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ESPN SIGN WARNE

The ESPN Star Sports (ESS) has signed the former Aussie leg spinner Shane Warne as a cricket commentator and analyst. The managing director of ESS, Peter Hutton, gave this information to the reporters.

Hutton said, “We are extremely happy to inform you that one of the greatest bowlers of all times Shane Warne is going to join the commentary team of ESS. We already had some great cricketers in our commentary team and now, the inclusion of Warne has made it even better.”

The star English batsman, Kevin Pietersen, was also in the studio of ESS as a cricket analyst for the World T20 Championship. However, Pietersen’s contract with ESS was only for the T20 World Cup and he is not the part of the ESS commentary team any more.

When the host of the ‘Cricket Extra’ show, Jatin Sapru, asked Pietersen about Shane Warne, Pietersen said, “Shane Warne is a superstar. People love him wherever he goes. It’s great that he is going to be a part of the ESS commentary team. He is an excellent analyst and the viewers of Star Cricket will enjoy listening Warney’s commentary.”

Wasim Akram and Sourav Ganguly were the other two experts who were sitting in the studio along with Pietersen. Ganguly said, “Warne gave me a tough time on the cricket field in my playing days. I hope he will not give me a tough time here in the studio.”

Akram said, “He was a champion leg spinner and I am delighted that he is going to join our team. He is an excellent reader of the game and we will have a great time with him in the studio.”

England tour of India will be the first assignment of Warne as a part of the commentary team of ESS.

ENGLAND FALL TO SA

The South African Cricket Team has defeated England by 7 wickets in the fifth ODI of the 5 match one day series at Trent Bridge, Nottingham.  With this victory, South Africa managed to level the series by 2-2. The English team looked completely off colour in the match. Almost every English batsman threw his wicket away by playing extremely poor shots. The English bowlers also bowled too many loose deliveries and allowed the South African batsmen to play in a dominating fashion.

Earlier, the English skipper won the toss and decided to bat. Jonathan Trott didn’t get fit on time and Jonny Bairstow was included in the side on Trott’s place. Robin Peterson was given the new ball by the South African skipper AB De Villiers and the left arm spinner delivered in the fourth over by trapping Ian Bell in front of the stumps with an arm delivery. Ravi Bopara was promoted in the batting order in the absence of Trott, but, he got out on the second delivery that he faced. Cook added 55 runs with Bairstow for the third wicket, but, the dismissal of Bairstow opened the floodgate. England lost three very quick wickets and the score became 99 for 5. After that, the England innings never got back on track. The wickets kept on falling regularly and the English team got all out on 182. Had Chris Woakes not played some good shots towards the end of the innings, England would have struggled to get past 150.

South Africa was off to a disastrous start in reply. Three wickets were down at the score of just 14 runs. But, AB De Villiers played the captain’s knock and put up a match winning partnership of 172 runs with Hashim Amla for the fourth wicket to see his team home. De Villiers played an unbeaten knock of 75, while, Amla remained not out on 97. Amla was declared the man of the match as well as the man of the series.

MORE IMPROVEMENTS NEEDED

The New Zealand captain, Ross Taylor, has said that the New Zealand players have to make some improvements before the start of the test series against India. The performance of the New Zealand team was disastrous in all forms of the game on the recent West Indies tour. The team managed to win only one match on the tour. The weakness of New Zealand batsmen against the spinners got exposed and the New Zealand batsmen kept struggling against the West Indies spinners throughout the series.

In India, the pitches would be slow and spinner friendly and India has also got two quality spinners in the form of Ravichandran Ashwin and Pragyan Ojha. So, it would not be easy for the New Zealand batsmen to score big runs in India. As per Taylor, in test matches, once you get in, you must play a big inning. But, the New Zealand batsmen are throwing wickets after getting set. In the two test matches against West Indies, none of the New Zealand batsmen was able to score a hundred. The opener, Martin Guptill, scored the maximum number of runs for New Zealand in the test series. He scored 277 runs in 2 test matches at an average of 69.25. Apart from Guptill, no other New Zealand batsman looked in good nick.

On being asked about Daniel Vettori’s fitness, the New Zealand skipper said that Vettori’s injury hasn’t got any better and probably, he would not be able to play in the upcoming test series against India. This is a big blow for New Zealand as Vettori could have been more than handy under the Indian conditions. Taylor said that in the absence of Daniel Vettori, the leg spinner Tarun Nethula might get a chance to make his debut in the test matches against India.

Dravid backs Captains

Former Indian captain, Rahul Dravid, has said that Sourav Ganguly and Mahendra Singh Dhoni are the best captains that India has ever produced. He said that every captain has his own style of going about his job. Sourav and Mahi are also pretty different. Sourav used to bring a lot of passion in his captaincy. He was very aggressive in his approach. On the other hand, Dhoni is a cool man. He always remains calm and doesn’t lose his composure even in adverse situations. He said that he played under both Sourav and Mahi and according to him, both of them have done a fantastic job for India.

Dravid said that he respects Mahendra Singh Dhoni a lot due to his amazing leadership qualities. As per Dravid, when the team was not doing well in England and Australia, Mahi attended all the press conferences and answered each and every question of the reporters. He never tried to hide himself from the media. And when the team does well, he goes into the background and never tries to take credit of the team’s win. According to Dravid, this is the quality of a true leader. He always leads the team from the front.

On being asked about his hobbies, Dravid said that reading books is his favourite pastime. Even during his playing days, books were his favourite companions. Dravid said that he didn’t used to discuss cricket with any other player, he used to discuss cricket with himself. Dravid said that some of his college friends used to read a lot of different books and from there, he picked the habit of reading books. Dravid said that, apart from cricket, he loved to watch other sports too. Whenever, he gets time, he watches tennis and golf. He said that it is fascinating to watch how the players of other sports go about their job.

Arthur wants Australia to Improve Batting

Mickey Arthur, the coach of the Australia Cricket Team has stated that the only weakness of the team at the moment is that the batsmen have failed to notch up runs in the domestic competition The Sheffield Shield. Speaking at a press conference, the former coach of the South Africa Cricket Team was extremely open about the areas that his team needed to work on, adding that batting is a weakness for the team at the moment and they are not in the same position in terms of batting as they are in terms of bowling.

He went on to add that he was extremely impressed at the batters that they have brought with them to the English shores to take on England. He pointed out the likes of David Warner, Peter Forrest for their performances and also praised Ed Cowan for his batting performances. He also added that although they were impressive and showed their sustainability in international level, he would love for the players of the Australia Cricket Team to bat deep, till 10 or 11 and not up to 5 or 6.

Arthur pointed out that the former captain of the team Ricky Ponting was the epitome of professionalism and perfection and the youngsters should take his performances as a yardstick to improve their game further. Ponting was dropped from the One Day International side of the Australia Cricket Team and upon being dropped, he returned to play domestic cricket for the Tasmanian Tigers, for whom he got two centuries in three matches of the Sheffield Shield and Arthur was visibly impressed with the former skipper.

Australia take on England in England for 5 matches in a One Day International series, aiming to hold on to their position as the best side in One Day Internationals as per the ICC ratings.