in this vital department.

Our defenders were too slow and I thought the marking could have been better. As the result, Austria were able to score twice, the first from open play and then a penalty corner conversion.

Our plan for the second-half was to score early and take control. Once Ignace Tirkey gave us a 3-2 advantage with the 42nd minute strike, we seized the initiative. Goals in quick succession meant that we did not give Austrians a chance to recover as we kept them under pressure.

As for the third goal we conceded with 10 minutes left, I will mark it down to our players relaxing after going 7-2 up. I concede that we should remain focused and be at the top of our game right through the 70 minutes and this is something we are working on. — PTI 

Dubai, March 4
Roger Federer lost in the first round of a tournament for the first time in three-and-a-half years when he was beaten by Andy Murray, the 20-year old Briton, who was a revelation with his cool attitude and his counter-attack.

The unseeded player's 6-7, 6-3, 6-4 win means that the world number one has not yet won a tournament this year, having lost in the semi-finals of the Australian Open to Novak Djokovic of Serbia.

He lost the last time he played Murray too, 19 months ago in Cincinnati, when he could claim he was tired from his previous week's efforts.

Three other seeds survived.

David Ferrer, the world number four, was far too mobile and resilient for Tommy Haas, the German who reached the semi-finals here last year, winning 6-3, 6-0.

Richard Gasquet, the world number eight, won for the first time in three attempts against Dmitry Tursunov, the extrovert Russian, 6-4, 6-4.

And Nikolay Davydenko, the world number five, dropped only four games against the wild card entry from Kuwait, Mohammed Gareeb. The Russian is one win from a possible quarter-final meeting with Murray. — AFP