Ahmedabad, November 10
Rahul Dewan struck an impressive unbeaten 143 but England bowled out Haryana for 333 and then extended their lead to 306 runs on the back of half-centuries from their openers in the second innings, here today.

Jonathan Trott was rock solid on 61 and giving him company was Nick Compton (54) as England reached 118 without loss at the end of the penultimate day of the warm up game.

Haryana's middle order collapsed and all they could mange was 333 after resuming the day at 172 for four as they handed England a 188-run lead. Dewan ran out of the partners but carried his bat through against a disciplined England attack and helped his side avoid follow-on. Dewan's knock stood out in the Haryana scorecard, in which the only other knock of relevance came from number three Sunny Singh (55).

Reduced to 256 for seven at lunch, Haryana managed to cross 300 after Chanderpal Saini contributed 35 runs, which included seven boundaries. Saini shared an important 60-run partnership with Dewan, frustrating the visiting bowlers for quite some time. Pacers Tim Bresnan (3/66) and Stuart Meaker (3/74) picked up three wickets apiece for England. Trott and Compton, who is most likely to be Alastair Cook's opening partner for the first Test against India, batted together for more than two-and-a-half hours. Trott, the only top-order batsmen to not have scored a fifty yet, was promoted to open the batting in place of Cookabd he obliged with a sedate half-century, laced with 10 hits to the fence. Trott hit some sublime flicks off his legs and reached his half-century with a glorious back-foot punch. Compton also struck a chanceless half-century, reaching 54 off 111 balls with seven boundaries as England consolidated their overall position in the match.

In the morning session, the fall of wickets started pretty early for Haryana as Sandeep Singh departed after a 35-ball seven with the help of a four.

He was caught by Cook off Bresnan.

Amit Mishra (17) and Jayant Yadav (17) provided brief company to Dewan before falling to Meaker, who is in the team as cover for the injured Steven Finn. Mishra was caught behind while Yadav was castled. — PTI

Drenched South African fans wait for the play to begin on Day 2 of the first Test. — AFP

South Africa's number one test ranking is on the line in the series, which continues after Brisbane with tests in Adelaide and Perth.

Disappointing Oz must make new ball pay: Arthur

Australia's bowlers must make the most of second new ball if they want to get anything out of the rain-disrupted first test against South Africa after disappointing on the opening day, coach Mickey Arthur said on Saturday.

The second day of the contest was washed out by the Brisbane rain but, if the wet weather relents on Sunday, Australia will still need to dislodge seven South African batsmen before they get a chance to bat.

The tourists had reached 255 for two on Friday with Hashim Amla (90) and Jacques Kallis (84) at the crease in an unbeaten third wicket partnership of 136.

Australia's pacemen James Pattinson, Peter Siddle and Ben Hilfenhaus were about to get hold of the second new ball when bad light brought an early close to play on Friday. "(Our bowling) probably wasn't good enough, I thought we got our lengths wrong, I think we needed to be a bit fuller," Arthur conceded at a rain-soaked Gabba.

“We weren't bad by any stretch of the imagination, but we weren't as clinical as we had been and as we had hoped to be. We weren't able to put South Africa under pressure for long enough. So, on our report card, probably disappointing. — Reuters

Mumbai, November 10
The Indian squad today had its second day's training session here ahead of the first Test match against England starting on November 15.

The team had a five-and-half-hour practice, supervised by chief coach Duncan Fletcher, bowling coach Joe Dawes and fielding coach Evan Speechly, at the Brabourne Stadium.

The rigorous session started with batsmen coming in pairs at the centre of the pitch. Later, most of them spent a few minutes at the nets.

All batsmen, who are expected to make up the first Test's line-up at Ahmedabad, had a decent stint against the likes of Umesh Yadav, Zaheer Khan, Ishant Sharma, Pragyan Ojha, Harbhajan Singh, R Ashwin and local net bowlers.

Skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni also rolled his arms over and bowled a few deliveries. Off-spinner Harbhajan Singh, who missed yesterday's session, was back in action as he spent time fielding, bowling and batting. There was a slight injury scare for senior batsman Sachin Tendulkar, who was fielding alongside Cheteshwar Pujara and R Ashwin at the start of the day, when he fell off balance and skidded on the ground as the ball hit his hand.

He excused himself from fielding but was back half an hour later and batted for nearly an hour without showing any signs of discomfort. The maestro followed it up with 25 minutes at the nets, the longest by any batsman.

Tendulkar's son Arjun had come to see the team's practice and watched Yuvraj Singh and Kohli's batting.

New Delhi, November 10
Senior pro Mithun Manhas played a brilliant innings on a poor Feroz Shah Kotla pitch as Delhi look well and truly on their way to notching up their first outright win in the second round Ranji Trophy encounter against Odisha.

Manhas hit the 21st first-class century of his career as Delhi finished their first innings at 331 taking a sizeable lead of 188 runs. Odisha were 7 for no loss in their second essay but it will be very difficult for the visitors to survive on a track which is deteriorating with time.

The 33-year-old Manhas batted for more than six and half hours for his unbeaten 161 on a pitch where most of the deliveries kept low and there was some swing for the seamers which is par for the course in northern India.

Punjab’s Jiwanjot Singh, Mayank Sidhana hit centuries against Bengal on Day 2 of the Ranji Trophy tie in Mohali on Saturday. — Tribune photo: Parvesh Chauhan

Score board

karachi, November 10
Claims made by a British journalist that the Indo-Pak 2011 World Cup semifinal may have been fixed were on Saturday dismissed by leading Pakistan spinner Saeed Ajmal, who said this was being done to spoil the upcoming series.

Ajmal, who played in that match in Mohali in March, described the claims as "useless" and said both the teams fought hard in that match.

"I think these allegations are being made now to just spoil our coming tour to India. There is no substance to the story. I played in the semi final and I know how every player fought tooth and nail in it," he said reacting to a fresh claim by a sports-betting journalist that the match could have been fixed.

"But if there is any truth in that the match was fixed how come even after such a long time no one has been able to show any evidence. This issue is being raised again to derail our series in India," the off-spinner told the 'Duniya' news channel.

India and Pakistan are set to resume bilateral cricket ties after a gap of five years with a three-match ODI series and two Twenty20s in December-January.

The journalist has written in yet to be launched book that he got a message from an Indian bookie, who predicted the trend and pattern of the match, which India won.

British Tabloid 'Daily Mail' published extracts of the book in which the author raised doubts about the match merely because of the predictions of the bookie turned out to be fairly accurate. The ICC had also earlier rejected the allegations which had surfaced shortly after the match. — PTI

Nadaun, November 10
HP's Prashant Chopra struck a fluent 115-ball 90 and shared a 138-run opening wicket stand with skipper Aakash Chopra to lay a strong foundation for a big first innings total against Services in Group C Ranji match.

Replying to Services' first innings total of 312 all out, Prashant and Aakash (65) gave their team a flying start as the hosts ended the second day on a high note at Atal Bihari Vajpayee Stadium. While Prashant struck 13 fours and three sixes in his aggressive innings, Chopra was more content to play the role of a sheet anchor as he took 141 balls for his 65 and had eight hits to the fence. After the dismissal of both the openers, Paras Dogra (56 no), in the company of C Hemanth Kumar (29 no), kept the momentum to take their team to 252/2.

Brief Scores: Services 1st innings: 312 in 97.4 overs (P Desai 61, S Chatarjee 54; V Malik 3/89, R Dhawan 3/80); HP 1st innings: 252 for two in 80 overs (Prashant Chopra 90, A Chopra 65; S Yadav 1/47). — PTI

Singapore, November 10
Indian golfers Gaganjeet Bhullar and Anirban Lahiri made hay on a sunny day and moved into the top six midway through the third round at the Singapore Open today. Bhullar (46 holes) and Lahiri (40 holes) were four shots behind the leader Thomas Bjorn of Denmark, who was nine-under after 39 holes.

The Indian duo will have a fair shot at the title tomorrow, when most of the players will need to play anything between 25 and 33 holes.

Shiv Kapur, the best-placed Indian at four-under after 36 holes, had a bogey and a birdie in the four holes he got in third round, while SSP Chowrasia moved up with two birdies against an opening bogey to get to four-under after 41 holes.

Both were tied 13th alongside Rory McIlroy, who after battling cold and carding 70-70 in two rounds, was two-under through nine holes.

The other Indian to make the cut, Jyoti Randhawa, started his third round from the 10th and had three bogeys against one birdie in his first five holes, but then birdies on sixth and ninth put him back on even par for the day and one-under for 45 holes.

Bhullar almost made no mistakes in the 10 holes he played in the third round. In the second round Bhullar managed a 69. In the afternoon he was three-under for the first five holes in the third round and played the rest in par to move to five-under for the tournament and four shots away from clubhouse leader Bjorn.

Accompanied by his tennis superstar girlfriend, Caroline Wozniacki, Rory McIlroy, who battled a cold to play 70-70 to be tied 26th after second round, made a big move up with a birdie and an eagle before dropping a double when he found water on sixth. — PTI

London, November 10
Leander Paes and Radek Stepanek will go into the semifinals of the ATP World Tour Finale as the unbeaten team as they pipped the top seeds Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan in their last Group A match here today. Third seeds Paes and Stepanek held their nerves to beat three-time champions 6-4 6-7(6) 10-7 in 1 hour, 45 minutes.

Now Bryans would be praying that seventh seeds Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi and Jean-Julien Rojer beat fifth seeds Marcel Granollers and Marc Lopez, so that they move to the next stage.

Paes and Stepanek broke both Mike and Bob to 30 in the third and fifth games, respectively, to take a 4-1 lead. Stepanek committed a double fault to lose his service game but closed out set 15 to with a wonderful backhand volley that angled away from Bob.

There were no service breaks in the second set. The Bryans took a 4-2 lead in the tie-break, but were powerless as Paes and Stepanek won three of the next four points.

At 5-5, Paes hit a high volley winner for set point opportunity, but Bob Bryan saved it with a smash winner. A clever low return by Mike Bryan at 7-6, enabled Bob Bryan to cross and volley into space to end the 53-minute set. In a 16-minute Match tie-break, Paes and Stepanek took a 6-4 lead and maintained the two-point cushion. At 9-7, Mike Bryan returned into the net.

In the singles event, world No. 1 Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray reached the last four after slicing through the various permutations of their round-robin group with matching wins at the O2 Arena. — Agencies

Bhubaneswar, November 10
After retiring from international cricket, former India captain Rahul Dravid might not have to deal with critics anymore, but he is continuing to face criticism from unexpected quarters — his two sons.

The batting legend says his two sons ask him during their regular backyard sessions to bat less like himself and more like Chris Gayle, the ‘Gaylestorm’, referring to the West Indian’s pyrotechnics in the middle.

“I think that truly proves the saying that, in our country, everyone is a cricket critic,” said Dravid during a visit here.

Dravid said he was happy not to be spending all his times thinking and contemplating (about the challenges of cricket befacing him) in the last few months.

“I now know the price of onions, tomatoes and sugar on a more or less weekly basis. I am an enthusiastic participant in parent-teacher meetings and in homework sessions, renewing my appreciation for simple routines of lives, rare luxuries during the humdrum life in professional cricket,” he said.

Reminiscing his cricketing days, Dravid said cricket has made him a better, well-rounded person and gave him a platform for both professional success and failure.

“On the flip side, my aspiration was always to leave the game better than I found it. I tried my very best to live up to that standard and by playing with integrity and pride. I feel I was able to achieve some of these goals on my own, very personal way,” he said.

Dravid said cricket is one of the few unifying things, which has provided him the opportunity to come in contact with people of every background and every sort. — PTI

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Sharath Kamal stuns Baum in Polish Open
Poznan, Poland: Ace Indian paddler Achanta Sharath Kamal stunned world No. 31 Patrick Baum of Germany in a gruelling seven-setter to enter the pre-quarterfinals of the Polish Open on Saturday. Sharath Kamal beat Patrick 4-3 (8-11, 10-12, 11-8, 11-9, 12-10, 7-11, 13-11) in the round of 32. Sharath will now take on world No. 19 Tianyi Jiang.

Arunachal Olympic body to support Randhir Singh
new delhi: The Aurunachal Pradesh State Olympic Association has pledged its support to Randhir Singh for the post of Indian Olympic Association president ahead of the elections. The battle to grab power in the IOA has intensified with the camps of Abhay Singh Chautala and present IOA secretary Randhir Singh, the two aspirants for the president’s post, extending their support and taking potshots at their opponents. — Agencies