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The full tour includes three Tests, five ODIs and three T20s and runs from January to March

ESPNcricinfo staff31-Aug-2018England will play their first Test match in St Lucia as part of a two-month tour of the Caribbean early next year.The other two venues for the three-match Test series, which is the first part of the trip, are Barbados and Antigua.England’s previous Test series in the Caribbean finished 1-1 after West Indies levelled the series in Barbados following England’s win in Grenada.A five-match one-day series will follow with matches in Barbados, Grenada and St Lucia before the tour wraps up with three T20s which also includes a match at the Darren Sammy National Cricket Stadium.England arrive in Barbados on January 11 and have one four-day tour match pencilled in ahead of the opening Test on January 23.A tour by England remains very important for the West Indies board because of the number of travelling supporters they are likely to bring. This is the first time all three formats have been played on the same tour since 2009.ItineraryWed Jan 23-Sun Jan 27 – 1st Test, Kensington Oval, Barbados
Thu Jan 31-Mon Feb 4 – 2nd Test, Sir Vivian Richards Stadium, Antigua
Sat Feb 9-Wed Feb 13 – 3rd Test, Darren Sammy National Cricket Stadium, St Lucia
Wed Feb 20 – 1st ODI, Kensington Oval, Barbados
Fri Feb 22 – 2nd ODI, Kensington Oval, Barbados
Mon Feb 25 – 3rd ODI, National Cricket Stadium, Grenada
Wed Feb 27 – 4th ODI, National Cricket Stadium, Grenada
Sat Mar 2 – 5th ODI, Darren Sammy National Cricket Stadium, St Lucia
Tue Mar 5 – 1st IT20, Darren Sammy National Cricket Stadium, St Lucia
Fri Mar 8 – 2nd IT20, Warner Park, St Kitts
Sun Mar 10 – 3rd IT20 Warner Park, St Kitts

The left-arm quick has picked up an official warning and one demerit point

ESPNcricinfo staff30-Oct-2018Khaleel Ahmed’s send-off of Marlon Samuels in the fourth ODI in Mumbai has earned the India left-arm quick an official warning and one demerit point.Having dismissed him in the 14th over of West Indies’ innings, Khaleel turned towards the departing Samuels and yelled out multiple times. Khaleel picked up figures of 3 for 13, helping India win by 224 runs.He was found guilty of a Level 1 breach of the ICC code of conduct, for violating article 2.5, which relates to “using language, actions or gestures which disparage or which could provoke an aggressive reaction from a batter upon his/her dismissal during an international match”.Khaleel admitted to the offence and accepted the sanction proposed by match referee Chris Broad, which meant there was no need for a formal hearing. The charge was levelled by on-field umpires Ian Gould and Anil Chaudhary, third umpire Paul Wilson, and fourth umpire C Shamsuddin.

South Africa batsman heads for Wantage Road on a three-month contract for the 2019 season.

ESPNcricinfo staff29-Nov-2018Temba Bavuma, the South Africa batsman, has been signed by Northamptonshire on a three-month contract for the 2019 season.Bavuma, 28, made headlines in January 2016 when he became the first black African cricketer to score a Test century for South Africa – hitting an unbeaten 102 against England at Newlands in Cape Town, his native city.In the course of 31 Test appearances for South Africa, Bavuma has scored 1,488 runs at 33.81, and has also represented his country in the ODI format. In all first-class cricket he’s made nearly 7,000 runs with a dozen hundreds. He was appointed captain of the Highveld Lions franchise for the current season.He will join Northamptonshire between May and July 2019, boosting the County’s batting line-up for eight Specsavers County Championship matches.”Signing a player of Temba’s international stature underlines our ambitions as a club,” said Northamptonshire’s chief executive Ray Payne.”We are keen to return to the Championship’s top division and hopefully his runs will help us achieve that. His Test experience will bring an added dimension to the team and we’re all looking forward to welcoming a cricketer who is admired and respected around the cricketing world.”

England close to finalising line-up but delay confirming their team with bad weather set to threaten a prompt start

George Dobell in Galle05-Nov-2018England look set to field two debutants in the Galle Test.The Surrey pair of Rory Burns and Ben Foakes both look likely to play, with Burns set to opening the batting and Foakes set to keep wicket and bat at No. 7. He will be England’s third wicketkeeper in three Tests.England did not reveal their team the day before the game as has become their custom. With the pitch covered due to the rain that could well prove a feature of this match, they were unable to take anything more than a quick glance at the surface. They have, therefore, decided to keep their options open until they know how it is going to look at the toss. With the forecast poor, it’s not out of the question that that may even be delayed until the second day.But it seems that, whatever happens, Joe Denly will miss out. While England had planned for him to start the series batting at No. 3, his form in the warm-up games – with bat and ball – has provoked a re-think. He could be forgiven for feeling unfortunate: having waited until he was 32 for his first Test tour, he’s had only two innings to impress and simply failed to take the chance. It’s not impossible he could feature later in the series, but it is unlikely.Meanwhile Foakes took part in wicketkeeping drills while the other option for the gloves, Jos Buttler, practised his out-fielding. With a first-class batting average of 40.64, Foakes is a more-than-decent batsman, but it is keeping that has long rendered him an outstanding prospect. He has been part of the England system throughout his career – he made his List A debut for the Lions rather than in county cricket – and is expected to prove more reliable standing up to the stumps against the spin than Buttler. Last year, his director of cricket at Surrey, Alec Stewart, rated him as the best keeper in the world.While Jonny Bairstow is expected to be fit for the second Test, there is no certainty he will reclaim the gloves. If Keaton Jennings, in particular, struggles in Galle, Bairstow could fit back into the middle-order with Moeen Ali and Ben Stokes both expected to bat in the top three.England are set to field a team containing several inexperienced players – Jack Leach has only played one Test, too – but the chances of Stuart Broad playing have increased a little. Broad is one of just two men – James Anderson is the other – in this England squad to have played Test cricket in Sri Lanka previously and it remains possible, though unlikely, he could be selected ahead of Sam Curran. Chris Woakes, who bowled a long spell in the nets on Monday, appears to have dropped out of consideration, while Broad, Anderson and Curran did not bowl.Root said he wanted to wait and see the pitch – which has had no chance to dry out under covers – before confirming his side, but he did accept that it would turn come what may.”I still think spin is going to play a huge part,” he said. “I think when it’s been tacky here in the past it’s still spun. We’ve just got to adapt very well very quickly and read the situation.”We’ve got a very balanced squad with plenty of different options. Whichever XI we go with we’re going to be blessed with that. From that point of view I feel we’ll be very well prepared for whatever surface is thrown at us.”Root also implored his seamers not to “waste a delivery”. With the new Kookaburra ball expected to swing for around 10 overs, it is imperative England’s seamers make the batsmen play in that period. For all the skill and success of Anderson and Broad over the years, that has not always been their strongest suit”You see in the subcontinent how important those first 10 balls are as a batter,” Root told Talksport. “You can’t waste a delivery with the ball, especially the seamers, so having that mindset and being really aware of that is going to be really important for us to have success here.”

The Australia captain says if his team had done better in the key moments in the series opener, the 2-1 scoreline might have been reversed

Andrew McGlashan at the SCG07-Jan-2019After a drizzly end to a Test series where the result had been known four days ago when India walked off with 622, Tim Paine looked back with regret at the series’ opening two days in Adelaide and said he believed if chances had been taken then the 2-1 scoreline could have been reversed.Even though this series has been crammed into a month, as India celebrated in front of a small gathering of fans, it felt a long time ago that India were 5 for 86 on the opening day of the campaign. Cheteshwar Pujara’s masterful hundred – his first of three for the series – lifted India to 250, but that still offered Australia the chance to take a lead. However, to set a trend for the series, they slipped with the bat and ended up conceding a small lead which India converted into a 31-run victory.Although Australia levelled in Perth, the slower pitches in Melbourne and Sydney stymied their ambitions and India were comfortably the better team. One more dry day in the final Test and it would probably have been 3-1.”We honestly feel that we let that [Adelaide] Test slip,” Paine said. “We thought we had a number of opportunities to go well ahead of the game and when those key moments came up India outplayed us to be honest. Looking back now, if we’d won that Test, we win Perth, outplayed in Melbourne then a washout it could have been 2-1 the other way. It’s funny, in a big series of four Tests you go back to a couple of key moments in the very first Test where we let ourselves down and you get to the end of the series and it’s really hard to take.”Paine lauded, and was no doubt envious of, India for having key players take charge of vital moments in the series: Pujara in Adelaide, Bumrah in Melbourne and Pujara again in Sydney.”We are really disappointed. We know we had some guys missing but we honestly felt coming into the series that, in Australia in particular, that we could beat India but, throughout the series, more often than not, when those big moments came up, Virat has scored runs, Pujara has scored runs, Bumrah has bowled a great spell and we couldn’t quite get through those moments.”That’s why India won this series, their best players stood up in the big moments – when they were falling behind in a game one of their good players dragged them back into the contest, or when they were in front of the game they put their foot on us and put us out of the game like they did in Sydney and Melbourne.”Pat Cummins and Nathan Lyon emerged from the series in credit, but there were slim pickings elsewhere. It was a series that was always going to challenge the depth of Australia’s batting without David Warner and Steven Smith, but the numbers have been chastening with just eight half-centuries and a top score of 79 by Marcus Harris.It was Harris and Travis Head who Paine picked out as being the gains – while also praising Marnus Labuschagne’s return to the team – and suggested that their chance for exposure at Test level could benefit the team in the future. While it is certainly true that Harris has taken his chance, Head’s series faded after half-centuries in Adelaide and Perth.ALSO READ: How do Australia fix their batting before the Ashes?“From a batting point of view, you look at what Marcus Harris and Travis Head have been able to do they are two examples of guys who might not have played any Test cricket at this stage. They’ve got an opportunity through an unusual situation and I thought both those guys acquitted themselves really well. This India attack was seriously good, I don’t think in Australia we’ve given them enough credit for how relentless they were, it was hard work batting against their attack for seasoned Test players. For Marcus and Travis to show they have got the game to make runs against the best attack in the world is a real positive.””For some of the guys in their third-fourth Test maybe it’s hard to look and say ‘I haven’t scored any hundreds’ but Marcus and Travis showed, and Marnus in the first innings [in Sydney], that they can score runs in Test cricket. Sometimes it’s difficult when it seems so far away, but we have three players there who are one innings away from really breaking through.”Australia’s two most experienced batsmen, Usman Khawaja and Shaun Marsh, scored one half-century apiece. The squad for the first Test against Sri Lanka will be named on Wednesday and Khawaja’s place is not under threat, but the debate around Marsh will be intense. Paine, who is not a selector, endorsed the pair and also the under-fire bowling unit.”I think everyone in our top seven didn’t play as well as we would have liked. Both of those players we know are absolute class, we know they can score a lot of runs. We have faith in them going forward. The group of bowlers we have in this team have been fantastic for quite a while now. They didn’t have their absolute best series but it’s not easy at this level and that can happen.”

Sri Lanka fast-bowling coach Rumesh Ratnayake admitted it was rare to see so many instances of batsmen being hit on the helmet in one match

Melinda Farrell in Canberra03-Feb-2019Kusal Perera will likely bat in the fourth innings at Manuka Oval, despite being forced off the field after suffering a blow to the helmet, as Sri Lanka try to salvage a positive finish and some much needed confidence ahead of their next series in South Africa.*SLC confirmed in a press release late on Sunday night that Kusal had been “cleared of any injuries”, and that his participation would depend on an assessment done on the fourth morning of the Test.Earlier, Sri Lanka’s fast-bowling coach, Rumesh Ratnayake, was confident Kusal would be cleared to bat, after the batsman was hit on the side of the helmet as he attempted to duck under a Jhye Richardson bouncer. Kusal initially played on, but left the field in the following over. He was replaced by Dimuth Karunaratne, who had been struck on the back of the neck by a short ball from Mitchell Starc on the previous day, but was cleared to play by the Sri Lanka medical staff.There were two other instances in the match of batsmen being hit around the head. Kusal had already been struck by Richardson earlier in the day, while a Pat Cummins short ball hit Dhananjaya de Silva on the helmet. Ratnayake later admitted it was rare to see so many incidents in one match.The former fast bowler speaks from experience: he once forced West Indies batsman Larry Gomes to retire after striking him with a short ball in an ODI at the MCG and, most famously, broke the nose of New Zealand opening batsman, John Wright, with a ferocious bouncer during a Test in Wellington.”When it hits the head it’s certainly a huge concern for us but this match was a lot on the head, wasn’t it?” said Ratnayake. “More so than any other game. So we would like to say it’s just one of those games but you can’t take the bowling off.”I mean Starc, who was not even a surety of [playing] this match, bowled extremely well and he was really on fire. And so did the other two who supported him as well. It was quality bowling, you can’t just take that away. Quality bowling I felt [affected] two of our guys [getting] hit on the head.”You can’t put it as a pattern. I mean I’ve seen bowlers hit batsmen on fast tracks also and certainly if there isn’t much pace the ducking process becomes different and the inconsistencies of a pitch – I’m not saying this pitch is inconsistent at all – it’s just sometimes you tend to duck for a ball that you shouldn’t be ducking. And that we saw in Kusal’s thing, he ducked into a ball which was not as ferocious as the ball to Karunaratne.”Kusal was replaced at the crease by Karunaratne, who added only 13 runs to the 46 he had scored before retiring hurt, but Ratnayake praised the character shown by the batsman.”I thought that showed a lot of guts and character from Karunaratne,” said Ratnayake. “That showed a lot for the team and we really thought that could help the morale so to speak. Those are things which we would like to talk on and hopefully the second innings we’ll sort of capitalise on that. When I say morale, [I mean] confidence.”Since they embarked on a challenging Test tour that began in New Zealand, injuries have forced Sri Lanka to field a side with little experience and, with two Tests looming in South Africa, there is little respite in the near future. Ratnayake said Suranga Lakmal, who missed out due to a stiff back, will be fit for the first Test against South Africa later this month but Sri Lanka don’t expect to have Nuwan Pradeep, Lahiru Kumara and Dushmantha Chameera available. It places a heavy burden on the young bowlers who have been drafted in, but Ratnayake believes a strong finish to the match could provide a significant boost to their confidence.”It’s still a learning curve because the Test isn’t finished but I’m sure they’ve learnt a lot, especially Chamika Karunaratne , who’s in his first Test.”It was kind of a shock to him to know the standards of Test level and it just happened that he was just – I wouldn’t say he was forced into it – he was sort of taken into it in a rush but he has shown a lot of character, he’s shown a lot of confidence, he’s showed a lot of things which he did just prior to the game. It was really encouraging but I think watching the Starcs, the Cummins, all of them I think certainly helped him on and it’s a learning curve.”‘”It is very important to finish off strongly here. And a good strong close-out of the match would certainly be a big gain for the boys in confidence, which hasn’t been all that great in the recent past, if you take the tours we’ve had in the [past] two years even, and it would certainly be a strong thing for the boys.”GMT 1824 *The story was updated to include details from the SLC’s release.

Peter Nevill also made a century, his first for two years, before Western Australia lost an early wicket in their battle to avoid defeat

Alex Malcolm25-Feb-2019Australia Test incumbent Kurtis Patterson continued his sparkling form with yet another century while New South Wales captain Peter Nevill made his first hundred in two years to put the Blues in complete control of the clash with Western Australia at Bankstown Oval in Sydney.Patterson made 134 from 229 balls with 15 fours and two sixes as the Blues piled up 8 for 477 declared. He has now made six centuries in his last 11 innings at all levels dating back to his Shield century against Western Australia in Perth in early December.The span includes two centuries for New South Wales, two for the Cricket Australia XI, a Test century for Australia and a grade century for his club side St George in Sydney.Nevill piled on the pain in the afternoon reaching his 10th first-class century and his first in two years before swiftly declaring with a lead of 198. Steve O’Keefe also added 57 in a partnership of 125 with his captain.WA debutant legspinner Liam O’Connor took five wickets in a tireless effort. He bowled Jack Edwards through the gate with another superb wrong ‘un, and took the last three wickets to fall to finish with 5 for 131 from 38 overs, as the Warriors could only manage eight wickets in 150 overs of toil.WA’s task to save the game on the final day was made even tougher when they lost Sam Whiteman just before close. He edged a ball to the gully off Sean Abbott driving away from his body with Patterson clinging onto the sharp chance. Cameron Bancroft and Josh Inglis survived to stumps but WA still need 185 runs to make New South Wales bat again, or to bat most of day four to avoid defeat.

India fast bowler Bhuvneshwar Kumar has been named the franchise’s vice-captain

Sreshth Shah in Kolkata23-Mar-20193:59

Warner ‘jumping out of his skin’ to play IPL – Moody

Despite David Warner’s availability for Sunrisers Hyderabad this season, the former IPL-winning captain will not lead the franchise in 2019. Kane Williamson – who led Sunrisers to the runner-up position last year – will continue to captain the side even though there are question marks on his fitness after he sustained a shoulder injury last week during New Zealand’s Test series against Bangladesh. Bhuvneshwar Kumar will be the vice-captain.

Steven Smith on missing the IPL last year

With his one-year ban for ball-tampering about to expire on March 29, Steven Smith has questioned the BCCI’s rationale behind banning him and David Warner from the IPL last season, as the pair gear up to make their return this season.
When the ball-tampering scandal broke, Cricket Australia banned both players from international cricket for 12 months and though it imposed no restrictions on the players participating in T20 leagues outside of Australia, the IPL governing council decided to bar them from the 2018 tournament.
“I am available from the first game so all’s good. [About last year] I don’t know about the rules. Maybe ask the BCCI, I don’t know.” Smith said during a Rajasthan Royals promotional event on Friday

“I’m in doubt for the first match, but we actually have a fairly decent break between the first and the second match,” Williamson told , “which should be more than sufficient time for my injury to heal and for me to be available for selection.”Warner was one of three Australian players embroiled in the ball-tampering scandal nearly one year ago which, among other things, led to him and Steven Smith being banned from the 2018 IPL. While Cricket Australia had said that Warner would never hold a leadership position for the country ever again, the left-handed batsmen was captain of Sylhet Sixers in the recently concluded Bangladesh Premier League.Despite his absence last year, Warner has been an integral part of the Sunrisers set-up. “Warner didn’t leave the Whatsapp group despite not playing last year,” Yusuf Pathan said. “Even though he wasn’t with the team, he was with the team. We lost, we won, irrespective he has been in touch and he discusses team ideas and dissect individual performances.”Warner led Sunrisers to their maiden IPL title in 2016, and is the only IPL batsman to score 500 runs or more in four consecutive seasons. His first game against Kolkata Knight Riders on Sunday, comes six days before the Cricket Australia imposed ban comes to an end.

The captain moving up the order is good for the team, but the strike rates of the other top-order batsmen needs quite a lot of work

Osman Samiuddin07-May-2019There was a time before he became captain when it mattered where Sarfaraz Ahmed batted.In the run-up to the last World Cup, it seemed like opening might be a good idea. As opener, he made 34, 65 and 32 in a three-game series against Australia not long before the tournament, but was then shunted down to seven and eight for five ODIs against New Zealand right after it.Then at the World Cup, he didn’t play Pakistan’s initial games. When they did pick him, they made him open (against South Africa’s attack by the way, on a great surface for all kinds of fast bowling). He made 49 and an unbeaten 101 in his first two goes as opener, but then four bats later he was moved down again.Then, in the English summer of 2016, he became Pakistan’s No. 5. He was a good one too: 55, 105, 38, 12 and 90 across five innings. More significantly, in a hopelessly non-vogueish batting line, he made those 300 runs at a strike rate of nearly 92.Three further innings at five – 35, 60* and 24*, strike rate 101.8, thanks – and that was that. The 24* came on October 5, 2016. In the 24 times he has batted in an ODI since, he’s ventured above six just three times.That innings was also the last he played before taking on the captaincy, so it’s not as if he’s been forced by others to not bat five. But such, presumably, is the overwhelming nature of the role that his batting, and where he bats, has become, well, somehow less important.So the fact that he has batted at five and four in Pakistan’s two 50-over warm-up games on this tour so far is significant, if only because it brings his batting finally back into focus. And that is where he plans to stay.”My aim is in England to bat four or five, throughout the World Cup,” Sarfaraz said ahead of their first ODI against England at The Oval. “We’ve come to a World Cup, it’s a long tournament so it’s good to have a stable and set batting order in which everyone knows where they are batting.”We will obviously be flexible so that when there are fewer overs left we might switch around if we need somebody as a hitter and look at sending Imad [Wasim] or Asif [Ali].”Asif Ali tries to go big•AFP

Ordinarily, this would be a good thing. Sarfaraz is not a power-hitter but he is the right side of restless in the middle overs, one of the few who weaponises running, and is innovative enough (bring back that sweep off the fast bowler). Of all the positions he’s batted in, five is, by some distance, his most productive: averaging over 50 and a strike rate of 92.And not that it’s been planned that way, but his sample sizes across the main positions he has played in – opening and then four to seven – are actually similar: ten innings as opener, nine at four, ten at five, 20 at six and 12 at seven. So his record at five really makes it a no-brainer.The only problem now is the strike rates of Pakistan’s batting above him. Fakhar Zaman is fine, but Imam-ul-Haq (80.23), Babar Azam (84.03 at three) and Haris Sohail (85.08 at four) means that Pakistan could really do with plenty more explosiveness before Sarfaraz arrives. Mohammad Hafeez and his very similar strike rate has also to be factored in once he returns from injury (which is soon).The batting has, as Sarfaraz said, become more modern than it was in 2016, but not maybe by a whole lot. “One of the issues then was that our strike rotation was poor and we’ve worked on that,” he said. “Our strike rate was low generally but if you look at Fakhar, he goes at 90-95. Babar plays long innings but when he finishes he is near 85-90. So things are better – it’s been a few years since that series and we’ve been preparing this side for the last 18 months.”What they really, desperately, want is for Asif to bolt into their squad for the World Cup. He is about the only man in or around the squad with the kind of power to really propel the second half of an ODI innings – in theory. If it hasn’t turned out that way in practice it is because opportunities have remained limited. Even then, Pakistan aren’t the kind of side that can easily overlook a strike rate of 130 in eight ODI innings and a career List A one of 109.He has, however, at best, two games to make a case. Shoaib Malik returns from his leave most likely in time for the second or third ODI and he is, for reasons that aren’t always obvious, among the first names in any Pakistan XI.Still, unlike any side other than England, Pakistan have this incredible opportunity to fine-tune their first-choice XI in precisely the conditions they will be playing the World Cup in.”It is definitely a big advantage for us, playing five top-quality ODIs before the World Cup,” Sarfaraz said. “We’re all focusing on the World Cup. But our first target is this ODI series. If we can take some confidence from this series, it will definitely help us in this World Cup.”

Netherlands were 167 for 5. They had never chased a target as big as 291 in ODI cricket. Fast forward to the 49th over and they were gifted the winning run off a wide

ESPNcricinfo staff21-Jun-2019
Zimbabwe came into this game after getting a proper beating. But nearly all of their key players stood up to change the narrative. Sikandar Raza played finisher to perfection, making 85 off only 68 balls and remaining unbeaten so that the effort of his team-mates higher up the order – Craig Ervine scored 84 and Brendan Taylor struck a fifty as well – yielded a solid total. At the innings break, 290 for 6 looked a winning score. And that perception only grew when Sean Williams too four wickets with his left-arm spin.Netherlands were 167 for 5 in the 33rd over. They had never chased a target as big as this in ODI cricket before. But fast forward to the 49th and they were gifted the winning run off a wide.Much of the recovery had already been done, with Roelof van der Merwe striking a composed 57 off 54 balls and the wicketkeeper Scott Edwards keeping pace despite scoring only three boundaries in his unbeaten 44. Eventually though that sixth-wicket partnership at nearly run a ball gave way to one that was pure mayhem.The Netherlands captain Pieter Seelaar came out with the equation reading 62 off 42 balls and completely broke the game. He faced only 15 deliveries but sent six of them to the boundary to ensure his team set a new national record.A big chase usually needs a good opening stand and Netherlands had that too. Tobias Visee, who will be opening the batting with Chris Gayle at the Global T20 Canada, batted in a matter befitting that as he whacked 41 off only 33 balls. His partner, Max O’Dowd who scored a half-century on debut on Wednesday followed it up with another, but when he fell to Williams, the game seemed to tilt towards Zimbabwe and the series was set to be shared 1-1.Then everything changed.