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On Friday Andrew Strauss became the first English batsman for 35 years to score a century in his maiden Test innings. “Strauss joins an elite quartet after composing historic score” read The Times headline, as the punsters of Fleet Street queued up to join him in a waltz.Not since John Hampshire hit a century against West Indies in 1969, also at Lord’s, has an English batsman reached the milestone in his first innings. Graham Thorpe, another left-hander, made an unbeaten 114 in the second innings of his debut Test, against Australia, in 1993.Hampshire, however, never came close to another century in the remainder of his eight-Test career. “Strauss’s innings was a lot better than mine because I was absolute crap”, he told The Mirror. “I nicked everything and I didn’t hit anything in the middle all through my innings. But I was proud of it, of course I was. I got my just desserts though, they left me out for the next Test. I had only played in the first place because they had injuries.” That aspect, at least, sounds familiar.Strauss looked nervous in the 90s, and took over 40 minutes to score the final 10 runs to reach his hundred. He was very lucky to survive an inside-edge off Chris Martin that actually clipped his off stump, and slashed a hard chance to gully when on 95. He finally drove Martin through the covers for his 12th four to reach a century off 199 balls.”The odds were in Strauss’s favour,” wrote Michael Henderson in the same newspaper. “The pitch was good and the bowling, all too frequently, was not. He plays for Middlesex so there was nothing unsettling about his presence on the game’s greatest stage, as there can be for others. Yet the runs still take some getting and he got them, somewhat methodically for some tastes but with no lack of conviction.”Strauss added 190 with Marcus Trescothick, his stand-in captain, against an attack that looked competent, but by no means dangerous. “Others have started well, including Ed Smith last season,” said Christopher Martin Jenkins, The Times’ chief cricket correspondent, “but not since Trescothick has it looked so abundantly clear that a Test batsman of substance has arrived for England.””And if England win this Test match, what about Trescothick?” wondered Martin Johnson in The Telegraph. “The stand-in captain has barely put a foot wrong here, which makes a change from critics of his batting complaining that he barely puts a foot anywhere. When Strauss makes a century the word “waltz” rarely fails to make it into the headline, but if Trescothick attempted an evening of waltzing, there would be a lengthy queue outside the chiropodist the following morning.”Strauss was not even in the original squad to play in the first Test atLord’s, but was handed his debut because of Michael Vaughan’s withdrawal through injury. His performance will now give the selectors and Vaughan, assuming he is fit, a lot to think about when picking the squad for the second Test.”Will the recently-mooted plan to move either himself or MarcusTrescothick down to No. 4 now be forced upon England?” asked Mike Dickson in the Daily Mail. “Will an extra batsman’s slot be needed to accommodate Nasser Hussain, who will now feel under even more pressure?””So the cat has been placed very firmly among the pigeons”, added Mike Selvey in The Guardian. “As Strauss was completing his hundred,Nasser Hussein had been watching from the team balcony and no doubt reading the runes. One reason not to change a side is a fear of the unknown. Now though, the pressure is on him, the most vulnerable of the England batsmen, to continue to prove himself.”The day did not belong only to Strauss. Chris Cairns is the closest thing New Zealand has produced to a superstar since the days of Martin Crowe, and Richard Hadlee before him. Had his career not been blighted by injury, he may even have surpassed their achievements. Against England on Friday he smashed 82 off just 47 balls, a rate of scoring not often achieved even in one-day matches.With his third six, Cairns surpassed Viv Richards’s record number of sixes in Test matches, and had another record, also held by Richards, well within his sights. Had he scored 18 off the next nine balls, he would have surpassed Richards’s record for the fastest Test hundred. It was not to be, however, as soon after hitting Andrew Flintoff into the stands past extra-cover, he skied the same bowler to Steve Harmison at fine leg.”Cricket has a few dull, earth-bound records, but this is not one of them,” said Tim de Lisle in The Times. “A six is more than just the most runs you can make from one shot. It is also the most damage you can do to a bowler’s self-esteem and it is the biggest thrill you can give a cricket crowd. When Cairns was batting, it was a different match.”Liam Brickhill is editorial assistant of Wisden Cricinfo.

The new-look South Africa team take another step forward in Chittagong on Thursday when the first Test against Bangladesh gets under way at the MA Aziz Stadium.The squad arrived in the bustling coastal city mid-morning on Wednesday and had a nervous wait for their playing kit and luggage that had been sent by road from Dhaka on Tuesday night.It was a mighty relieved Manager Goolam Rajah who welcomed the truck to the hotel just forty minutes before the team was to leave for training. “I was getting a little worried, we would have had to share kit with the Bangladeshis,” he joked.A journey that should not take more than seven hours had taken fifteen hours thanks to a mechanical failure in the truck.The first thing the team noticed upon arriving at the ground was the bare, rock-hard outfield. The pitch was not a lot different, devoid of any grass and baked hard. There are numerous cracks throughout the length of the strip and they could be hazardous for batsmen as the Test unfolds.It’s been 28 Tests since South Africa played two spinners. The last time was on August 6, 2000 in the third Test against Sri Lanka at the SSC in Colombo when Paul Adams and Nick Boje both played.The scenario is rather similar this time, Adams is back in harness having played in South Africa’s last Test, a convincing win over Pakistan at Newlands over New Year this year, and orthodox left-armer Robin Peterson is also in the mix.Should they both play then the decision will revolve around which of Andrew Hall, Alan Dawson and Charl Willoughby gets the nod as the third pace bowler.All three bring strong claims to be included. Hall showed in the ODI series that he has mastered bowling on these sluggish pitches and of course he is a seriously good lower-order batsman.Dawson took 11 wickets in the TVS Cup and was named Man of the Series. He has great control over pace and length and is the in-form man.Left-armer Willoughby brings extra pace and an ability to swing the ball late, however he has not played since the opening match of the triangular tournament where he endured a baptism of fire against the rampant Indian batsmen.Of course there is the option of playing one spinner and including two of the above three mentioned seamers, with the Graeme Smith and Jacques Rudolph to provide support to either Adams or Peterson.One thing is certain; there will be new caps.Gary Kirsten, Jacques Kallis, Nicky Boje and Nantie Hayward all played at Newlands in January, none are on this tour.Jacques Rudolph looks likely to make a long-awaited and richly-deserved Test debut, 33-year-old Dawson could be rewarded for his good form and Willoughby and Peterson are also on the brink of playing at Test level for the firsttime.Add to that Graeme Smith who will be leading his country for the first time in just his ninth Test match.One area that both teams will have no control over is the weather. Storms, called “nor’westers” in Bangladesh, have brought heavy rains and destructive winds to the country over the past week and more are predicted for the Chittagong area over the next four days.

After Sri Lanka ended the second day in the first Test of the threeTest series at the Galle International Stadium well on top, Sri Lankancaptain Sanath Jayasuriya declared it as a total team effort by hisside. "It was a good overall team effort. I am happy that we managedto bowl them out for less than 200. It was crucial to get them outbefore too long," said Jayasuriya."After getting the cream of the Indian batting out yesterday, wewanted to just to finish them off under 200 and the bowlers did justthat," remarked the Sri Lankan captain.Dilhara Fernando made life difficult for the Indian batsmen byfinishing with a five-wicket haul. Jayasuriya’s side in the recentpast has depended on Muralitharan a lot in the bowling department, buttoday Fernando rose to the occasion,"It was a grassy wicket and conditions were ideal for a bowler likeDilhara. So he made use of the conditions and things went on reallywell for us," said Jayasuriya.After the wonderful display in the field, the Sri Lankans had to batwell to end the day on top. Their batsmen did just that and Sri Lankaended gaining considerable advantage, "After the good performancewith the ball it was the responsibility of the batsmen to do well andI thought all of us batted well."Jayasuriya himself ended the day with a century and, analyzing theIndian bowling, he said, "Srinath bowled well in his first spell. Weknew we had to see him off in his initial burst and then when I was inthe middle I got a lot of width from both sides of the wicket and Ithought of making the most of the opportunities."Harbhajan Singh picked up the first Sri Lankan wicket but failed toput the brakes on the Sri Lankan batsmen despite bowling a marathonspell of 27 overs. "He’s a good bowler. You can’t underestimate him.He’s the type of bowler who can really turn the ball. More than himmaking any mistakes, I thought we handled him well," remarkedJayasuriya.Though Sri Lanka ended the day in a good position, Sri Lankan coach,Dav Whatmore cautioned his players. "You haven’t won a Test Matchuntil you have really won it. What we are trying to do is to get agood advantage and then try and extend that advantage. It’s a verytricky pitch and batting last on this track will be very difficult, sothere’s a lot to play for tomorrow."

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Scorecard and ball-by-ball details Cyclone Komen ruined another day of Test cricket•AFP

There has now been as much play in this Test series as there has been waiting for clearer skies; the second successive abandoned day in Mirpur because of cyclone Komen taking the total number of washouts to four.With the forecast improving, prospects for play appear brighter on the remaining two days of the second Test, though that may not be enough to force any result other than a draw.Things could have been different had there been some action on the third day. The rain abated for a brief period in the afternoon and the ground staff was able to dry the surface. Play was due to start at 2:15 pm local time with 45 overs to be bowled, but the rain returned half-an-hour before the resumption.The amount of time lost in the series made the chance of any result other than a draw unlikely. In that case South Africa, who are currently at the top of the Test rankings on 130 points, will lose five points, while Bangladesh, who sit at No.9, will gain six points.

Leicestershire have defended their use of Kolpak players and insist they won’t mean that young English cricketers will be kept out of the first team.There have been plenty of arrivals at Grace Road during the off season with South African quicks Garnett Kruger and Dillion du Preez along with Jermaine Lawson, the West Indies fast bowler, joining on Kolpak deals. They join HD Ackerman and Claude Henderson, while the official overseas player is Boeta Dippenaar.However, chief executive David Smith told the that the club’s aim is to push forward young talent. “Our medium-term plan is to develop Leicestershire and Rutland-born cricketers,” he said. “This will help us engage the local business community as the team will reflect the multi-cultural diversity of our city. This is vital if we are to underpin the financial stability of the club over the coming years.”He says that the Kolpak route isn’t one that the county takes lightly, but draws on the example of Durham to prove how it can be successful.”Kolpak cricketers are not popular but we have used the Durham blueprint for success in an effort to develop our team in the mid-term and hopefully provide England with some international cricketers.”However, Durham have produced a number of England players in the last five years – Paul Collingwood, Steve Harmison, Liam Plunkett and Phil Mustard – while Leicestershire’s only major success story is Stuart Broad who has now moved to Nottinghamshire.

Jacques Kallis, the South Africa vice-captain, has warned that Australia’s unbeaten record in the World Cup will count for nothing when the sides meet in the semi-final in St Lucia on Wednesday.”They’ve played some very good cricket in this tournament, being unbeaten, while we’ve had a few hiccups along the way,” Kallis said. “But now it all doesn’t mean much. There’s all the hype before the game but carrying your points through doesn’t count for anything in a semi-final. It’s a game where whoever produces the goods on the day will win.”Kallis said both teams would go into the match with high expectations. “They’ll carry a lot of confidence through because of the way they’ve played but we’re also confident after a massive win against England,” he said.”There’s no need to stress the importance of the game. It’s important that we stay relaxed and calm. From our perspective the trip to the Caribbean has been a positive thing. We’ve had some pressure situations, like when we faced possible elimination in the match against England. We’ve had some other close calls to deal with and we’ve managed to stay calm throughout.”Kallis is one of four survivors from the dramatic tied semi-final against Australia in the 1999 World Cup at Edgbaston, along with Shaun Pollock, Mark Boucher and Herschelle Gibbs. All four said after a team practice on Saturday that they believed the experience of playing in that game would have positive benefits.”From our side we gained a lot of experience in that game,” Kallis said. “Looking back there are a few things that we might have tried to do differently so the experience we’ve carried around for all these years will probably stand us in good stead.”Pollock said he was looking forward to the challenge of trying to contain or dismiss Australia’s hard-hitting top-order batsmen. “We’ve had some close encounters against Australia and we’ve learnt from those,” Pollock said. “It’s the kind of challenge that you want to play cricket for. You want to come up against the best and if you can win the battle it gives you real satisfaction. “Gibbs said there was no pressure on the South Africans. “Our backs were against the wall [before the game against England]. Now we’re just going to go out there and enjoy it.”

Surrey have announced what they claim is “the biggest sponsorship deal in English club cricket history”. Although no specific figures have been released, the five-year deal with Brit Insurance will run until the end of the 2010 season.”These are exciting times for Surrey County Cricket Club,” said Paul Sheldon, the county’s chief executive. “With the completion of the redevelopment of the Vauxhall End we can proudly boast one of the finest arenas in world cricket.”The support of Brit Insurance will be absolutely crucial in helping us to achieve our objectives both on and off the pitch.”Aside from naming rights over the ground, which will officially continue to be called The Brit Oval, the company will also sponsor Surrey’s first-class and one-day strips.

The England Cricket Board has refused to play a Test match at Karachi on England’s winter tour of Pakistan owing to security reasons. While confirming this Shaharyar Khan, the chairman of the Pakistan board, said that England didn’t want to spend a week in Karachi but added that there was a possibility of staging a one-day international there.Karachi has been a contentious venue on several teams’ itineraries in the recent past, and the suicide bomb attack earlier this week and subsequent rioting by angry protesters might well have exacerbated England’s concerns. Australia, West Indies, South Africa, New Zealand and India had all declined to play a Test match in Karachi earlier, and since the 2002 bombing outside the New Zealand team’s hotel, which forced the tour to be abandoned midway, the only two countries to have played a Test there are Bangladesh (2003) and Sri Lanka (2004).Shaharyar, who met David Morgan, the ECB chairman, in London, admitted that it would be difficult to convince England to play a Test at Karachi. “They have conveyed to us that while they don’t feel there is any direct threat to their players in Karachi, they don’t want to be caught in a crossfire as they have reservations over the atmosphere in the city,” he was quoted as saying in , a Pakistan-based daily. “Their main concern is that if they play a Test it would mean they would have to stay for a week in Karachi and they are not comfortable with that prospect. We have started looking at the possibility of just hosting a one-day International against them in the city.”England’s tour to Pakistan, which includes three Tests and five one-day internationals, is scheduled to start from October 22 and the Pakistan board had sent the ECB a proposed itinerary in which they had suggested a Test and an ODI in Karachi but had left out Peshawar, another venue that several teams have shown reluctance to tour, out of the schedule. “The proposed venues were discussed with Morgan,” said Shaharyar, “and what we have suggested to them is they send a security delegation to Pakistan to see for themselves there should be no security concerns for their players while in Pakistan.”He added that the ECB would confirm dates of the delegation’s visit to Pakistan by Monday and said he had given all security assurances to the ECB about playing in Karachi. Shaharyar said that if Karachi was ruled out as a Test centre, the board would then choose from Lahore, Faisalabad, Rawalpindi and Multan to host the three Tests against England.

Gauteng have called into question the spirit of cricket by choosing to field a second-string side for their first-class SuperSport Series game against Easterns, while sending their first team off to Potchefstroom to prepare for the forthcoming Pro20 series. It is a major snub, not only to the opposition and South Africa’s United Cricket Board, but also to their own fans and sponsors.The decision also has serious ramifications for the Shield table. At the start of the match, Easterns had an almost unassailable lead at the top of the table, while Gauteng were cut adrift at the bottom. The decision to field such a weak side, with four players making their first-class debuts, has effectively wrecked any hopes second-placed Boland might have had of taking the title.”It is not an ideal situation,” said a UCB spokesman. “We are not happy with it, but there is nothing in the laws or rules that says we can tell them who to pick.”But Ray Jennings, Easterns’ coach, was less conciliatory. “To what depth have the values and principles of the game fallen?” he asked. “In my long career I have never seen something like this happen. A team placing practice ahead of a committed first-class fixture just does not make any sense.”Gauteng’s coach, Jimmy Cook, was initially opposed to the move as well, but with the new franchise system coming into effect from April 1, he discovered his hands were tied, and says the team playing at Benoni is “the best available”. The senior players are already contracted to the newly created Highveld Strikers team – a ludicrous situation, given that the current South African first-class season hasn’t ended yet.If Gauteng had been in the running for the SuperSport Shield, one suspects an alternative solution might have been found.

A World Cup record low score against Australia did nothing to harden New Zealand’s batting resolve in their last-chance Super Six match with India at Centurion yesterday and summed up the failings of this side not only at the World Cup but in recent One-Day International history.At a time when it might normally have been expected that circumstances demanded extra vigilance, New Zealand collectively showed the attention span of an American diplomat listening to opponents of their plans for Iraq.The result was just as explosive as far as New Zealand was concerned.This collective failing was an unmitigated disaster which sadly has been all too symptomatic of New Zealand’s preparation for this tournament.New Zealand’s effort lacked for basic intelligence at times. Surely the situation for the New Zealanders attempting to come back from their record-low effort in the Australian match demanded that at least a look be taken at the bowling before launching into shots.Craig McMillan went into the match with the selection chairman Sir Richard Hadlee stating that McMillan had been asked to take more time in establishing his innings. A second-ball dismissal did nothing to suggest the request had registered.That preparation for South Africa started after the last tour of England in 1999, where New Zealand had made the semi-finals.It was apparent even then that New Zealand needed to establish an opening partnership.Nothing has worked.The situation got so bad that Craig McMillan and Daniel Vettori were press-ganged into opening during this tournament. Yet Mathew Sinclair was never given a chance.Has there been a clearer admittance of failure in New Zealand’s one-day history?The whole campaign has smacked of an ad hoc policy in regard to the vital opening role. Opening the batting is the most crucial area of influence in the one-day game. That is why Australia have Matthew Hayden and Adam Gilchrist, why India have Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag and Sri Lanka have Sanath Jayarsuriya.The opening game which saw McMillan opening, Lou Vincent ‘keeping and Nathan Astle at No 3 for the first time this summer, seemed a strange place to be trying something so radical. That’s not to forget the decision not to play Daniel Vettori.This was more worrying given the job confronting New Zealand in their pool which demanded they win as many games as possible, knowing they were going to lose four points to Kenya.Stephen Fleming addressed the shortcomings of his game to be the dominant batsman in the side in South Africa, and all credit to him for doing that.But why was it necessary to “protect” Astle by having a makeshift opener in McMillan fill a role where Astle had developed into an opener regarded as one of the world’s leading one-day batsmen? What suddenly changed?And if there was a compelling reason, why was it not tried in New Zealand beforehand?Against the West Indies and South Africa, New Zealand seemed to get it right. They were under pressure and responded. It was a team batting performance in the West Indies game, and the superb effort of Stephen Fleming in the South African match, that spelled the difference.McMillan did score 75 against Bangladesh, but the opposition had to be put into context while Astle paced himself well to a century against Zimbabwe.But the fact of the matter is that the only two players who scored anything like the number of runs New Zealand needed during the tournament were Fleming and Scott Styris, who achieved his century in the first round loss to Sri Lanka.Chris Cairns never produced when it was required. His scoreline read: 32, 37, 33no, 31, 54, 16 and 20 – hardly the sort of return that could be expected of a player of his stature.What was most infuriating about his return was the number of times he got himself out to soft options. It was typified by his dismissal to Harbhajan Singh against India and that against Andy Bichel in the earlier match against Australia.Cairns also had an unfortunate tendency to be quoted before the last two matches especially about what was possibly going to happen.The words were not matched by actions and, quite frankly, they were embarrassing.That word probably best sums up New Zealand’s campaign, embarrassing.The claims before the Australian game that McMillan was being dropped because he was out of form came back to haunt chairman Sir Richard Hadlee, and the team, when Lou Vincent’s inability to produce the form expected of him at the World Cup, required McMillan to be tried again against India.He lasted two balls.That’s embarrassing.Too often in the early stages of the tournament, New Zealand’s bowling was indisciplined with wides and no-balls too prevalent.These are fundamental requirements that should have been ingrained into players long before they landed on South African soil.Shane Bond was outstanding. He was one of the tournament’s personalities and a rare asset. The quality of the batsmen he removed at the top of the order was testimony to his touch.But in reviewing the bowling options New Zealand again had a fatal flaw as bad as that which has developed over the opening batting position – their bowling at the death.New Zealand consistently have failed to bowl sides out. It is not a new problem and even the player selected with the idea of bowling at the death, Andre Adams, was rarely in a position where his skills could be put to the test.And that was because he was suddenly drafted into being an opening bowler. That was surely the role for which Daryl Tuffey and Kyle Mills were selected. The haste with which Tuffey was discarded after the first game was embarrassing, a point he at least reacted to by bowling 10 overs in the final game against India for 41 runs, a more than reasonable effort given the 12 runs taken in the three balls before he dismissed Tendulkar.It says something too, that for all the pre-series talk about pitches with pace and bounce from which New Zealand’s big men, Tuffey, Mills and Jacob Oram would benefit, the opposite was more the case. Matches were more like those from New Zealand in the early 1990s which allowed Chris Harris to revive a career that looked to be on the ropes.Having at least had the good sense to have selected him was one thing in the selectors’ favour in the final outcome of it all.Upon reflection it was probably New Zealand’s worst World Cup since 1987. At least when the 1996 campaign foundered in the quarter-final stages, the side went down fighting with an outstanding effort against Australia.Similar qualities were far from evident in the capitulations to Australia and India at the business end of this tournament.Still, in Bond, Styris, Oram, Vincent (when his role is finally decided upon), Vettori, Adams, McCullum, Mills, Tuffey there is a core around which a side can start to be developed with the West Indies in 2007 in mind.Whether McMillan is part of that will depend on how he responds to the clear problems he has had this summer, a similar situation for Sinclair, while longevity of service and avoiding the ravages of time will determine the fates of Fleming, Cairns, Harris and Astle.