Ian Botham has been unveiled as the new chairman of Durham, a beleaguered county that can only benefit from his roistering attitude to public life

David Hopps03-Nov-2016Sir Ian Botham’s inspirational qualities on and off the cricket field have been well chronicled. The great deeds that won him the reputation as one of the greatest England cricketers in history have been followed in retirement by indefatigable charitable commitments approached with the same gusto. Now those energies will be committed to a new challenge: the chairmanship of Durham, a county that needs leading to a secure and lasting future.Durham’s tired old board was sacked in its entirety last month as part of the punitive measures imposed by the ECB after the game’s governing body reluctantly provided the financial assistance, and expertise, they needed to stop them falling into bankruptcy.Botham, an English cricketing icon, not least in the north-east, has now accepted a largely figurehead role for a restructured county which will operate as a community interest company; the man expected to bang the drum, rouse the spirits and help bring in the money, while the rest of the new board, as yet not divulged, work on the small print of recovery.Not that there is much money to be had. Unemployment in the north-east is among the highest in the country and figures from the Office for National Statistics suggest the region has been worst hit since the credit crunch of 2008. But Durham have a knack of uncovering cricketing talent which must be preserved whatever challenges present themselves.Ben Stokes – an allrounder in Botham’s mould who has welcomed his involvement as “brilliant” – Mark Wood, Paul Collingwood and Steve Harmison have all made the grade at England level. And, unlike some other counties, they draw their talent from all social classes.Harmison’s past comments help keep the response to Botham’s return in proportion. “I would love to help out in any shape or form but it’s easy for ex-players like me to say that,” he said recently. “What we need are financial experts.”Daily involvement will not be Botham’s remit, rather more the need whenever he can to inspire, bully and cajole businesses and individuals in the north-east to prove their affection for England’s newest and most northerly first-class county. As someone who has raised more than £12m for charity, largely for leukaemia research, and predominantly by the method of yomping into the sunset down hills and dale until he could yomp no more, Botham’s emotional right to request a little largesse from others cannot be questioned.His love for the region, especially its big-heartedness and open spaces, is unquestionable. He lives a few miles over the border, in North Yorkshire, in a 17th Century farmhouse which has led him to be fondly dubbed the Squire of Ravensworth, but his affinity is with Durham. He spends much of his leisure time in country pursuits such as fishing on the nearby River Tees which rushes across untamed Pennines valleys and forms the historic border.His association with the north-east stretches back to the time he joined Durham for their inaugural county season in 1992 – a host of injuries finally silenced him as he retired the following season. He will hope that his second coming is more triumphant because then his body hurt, his career was almost spent and his reputation could not be matched by performance. He described his last hurrah as one of the worst decisions he had made and, as various studies of his cricketing career have made plain, he made one or two bad ones.These were bleak times for Durham as they struggled to adjust to life as a fully-professional county and, mistakenly in hindsight, committed to building an international-sized stadium in the relatively small market town of Chester-le-Street. From there, their financial problems have grown.Chairman Botham: the very thought will bring smirks around the cricket circuit, although not in his line of sight. After all, he is the least governable of men. At the height of his fame, during one of his many wars with officialdom, he once stood up before a cricket dinner to condemn cricket administrators the world over as “gin-soaked old dodderers”.Approaching his 61st birthday, English cricket’s greatest roisterer has now joined them, even if his preferred tipple is likely to be a decent swig of good red wine.It is tempting to remark on this fine example of poacher turned gamekeeper, except that any image concerning Botham and country sports is dangerous. Chris Packham, the mild-mannered presenter of BBC Springwatch, attracted his ire earlier this year, for condemning the deliberate killing of birds of prey on grouse moors to protect the stock of grouse for the shooting season. Botham took to the airwaves to condemn him as an “extremist”.That he will be an absentee chairman for large chunks of the year is inevitable, certainly as long as his commitments persist – and, as if to illustrate that, he will not take up the role until he returns from England’s Test tour of India. Having attracted a chairman of world repute, Durham’s next task is to find a vice chairman of complementary qualities – someone more taken with the minutiae of life. There have even been suggestions that Botham will hand-pick his own Board.Botham, as his cricket commentary reveals, is a man of unyielding opinion and not overly obsessed by facts. He has never coached, not held an administrative or business post. But he is perfectly placed to attract star names to fund-raisers, to shame the business community into supporting the county once more, or to lobby support for Durham in the NatWest Blast and turn around some of the most disappointing T20 crowds in the country. And his rebellious air, in a county that feels mistreated by the ECB, will also not go amiss. He described himself as “privileged” but warned of “challenging times ahead”.If you care about Durham cricket – or even if you don’t, but Sir Ian Botham thinks you should – you may be hearing from him soon. For the good of English cricket, it is to be hoped that this second coming is a good deal more successful than the first. There is a valuable job waiting to be done. And the red wine will be very palatable.

Cheteshwar Pujara’s strike rate has been a worry over the last 30 months, but much of it is to do with his inability to score against pace when playing overseas

S Rajesh27-Sep-2016One of the significant pluses for India in the Kanpur Test was the performance of Cheteshwar Pujara at No. 3. In both innings of the match, he made significant contributions, and more importantly, got his runs at an excellent tempo, scoring 140 off 261 balls, a strike rate of 53.6. Before the game, Pujara’s inability to increase his scoring rate after settling in had been an area of concern for the team management, and Virat Kohli admitted that he and Anil Kumble, the coach, had spoken to him about it. That aspect had been particularly glaring in the West Indies, where Pujara scored 62 runs off 226 balls (strike rate 27.4) and was dropped for the third Test.Since his comeback in August 2012, Pujara’s strike rate, coming into this New Zealand series, was 48.05. Among batsmen with 2000-plus runs during this period, only four have a lower strike rate, but his rate wasn’t that much slower than some of the other top batsmen during this period: Hashim Amla’s was 47.73, Kane Williamson’s 50.47, and AB de Villiers’ 51.24. Where Pujara had slipped up was in the last two-and-a-half years: since the start of 2014, his scoring had dropped to 42.39, about 20% lesser than his strike rate in the 2012-13 period. It was the lowest among Indian batsmen during this period, and third-lowest out of 47 batsmen who had scored 750-plus Test runs in this phase. Only Faf du Plessis (strike rate 38) and Kaushal Silva (40.88) had more sluggish scoring rates than Pujara.

The aspect that had particularly worried Kohli and Kumble was Pujara’s tendency to get stuck after getting starts. As the table below shows, his strike rate since 2014 remained in the 40s even after the first 50 balls of his innings, whereas earlier he had shown the ability to shift gears and up his scoring rate into the 50s after settling in.

Given these numbers in the 30 months prior to this series, Pujara’s comeback in Kanpur was encouraging, but not entirely surprising given how he has performed at home in the past. Since August 2012, Pujara has averaged 67.17 (strike rate 52.87) at home, and 35.92 (strike rate 42.52) in away Tests. The averages and strike rates resemble those before and since 2014, and that is because India’s schedules have been similarly lopsided: 14 out of his 18 Tests in the last 30 months have been away games. The only home series during this period was against South Africa: Pujara managed a strike rate of 48 in that series despite the pitches being particularly difficult for batting.Through the last 30 months, Pujara’s major problem has been his tendency to get bogged down against pace, an aspect that was not tested much in Kanpur. Even during the period when Pujara was struggling to score quickly, he still made his runs at a fair clip against spin: since the beginning of 2014 and before the Kanpur Test, his strike rate against spin was 52.29, but against pace it dropped to 38.14. In the Kanpur Test, he faced only 36 balls against pace and scored 12 (strike rate 33.33), while against spin he continued to get his runs comfortably, scoring 128 from 225 balls (strike rate 56.89). In the 2012-13 period, he was far more assertive against pace as well, though 12 of his 14 Tests during this period were in India.

Admittedly, on the West Indies tour, Pujara completely went into his shell, against both pace and spin: he scored at a strike rate of 38 against spin, and 20 against pace. After those pedestrian numbers, it isn’t surprising that the team management discussed the issue with him. The Kanpur numbers are encouraging, but the real test for Pujara continues to be his numbers outside Asia. With India scheduled to play 12 more home Tests this season, that issue won’t come up any time soon, though.

ESPNcricinfo staff30-Oct-2016Dhananjaya de Silva got three boundaries away, but he could not kick on; he was out for 25, caught off Graeme Cremer•Associated PressAsela Gunaratne, batting on Test debut, hung around longer•AFPHe managed to mark his maiden Test innings with a fifty•Associated PressTharanga, holding firm at the other end, got to a second Test hundred just after tea•AFPCarl Mumba dismissed Rangana Herath with a short ball for his maiden Test wicket•AFPEventually, Sri Lanka were bowled out for 537 in the final session. The Captain Cremer topped the bowling figures for Zimbabwe, taking 4 for 142•Associated PressIn reply, Zimbabwe lost opener Brian Chari early but Tino Mawoyo and Hamilton Masakadza went to stumps unscathed as the hosts ended at 88 for 1•AFP

Plays of the day from the third ODI between India and New Zealand in Mohali

Karthik Krishnaswamy23-Oct-2016Guptill’s monster hitMartin Guptill has a thing for hitting roofs. His sixes have twice hit the roof at the Westpac Stadium in Wellington and once at Auckland’s Eden Park. Stepping out of his crease to Hardik Pandya, he hit the first ball of the fourth over of the match for a humongous six that would have exited the PCA Stadium had he aimed towards the single-tier stands behind wide long-on. Instead, he launched the ball over the bowler’s head, and ended up pinging the front wall of the third tier of the stand behind the straight boundary.Those Dhoni handsAmit Mishra had just dismissed Ross Taylor with a superlative bit of flight, slowing the ball down to bring the batsman forward, getting it to dip to make him stretch and drag his back foot out of the crease, and turning it past his outside edge. MS Dhoni, as he so often does, wasted no time in getting the bails off.
Dhoni’s task was just a little harder in Mishra’s next over, though, when he spun another legbreak past a groping batsman. This time, though, Luke Ronchi’s foot did not slide as far out of his crease as Taylor’s had done, and the ball turned from a little wider outside off, which meant Dhoni had a greater distance to cover between collecting the ball and stumping Ronchi, with less time at his disposal. But in his inimitable, non-textbook manner, he collected the ball without drawing his gloves back an inch, and whipped the bails off before Ronchi even knew what had happened.The spillIndia lost Ajinkya Rahane in the third over of their chase. Virat Kohli, new at the crease, had just shown what kind of form he was in, driving Matt Henry to the cover point boundary off the third ball of the fifth over. The next ball was shorter, and Kohli went on the back foot, looking for a dab to third man. He had not accounted for the presence of a catching fielder at wide slip, however, set for precisely that kind of shot. The ball went low to Taylor, one of the better catchers in world cricket. He fell to his right, got both hands to the ball a couple of inches off the turf, and dropped it.Those Kohli wristsRight through India’s chase, the only trouble their batsmen encountered from a flat Mohali pitch was the occasional tendency for the ball to stop on them. Rahane and Dhoni were both out caught at short cover, playing too early and having to check on-the-up drives. In the 33rd over, James Neesham got a shortish ball, angled into Kohli’s body, to stop on him. Kohli adjusted brilliantly, standing still for an instant to let the ball get to him before whipping it off his hips to the midwicket boundary, nearly getting it to carry all the way over the rope.

The portents were bad when he went down after a fielding mishap, clutching his knee. A few minutes later he was bowling a spell for the ages

Jarrod Kimber in Brisbane15-Dec-2016The ball was slowly trickling to the boundary, but no one went to pick it up. The crowd began jeering the terrible bit of fielding – Mohammad Amir committed worse mistakes on Thursday – but as he dropped to the field, the jeers turned into a concerned collection of whispers.Amir buried his face in the turf as he clutched his knee. He couldn’t keep still through the pain.His knee didn’t slide on the ground, it dug in. His weight went towards the ball, but his knee did not. His first instinct was to go after the ball, but as he moved, grabbing for it in mid-air, he just collapsed.Mark Taylor suggested he had a kneecap problem, those in the pool swam across for a closer look and medics from both teams converged on Amir. Some non-experts noticed swelling, others a cruciate ligament injury, the sort that ended players’ careers every footy season in Australia. It was the kind of pointless speculation you do when there was a star crumpled before you. Simon Jones was mentioned a lot, and no one was talking about magical reverse swing from the 2005 Ashes.A stretcher was called for, but none came. So Amir was helped over the boundary by support staff. People start to talk about why it had to be him. We hadn’t seen him unleashed in the series, or at all since he got back to Tests, and now it looked like he could be out of order.His last 39 balls were dots, which seemed to be part of the Misbah-ul-Haq plan to get to dusk and then hope something happened. But it wasn’t dusk yet, we hadn’t seen what the pink ball could do under dark Gabba skies. We hadn’t seen anything. It got darker in the incredibly long time it seemed to take the ambulance cart to make it out to him.Amir has overcome stupidity, criminal acts, jail time and five years out of professional sport, and now stopping a ball at fine leg had brought him down.On the outfield, there was an enormous divot and, despite the break in play, no one covered it up. Pakistan had a similar-sized hole in their team.The message from the PCB was not to worry; the early signs were good, they said. But how could you not? An entire army of people were down on the boundary helping Amir out. He couldn’t even hobble the 80 metres to the change room.At drinks in the final session, 18 minutes after Amir had fallen, a groundsman went out and filled in his divot. Twelve minutes after that, Amir jogged back onto the field. His recovery had seemingly taken less time than it took for the ambulance cart to reach him. As he ran across the outfield you could almost sense the different sections of the crowd realising it was him. There was a sound wave of people saying, “What’s all this about?”Was he brave, stupid, or soft? Did it even matter? The new ball was due soon and he was obviously going to take it. Maybe, if you squinted with your head on the side, he was limping. But he still took that brand new fluorescent pink ball.

It was the kind of magical spell Test cricket has been waiting to see from Amir for years, and he’d been waiting for it the most.

Amir didn’t trample the turf like Wahab Riaz. He wasn’t a killer semi-trailer like Ryan Harris. He floated across the grass, barely making an impact, and even at the crease there was no violent crash. It was more a little skip and the ball zipped out of his fingers. This man whose kneecap was dislocated, whose anterior cruciate was torn, whose day, Test and series were over, was delivering a ball to Peter Handscomb like nothing was wrong.Until the third step of his follow through. And there was a limp, a worry, but he went back to the top of his mark and floated in a couple more times. Handscomb took a single off the the third ball; it was the first run off him in the last 42, delivered either side of a trip on the ambulance cart.The fourth ball was the Amir that made lovers of fast bowling cry when they first heard the news of his fixing all those years ago. It shaped to drift in, just short of a length, and then decided to go away, at pace. To get near it, you would have to be one of the best batsmen in the world, and Steven Smith was. The ball went through to Sarfraz Ahmed, who threw it to slip as Amir walked back to his mark.Later, after a few replays, it was clear Smith had edged the ball and, instead of enjoying his wicket, Amir finished the over hopping and grabbing at his knee, his trousers still stained from his fall.For the next little bit, he bowled more trademark Amir balls, the kind that made you gasp and despair at their beauty as they beat the bat. One was so good Smith seemed angry at its existence as he tried to recreate the kind of alien movement it got with his hand. There were more than went past Handscomb too; one of them took the edge but fell short of slip.It was the kind of magical spell Test cricket has been waiting to see from Amir for years, and he’d been waiting for it the most. The only problem was, though he might have overcome serious injury, he couldn’t take a wicket. As good as he was, as dangerous as he looked, and as much drama as he had created – none of it mattered when the edges did not carry, or when they weren’t spotted. His Lazarus rise was ultimately pointless.They say you can’t tell much from just seeing the stats, but you could from Amir’s on day one at the Gabba: Three limps, 18 overs, one knee injury, six maidens, one ambulance cart, one wicket, one injury, 33 runs and one miraculous recovery.

Aakash Chopra suggests Ravindra Jadeja should have come on earlier against Ben Stokes, and wonders why India’s fast bowlers have stopped bowling cutters

Aakash Chopra19-Nov-20162:45

Compton: Umesh lacks a bit of skill

Umesh’s use of the creaseIn the first over of the day Umesh Yadav showed he’s constantly evolving as a bowler. He’s not only clocking speeds in the high 140kph range consistently but also using the crease quite well. Usually he bowls from the middle of the box but in the first over today, he went to the corner of the crease and also came closer to the stumps. The idea behind using the crease is to create new angles and therefore sow the seeds of doubt.Are modern helmets ideal for keeping?The helmets used in cricket are manufactured to protect the batsman and are designed from a batsman’s perspective. A batsman isn’t required to look up or down but a wicketkeeper is, for in the wicketkeeping stance he is required to look up and on other occasions forced to look down as well. In terms of both comfort and visibility, the modern helmet isn’t meant to be worn by the wicketkeeper. Time to manufacture a wicketkeeper’s helmet?Left-arm spin to Stokes?The pitch has held up really well thus far, and the business areas haven’t disintegrated one bit. The only area of concern was the footmarks on the far end but those too were only likely to bother the left-hander. Surprisingly, Ben Stokes’ numbers against left-arm spinners aren’t great – in the two Tests in Bangladesh, he was out to left-arm spin in all four innings – and therefore it might not have been a bad idea to start with Jadeja and target the rough outside his off stump. India chose to operate with fast bowlers instead and by the time Jadeja got into action, Stokes had already made a strong start to the day.

No substitute for paceOnce a batsman gets set on Indian pitches, there’s not much a fast bowler can do to dislodge him, for there’s no help from the surface. Even if there’s reverse-swing available, it’s not as lethal unless you have extra pace. To produce a wicket-taking ball, you need extra pace, and that’s where Umesh was sensational. He beat a well-set Bairstow with extra pace, for that accentuated the reverse-swing. This Indian team is blessed to have two fast bowlers who bowl at over 140kph consistently and that’s why they have been able to contribute in this home season.Broad’s leg-cuttersThe ball that dismissed KL Rahul highlighted Stuart Broad’s ability to bowl cutters. He pushed the ball inwards a little more while putting a little more pressure with the index finger to get away movement off the pitch. Anderson also did something similar to Vijay and then to dismiss Pujara. While Indian seamers have bowled quicker, Anderson and Broad have found more lateral movement off the pitch on this docile pitch. In fact, there are few like Anderson and Broad in the world.There was a time when almost every Indian fast bowler used to bowl cutters, since they honed their craft on matting surfaces. But as cricket moved to turf pitches, the reliance on cutters reduced dramatically and that reflects in the Indian fast bowlers of this era.The data clearly shows how much England’s fast bowlers emphasised the use of cutters. Ben Stokes, Anderson and Broad achieved average deviations off the pitch of 0.65°, 0.58° and 0.53°, while Shami managed just 0.11° and Umesh 0°.

Geelong is about to become just the second non-capital city to host a full international featuring Australia, and this may be just the start

Brydon Coverdale14-Feb-2017Ask the average cricket fan in six weeks’ time who won this T20 series between Australia and Sri Lanka and they’ll likely have forgotten. Ask them in six months and they may not remember the matches ever happened. And yet this series is momentous – not only because Australia are fielding two teams in two countries almost simultaneously. It is significant also because cricket is taking a rare detour into regional Australia.Geelong is not exactly beyond the black stump – it is only an hour’s drive from Melbourne and boasts a population of nearly 200,000 – but it is the gateway to the farming districts of south-west Victoria. That one of its landmarks is the National Wool Museum tells you that you’ve left the big smoke. And this Sunday, Geelong will become just the second non-capital city to host a full international featuring Australia.The only other city to have done so is Cairns, which hosted top-end matches in 2003 and 2004 during the southern winter. In a home summer, only the six state capitals plus Canberra have ever hosted Australia’s men’s team. But Geelong, home to one of the oldest and most loyally-supported AFL teams, start and end point for cycling’s Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race, now gets its chance to host international cricket.In order to meet ICC standards for the size of the playing area, the pitch orientation at Kardinia Park – aka Simonds Stadium – has been altered to slightly off-square. The ground had a taste of elite cricket last summer when it hosted a warm-up BBL match between the Melbourne Stars and Melbourne Renegades, and then a two-day practice game between West Indies and a Victoria XI ahead of the Boxing Day Test.And if the city is not excited enough at the prospect of hosting international cricket, the absence of the captain Steven Smith and his deputy David Warner, who are in the UAE preparing for the Test tour of India, means Australia will be led in this match by Aaron Finch, a loyal member of the Geelong Cricket Club. Finch grew up in the nearby country town of Colac, and from his early teenage years has been playing for Geelong.”It’s something that I’m really proud of, to get the opportunity to captain Australia, but to get to do it in front of my home fans and friends and club team-mates,” Finch told ESPNcricinfo. “There have been a lot of people in that area who have helped my cricket a huge amount over my career. I’m sure it will sink in a bit more on the day, but it’s something that I’m very proud of and grateful for.”The amount of work that so many people do to try and attract the biggest and best events to the area is huge. I think this is just a small reward for that. The footy club has been unbelievably successful over the last 15 years, on and off the field … No matter what sport comes to the area, people come out and support it. I think it’ll be a huge boost for the area, but also I think the game will finally realise that Geelong is a fair dinkum place for cricket.”And perhaps this is just the start for Geelong – and regional Australia in general. The venue has a pair of useful allies in the chief executive James Sutherland, a Geelong Cats supporter, while the current chief of the Kardinia Park Trust is Sutherland’s former second-in-command Michael Brown. The BBL will be expanded next summer to include an extra eight games, some of which are likely to be played outside the capital cities. Finch, who captains the Renegades, said he was looking forward to the prospect of Geelong potentially hosting a BBL match next year – and maybe even having its own side further down the track.James Sutherland, the Cricket Australia chief executive, also has a long association with Geelong•ICC”We played a Renegades v Stars practice game the year before last, and we got 12,000 people to a practice game – when only half the stands were available, because they were in the renovation stage,” he said. “To me that just goes to show that the people are going to come and support the best of whatever you provide … I can guarantee you’re packing out Simonds Stadium, every game.”You see Sheffield Shield games get taken to regional areas more than anything else. I think with the way the landscape of cricket is changing, you see how many kids and families and women are coming to the game now and are new to cricket … if you took a Big Bash game to Geelong, or to Wollongong or somewhere like that, I think you’d find the results would be enormous.”For the time being, Finch is thrilled to be the first man to captain Australia in an international match in Geelong. Although he now lives in Melbourne, he has never changed clubs, believing that he should give back to the Geelong club that gave him his start in elite cricket all those years ago.And after being dropped from the ODI side in December, then recalled and made stand-in captain during the recent Chappell-Hadlee Series, Finch is just happy to be part of the national side. To be axed at the age of 30 leads naturally to self-doubt and wondering if your days as an international cricketer are over.”That is the first thing that goes through your mind – when Trevor Hohns called me and said ‘we’re not picking you in this squad’, I actually couldn’t disagree with him,” Finch said of being dropped in December. “I hadn’t made many runs, so it was hard to see yourself getting back in there, especially when guys have been performing so well. Then a bit of luck goes your way and you end up captaining the side a couple of weeks later.”And now, he captains a T20 outfit missing Smith, Warner, Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Glenn Maxwell, among others, with the first Test in India due to begin the day after the final T20 in Adelaide. In their place are the likes of Ben Dunk, Michael Klinger, Ashton Turner, Tim Paine and Jhye Richardson.”It’s going to be interesting, I can’t remember it happening in the past,” Finch said. “The squad that’s been picked in the T20s is still a fantastic squad. Any time that you take Warner, Smith, Starc, Maxwell, Hazlewood out of an Australian XI, it’s always going to hurt slightly because they’re some of the best in the world.”But then you look at the guys who have been picked and it’s hard not to see how they’ll be very successful as well. They’re coming off great Big Bash tournaments, which in my opinion is the toughest T20 competition to be successful in around the world, because the quality of cricket is exceptional.”

There will be challenges ahead as Joe Root takes on the England Test captaincy but he has the temperament and drive to succeed

George Dobell13-Feb-20170:51

Will Root follow suit?

It doesn’t seem long since a baby-faced Joe Root first strode into the glare of international cricket.It doesn’t seem long since those first press conferences when, consumed by nerves, he blushed and blustered, or since Graeme Swann compared him to an “annoying little brother”. It really isn’t very long (it was at the end of the 2015 Ashes) since he couldn’t control a fit of giggles when construing a double-entendre out of an innocent question about Stuart Broad’s immaculate length.But while he retains (lucky fellow) the fresh-faced look of a student who might still be asked for their ID in a bar, he has matured greatly in recent years and was the only realistic option for the vacancy of Test captain.That is not to damn him with faint praise. It is to acknowledge that he has developed into an obvious leader for this young side. To acknowledge that he has, for a while, been England’s best all-format batsman – might he be the best they have ever had in all three formats? – and that he has become a senior player, a vice-captain and a father.He has retained a sense of fun – quite right, too, for it will help him maintain perspective on the days he is told he is a hero or a fool – but demonstrated a work ethic and hunger for success that has taken him, albeit briefly, to the very top of the Test batting rankings. Yes, by England standards, he is a young captain at 26 (Mike Atherton was 25), but the average age of an RAF pilot in 1940 was 20 and they managed rather well.His challenges? He does not have, as Andrew Strauss and, for a while, Alastair Cook had, a top-class spinner on whom he can rely to give him control in the field. Until he does, success in Asia looks unlikely.The time is looming, too, when England will have to look beyond James Anderson. Both Root’s predecessors have been able to rely upon Anderson’s control and skill for the bulk of their careers. It is no coincidence that he and Swann played defining roles in the Ashes success of 2010-11 and the India success of 2012. Such players are not easily replaced.

The Root era promises the boldness of youth, the aggression of players brought up on T20 and encouraged to embrace their aggression. It promises likeability and entertainment

But Root’s most formidable opponent is perhaps England’s own schedule. By expecting the team to play almost all year, to be away from home for more than six months at a time (if that sounds like hyperbole, check their schedule for the winter of 2017-18), England are asking a huge amount of those involved in all formats. For a young father with a history of back trouble, there must be dangers of burnout and exhaustion. Root will require careful management if he is to remain as productive as he might be into his 30s.He inherits some tremendous assets, too. The reputations of Mike Brearley and Michael Vaughan as leaders were built, to a large part, on the presence of top allrounders in their side (Ian Botham and Andrew Flintoff at his best, respectively) and in Ben Stokes, Root has one to rival them. Indeed, his side is bursting with allrounders, which provides depth with bat and ball.He also has, in Stuart Broad, a highly experienced attack leader who offers some security for LAA (life after Anderson), a middle-order that will relish his positive approach and a couple of promising players at the top of the order that have hinted – it is probably premature to claim more than that – they can solve the problems England have had there since the decline of Strauss.It may well be that he proves a more natural fit with Trevor Bayliss, too. While Bayliss’ aggression sometimes jarred with Cook’s caution – most notably in England’s attempts to bat for a draw in Vizakhapatnam – Root would seem to be of similarly positive mindset. Whether Test cricket really can be mastered with such an outlook remains to be seen, but it promises to be a lot of fun finding out. England look as if they are all on the same page now and an England side run by Root, Bayliss and Stokes promises very few dull moments.The appointment of Stokes as vice-captain is arguably more revealing than the appointment of Root. England had other options for the vice-captaincy, including not appointing one at all. To give it to 25-year-old Stokes suggests they want the team to take on more of his traits: the aggression; the fight; the courage to trust to talent and respond to every punch with an even stronger counter-punch.It’s an appointment that makes a lot of sense, too. Stokes has expressed little enthusiasm for captaincy – he joked that captains had to be “boring like Cooky” when asked about it in India – but has the talent and force of personality that inspires. Like Cook and Broad and Anderson, he will prove a willing lieutenant to Root. There is no sign of unrest in Root’s dressing room; some of his predecessors would have killed (a team-mate) for such harmony.This is an era that promises the boldness of youth, the aggression of players brought up on T20 and encouraged to embrace their aggression. At a time when cricket in England is fighting for oxygen, it promises likeability and entertainment. These things may never have mattered more.Joe Root has been England’s most consistent batsman over the last few years•AFPThere is conflicting evidence for the effects of captaincy on an individual’s batting. Cook, for example, made seven centuries in his first 11 Tests as captain (the first two as stand-in), while Steven Smith and Virat Kohli also appear to have taken to it with relish. Realistically, it seems the danger comes more from the long-term effects. Cook only made five more centuries in his final 48 Tests as captain; Root will need greater returns from him now.His lack of captaincy experience – just four first-class games – is not ideal but it is a symptom of modernity. It is better, surely, that his ability as a batsman has kept him in the Test side almost constantly (he was dropped at the end of the 2013-14 Ashes) and that, unlike many predecessors, he should rarely be under pressure to justify his place as a batsman. For all the praise Brearley warrants as a captain, there is no chance he would win selection in this day and age. Besides, as Strauss said last week “playing in the middle and understanding the demands is more important than captaincy”.To be judged a success Root will probably have to lead England to the top of the rankings, win the Test Championship (if and when it is launched) and, most of all, keep beating Australia. But he won’t be able to do it on his own: he will need county cricket to deliver him the players; the selectors to remain consistent; the coaches to help him create an environment which is at the same time relaxed and hardworking. And he’ll need a supply of bowlers who can remain fit, gain lateral movement and bowl with control and pace. He will, in short, be reliant on many other cogs in the wheel if he is to prove a success.But if he can retain the sense of fun that has characterised the best of England cricket in recent times, if he can retain the drive that has seen him and Stokes graduate from promising to excellent, if he can keep his back from seizing up and coax the best from his talented team, he has a great opportunity to build something quite exciting. It’s a huge, demanding job without any guarantees of success, but Root is the right man for it.

ESPNcricinfo previews Nottinghamshire’s prospects for the 2017 season

George Dobell02-Apr-2017Last season:

In: Ben Kitt, Billy Root, Jack Blatherwick
Out: Will Gidman (Kent), James Taylor (retired), Sam Wood (released)
Overseas: Daniel Christian (Aus, T20), Ish Sodhi (NZ, T20), James Pattinson (Aus, April-June)2016 in a nutshell
Bitterly disappointing. Perhaps unsettled by the trauma of James Taylor’s illness in the opening days of the season, Nottinghamshire underperformed dramatically as they finished bottom of Division One in the Championship and failed to progress from the group stages in the Royal London Cup. While their T20 campaign contained much to admire, they were eventually undone at the semi-final stage by a Ben Duckett-inspired Northants. It was, in general, the batting that let Notts down. They failed to win a Championship match after April 13 – the first game of the season – and no other side in either division suffered as many as their nine losses. It wasn’t all grim: Jake Ball, with an immaculate length and a yard of extra pace, bowled as well as anyone in the country and both Steven Mullaney and Harry Gurney enjoyed decent seasons, but for a squad as talented as this to find themselves at the bottom of the table could only be considered a significant underachievement. Mick Newell, coach since 2002, announced he would cede first-team responsibility to Peter Moores and move into the more strategic director of cricket role.2017 prospects
Anything less than promotion must be considered unacceptable. An attack that will, for a few weeks at the start of the season, include Stuart Broad, Ball and James Pattinson (who replaces the injured Peter Siddle as overseas player until the end of June) and a batting line-up set to be boosted by the return of Alex Hales (now in the middle order) for much of the season really should be strong enough to dominate in Division Two. A few senior batsmen, notably Michael Lumb, have something of a point to prove after modest 2016 campaigns and, with the likes of Billy Root and Tom Moores pushing for more opportunity, it might prove to be a season of transition for the top order. Ben Kitt and Jack Blatherwick are young seamers with pace and time on their side.In charge
The evidence of Moores’ approach is already apparent in a squad that looks noticeably fitter than it has for some time. While Moores was a batting consultant last year – and it was the batting that let Notts down – this is the first season in which he has had the opportunity to create his own team environment. Luke Fletcher and Brendan Taylor have both shed significant amounts of weight and, under the guidance of physio James Pipe (the former keeper who has joined from Derbyshire), the squad have been working to improve their fielding – throwing, in particular – which, judged by the highest standards, has been modest in recent years. Paul Franks is the new assistant coach, with Ant Botha having joined primarily to look after the 2nd XI. Chris Read, in his final season, has been persuaded by Moores to continue as club captain, though it is anticipated that Dan Christian will lead in T20.Key player
Top-order batting at Trent Bridge has been demanding for several years. But Mullaney was good enough to make 1000 Championship runs in the top division last year and will have a valuable role to play if Notts are to win promotion this year. While he might lack the England pedigree of some of his colleagues, he has the technique to cope with the new ball, can contribute with bat and ball in limited-overs cricket and drives as pleasingly as anyone in the county game. If Notts’ middle-order are to prosper, they will rely on the solid starts provided by Mullaney.Bright young thing
Luke Wood hardly played last year and may struggle to find a place this season. But he is a gifted left-arm swing bowler who, aged only 21, could make rapid strides in the game if he can force his way into a side blessed with outstanding seam bowling depth. He can bat, too. Jake Libby, a batsman who bowls offspin, is another worth watching. He has enjoyed a good pre-season in Barbados and is one who could solve Notts’ problem at the top of the order.ESPNcricinfo verdict
A squad as talented as this should never have found itself in Division Two and shouldn’t stay there for long. There will be disruption caused by England calls, but Notts have the depth to cope better than most. Strong favourites for promotion and likely to prove dangerous in the white-ball formats.Bet365 odds: Specsavers Championship: 7-4; NatWest Blast: 8-1; Royal London Cup: 12-1

It has evolved at a crazy pace in the last few years, but comparing it to the men’s game, which has been professional for hundreds of years, is pointless

Jarrod Kimber22-Jul-2017Ashleigh Gardner has come in to bat at No. 8, faces her first ball of the match, the 25th of her career, and clips it so sweetly it almost hums as it clears the deep backward square fence. It’s an incredible moment of cricket, like a dream, and it is where the women’s game is right now.The reason Gardner had to smash the first ball she faced is because Australia had got behind the rate. England had hustled well in the field, they had bowled very straight, and after Meg Lanning’s wicket, they managed to shut Australia down.Ellyse Perry and Elyse Villani were batting together in the last Powerplay. Perry had been struggling to get the ball away, but was on the way to another half-century; Villani was new to the crease and it was her facing the first nine balls of the Powerplay, scoring from only the ninth. There are no plays and misses, no savage turn or hooping swing; there is even a full toss. But Villani just can’t get the ball away. Perry doesn’t fare much better, and they end up with only 16 runs from their Powerplay.The six and the dot balls, the story of women’s cricket.

****

Most of us have grown up on men’s cricket. Our notion of what cricket is could only ever be based on the majority of the cricket we watch, and the era in which we grew up. If you grew up in the ’70s, ’80s or ’90s, women’s cricket wasn’t part of the cricket you watched. You might have seen tiny bits, years apart, but it wasn’t much, and it wouldn’t have been implanted in your brain the way other cricket was.And there are people who, because of their age, or cricket dogma, don’t think T20 cricket is proper cricket. Hell, there are a few who still don’t think ODI cricket is. Women’s cricket is another sometimes seen that way. But it being in this company is also apt, because women’s cricket is as alien to the men’s game as ODI cricket is to a Test match. It’s a different format, still obviously cricket, but its own brand, with its own rules and kinks.And we can’t help but compare things; it’s what we do in cricket all the time. But as Kartikeya Date has written, comparing the women’s games to the men’s is silly. There are many reasons, one of which is the slowness of evolution of the women’s game. Men have been paid to play cricket since the 1700s; the women briefly had a professional competition in the late 1800s (before the men who ran it stole all the money) and then became professionals again a few years ago.The worst thing about the comparison stuff is that most of the talk about what the women’s game is really centres on what it isn’t. What it is may be the most fascinating part.With more fielders in the inner circle, batsmen are under more pressure to go for the boundaries•Getty/ICCWhen Pakistan faced up against England, we had two horribly mismatched sides. On paper, England had lost their last match, against India, and Pakistan had lost to South Africa, but in reality, the Pakistan women’s team is still years from being a top-flight women’s team who turn up with a chance of winning the tournament. Five teams looked like they could get into the semi-finals, maybe six if you trusted West Indies’ T20 form over their ODI form. Pakistan were not one of them, and despite almost causing an upset over South Africa, they were not supposed to cause England problems.So here you have the seventh-ranked side in women’s ODI cricket, a team that until the previous game had never scored over 200 in a World Cup game, playing one of the favourites, who were keen to atone for a first-match loss, at home. And regularly in the first few overs, the Pakistan women had eight fielders inside the ring. Pakistan have six women whose job it is to stop singles, and two slips. At the crease is no dud: Sarah Taylor, who even with her recent troubles is still one of the best, and quickest, scorers in world cricket. With the smaller ring, and the extra fielder, it’s an entirely different environment – it’s intense dot balls, followed by regular boundaries.The dot balls do pile up. Even one extra fielder in the circle changes things. In ODIs since the start of 2015, men have scored 48.3% of their runs in boundaries, and the women are only two points behind, on 46%. What the women don’t do is make as many runs overall. There are only three women’s teams that average over 250 runs per first innings. (At the Champions Trophy all eight teams averaged more than 250.)There is also another knock-on effect from the extra fielder; women get run out a lot: 11.5% of their dismissals are from run-outs (even more than lbws); that is way more than the men’s 6.7%. This is a big part of the game, and in the second game of the tournament, India ran out four England batsmen. It was the second run-out that showed the world how far India had come, when Deepti Sharma received a ball at point, turned and knocked down the stumps.That run-out was only one of many incredibly athletic fielding displays in this tournament. The fielding athleticism is the most striking improvement in women’s cricket. When Pakistan hit the ball into the outfield against South Africa, they instantly decided on two runs. And there was a time, not even that long ago, when in women’s cricket it would have easily been completed. But Shabnim Ismail, the self-proclaimed fastest bowler, was out at deep cover. And as she put it, she didn’t have to run that fast because she knows what a powerful arm she has.How do the sixth-ranked South Africa have four quality seamers in their attack?•IDI/Getty ImagesThe athleticism, smaller ring, and extra fielder in the circle certainly contribute to the extra run-outs, but there are other aspects to it. Perhaps the most striking thing is how many of the women seem to lack the kind of match awareness you’d expect of cricketers who are at the top of their sport.It’s not a lack of talent; it’s a lack of time in the middle. Kainat Imtiaz bowls huge hooping outswingers from close to the stumps. What she doesn’t do is try for straight balls, bowl cross-seam or bowl wide of the crease. The talent is often there, but it’s raw.The women have not played enough, and mostly they have not played enough under huge amounts of pressure. Most women’s games are not televised – they are barely attended, and there is virtually no press there to dissect them. The women go from games in front of family and friends to games in front of huge TV audiences. It’s not an easy adjustment.South Africa made the semi-final despite 18% of their dismissals being run-outs. West Indies won the World T20 last year and were bowled out for 48 (which took 6.2 overs to chase). And the bowling is still a long way from the standard it should be at the top level.There are too many doorknob spinners delivering naked pies on slow pitches, and while spin is being successful, it’s hardly the sort of quality spin that excites or inspires. There is a genuine lack of proper seam bowling in the game – bowlers who can run in and hit the top of off with a probing delivery. The leading wicket-taker at this tournament was South Africa captain Dane van Niekerk, who ended with 15 wickets at 10, going at 3.46 an over from her legspin, while also questioning how well she had bowled the entire time.It is also possible that the batting has moved beyond the bowling. That happens in cricket all the time. In Mithali Raj, Taylor and Lanning we have three all-time greats. Lizelle Lee, Nat Sciver, Harmanpreet Kaur and Deandra Dottin are all in the list of best hitters ever in the game. That doesn’t account for older stars like Suzie Bates or younger ones like Hayley Matthews. The batting is incredible.And maybe the future of bowling can be seen in van Niekerk’s team, four seamers, all of whom bowl a decent pace or move it: Marizanne Kapp has a textbook action; Moseline Daniels bowls left-arm swing; Ayabonga Khaka is tenacious; and Ismail is wild. How is it a team that is ranked only sixth in the world coming into this tournament can have four seamers of this quality?Bold and aggressive batting has led the advancement of women’s cricket. Here, Nat Sciver plays an innovative shot, now nicknamed the Nat-meg?•Getty ImagesThe truth is, it isn’t just South Africa improving, it’s everyone. Almost every single question about how a team had improved in this tournament was met by a player or coach saying that everyone had improved. England coach Mark Robinson has not yet been in women’s cricket two years, and even he could barely believe the improvement of the teams in that short period.There are a lot of dot balls, too many run-outs, and on occasion, some filth bowled, but there are also teenage girls hitting sixes off their first ball, a bowling attack with four genuine seamers, and by far the best collection of batting that has existed. Women’s cricket right now is claustrophobic cricket that is evolving quicker than any other format. And it is one other thing: the best it has ever been.

****

Jhulan Goswami looks like a giant compared to her mid-on and -off. Her hair is blowing everywhere in the wind. She looks up and in front of her is Lanning. Goswami is not new to the game; she’s been around for years, a true lionheart for the Indian team. But she is bowling to the evolution of the modern game.Lanning is a professional, has power and timing, can hit sixes, bats long innings, places the ball to every part of the ground, runs hard, and has one of the best support systems in the game behind her.Lanning and her ilk have owned this tournament. Laura Wolvaardt has made graceful runs. Smriti Mandhana opened the tournament with a bang. There were Lee’s huge hits, Taylor’s comeback knock, Sciver’s two brutal hundreds, Kaur’s day of destruction, and the once-in-a-lifetime knock of Chamari Atapattu. All have all been brilliant. It has been the batting, along with few close games and qualification for the finals right until the end that have made this a great tournament.Almost all the players who have starred in this tournament have got into professional, or at least organised systems, early in their life.Goswami is 34, and it wasn’t until a few weeks ago that she ever played in an Indian side with a full-time fielding coach. But here she is, a legend largely of her own making, steaming in to deliver a ball that beats Lanning for pace, beats her off the pitch, just beats her and takes off stump.There are some who think that to fix women’s cricket we need to shorten the pitch, and yet here is one of the last champion amateurs, blasting through one of the greatest players in the history of the game. If the women’s game can invent someone like this from outside their brave new world, what will it be able to unearth from their professional revolution?When Goswami started playing, being a professional wasn’t even a real dream. Playing every game of World Cup broadcast in India was unheard of. And no one expected India to be a force in the game. Her ball to Lanning is an incredible moment of cricket, and it isn’t a dream, it is also where the women’s game is right now.