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Asian Voice - Saturday 14th July 2012
Kevin Pietersen ponders one-day return
Kevin Pietersen has said there is still a chance he could play 'white ball' cricket for England again despite retiring from limited overs internationals. However, the South Africa-born batsman -who remains a Test cricketer - said it would need a drastic change to England's packed schedule for him to consider a return to one-day and Twenty20 matches for his adopted country. "I've had my wife, mother, dad, mother-inlaw, brothers and my best mates all saying to me 'don't you wish you were out there batting against Australia (in the on-going one-day series)?' Pietersen said "And I've said to them I haven't missed it at all. But maybe all I needed was a break. Who knows? I've played a lot of cricket in the last seven years." Asked if he would reconsider his retirement from international cricket's two shortest formats, the 32year-old said: "Never say never. I'm a lot older and more mature than a few years
ago, so you never know. "Anything can happen. I'll never say no, but the schedule would have to be a hell of a lot different for me to come back. Wait and see. "Pietersen, one of the undoubted 'box-office' stars of world cricket, called time on his international limited overs career when the England management denied him his wish to carry on playing Twenty20s while quitting 50 overs per side one-dayers. They said he had to make himself available for both formats amidst concerns that, otherwise, the 50-over side would be weakened by several players following
No plans to retire from ODIs: Sachin Tendulkar He might be skipping ODIs with regularity but Sachin Tendulkar says he does not plan to quit the format altogether just yet and will continue as long as he enjoys the game. Tendulkar, who has played just two ODI series after the World Cup last year, most recently opted out of the tour of Sri Lanka later this month, fuelling speculation about his future in the format. But the 39-year-old star batsman insisted that he rarely gets affected by what is speculated about him. "It's not what XYZ think, it's what I feel and I feel as long as I am enjoying and I feel like being part of it, I'll continue (playing ODIs)," he said. "I felt I shouldn't be part of the Twenty20 squad in 2007 and I had been asked (to
stay on) but I felt I should not be part of Twenty 20 squad because the team did well. When I get that feeling in oneday cricket may be I would take that decision," he said. Tendulkar said he decided to opt out of Sri Lanka tour as he wanted to spend time with his children. "I just wanted to spend time with my family, as simple as that. I spoke to the BCCI and requested them. To be able to spend time with my children is also important. "Because once we go back they will go to their schools then you won't get quality time which any family man expects from his family and that is something which will keep me going for next 10 months," he said.
Pietersen's lead. Pietersen, man of the tournament when England won the World Twenty20 in the Caribbean two years ago, still harbours hopes of helping the side defend their title in Sri Lanka in September. "I still hope there might be a compromise for the World Twenty20 in Sri Lanka," he said. "The squad hasn't been announced. "I would love to play in that and defend our title with England. If it happens, great, but I'm not holding my breath." England's geography means that, uniquely among cricket countries, they are guaranteed a near year-long programme of international cricket. However, Pietersen's critics insist he could have kept playing for England in all three major formats and still have given himself a break if he'd opted out of the lucrative Twenty20 Indian Premier League. But Pietersen said expecting him, or other world stars, to miss the IPL was unrealistic and that his partic-
ipation wasn't simply a matter of cash. "Okay, the ECB (England and Wales Cricket Board) may say me playing in the IPL makes it hard to rest me but what annoys me is that, with every other board the IPL is a matter of fact. It's not going away," he said. "It's going to be there and players want to play in it. Players want to go and earn their money and unless you let them decisions will have to be made."Big players want to play in front of big audiences. You want to hear your name chanted by 50,000 people. It's amazing. It makes you feel so good. "The window for that has been created by the other boards but unfortunately not ours." England have so far coped well without Pietersen and lead Australia 3-0 in a five-match one-day series ahead of Tuesday's finale at Old Trafford. In particular Ian Bell, since being recalled to the one-day side in Pietersen's place as an opener, has scored 364 runs in five innings at an impressive average of 72.8.
Virender Sehwag, Zaheer Khan selected for Lanka tour India opener Virender Sehwag and pace spearhead Zaheer Khan returned to a 15-member Indian cricket squad even as senior batsman Sachin Tendulkar decided to skip the limited overs tour of Sri Lanka starting on July 21. Sehwag, Zaheer, along with young pacer Umesh Yadav, had sat out of the Asia Cup in Bangladesh in March due to fitness issues. Tendulkar, who has played only two ODI series since 2011 World Cup and is now a Rajya Sabha MP, made himself unavailable for selection for the Lanka tour which will have five ODIs and a Twenty20 international. Young Mumbai batsman Ajinkya Rahane has replaced Tendulkar in the side. The other change from the Asia Cup side is the inclusion of left-arm spinner Pragyan
Ojha in place of out-of-form all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja. The committee, which picked the squad, also decided to include Umesh at the expense of Praveen Kumar. "We have the best available team. Sachin is not available. I think it is a very good side which has very strong batting line-up and good bowlers and we are confident that it will do well in Sri Lanka," chairman of selection committee Krishnamachari Srikkanth told reporters after announcing the squad. There was no place for feisty off-spinner Harbhajan Singh, who endured indifferent form during the IPL and has now signed up with English county side Essex, as the selectors continued to ignore him while Rahul Sharma was retained in the side.
Tests may be in danger in 10 years: Rahul Dravid Rahul Dravid cautioned that Test cricket will face a stiff survival challenge in a decade's time since children, who are growing up now, may then prefer easy bucks in Twenty20 format over the traditional form of the game. "I think today's youngsters like Rohit Sharma, Suresh Raina, Manoj Tiwary have grown up watching and idealising the Test cricket. It's (about) kids of my son's age, who have grown up watching T20 and IPL, and what those kids want, will be the challenge in 10 years' time," said Dravid at a book launch function that had taken place last week. "I don't see that as an immediate problem, I see it as a longterm issue. That challenge is going to arise in 10 years' time and we need to address that problem right now," said the batsman who was the proverbial rock at no.3 for India in Tests for more than a decade and a half.
Dravid, who holds the record for second highest runs scored in Test matches, said while the cash-rich Indian Premier League (IPL) provides the opportunity for players to earn big bucks, the children growing up with the game should be told that the real satisfaction comes by playing Test cricket around the world. "I had gone through a Commerce degree and not very successfully. So I knew that the only option
for me was to be a successful Test cricketer at that stage. Today the options are a lot more. People have the option of not playing Test cricket but still making money out of the game. Who is to blame kids for taking that option? I won't judge them on that. "I want to tell kids that the greatest satisfaction you are going to get is by playing Test cricket across these wonderful stadiums in the world. So don't sell yourself short," the former Indian skipper said. Dravid, who took over the reins of the national side when Greg Chappell was the coach, said he always had felt in command of the team contrary to the general belief that it was the controversial Aussie who ran the show. "It was always my team. There is no doubt about that. Because Greg was a strong personality and because he himself was a great cricketer, because of the fanfare and publicity at times
it could come across as it was his team," said Dravid about a tumultuous phase in Indian cricket. "He (Chappell) can polarise a team with his strong personality. But I always thought it was my team. I never felt that he took a hard position when I wanted to do things differently," said the man nicknamed "The Wall". Dravid conceded that while he took up the leadership role with enthusiasm over the years he started to see it as a burden probably because of excess cricket combined with bad results, like India's early exit in the 2007 World Cup, and that forced him to quit the highprofile job. "I took it up (captaincy) with enthusiasm, energy, passion and desire to do it. I felt at the stage when I gave it up that somehow over the period, it (desire) had gone, maybe because we played too much cricket then or some of the bad results we had.
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Action at a Glance BCCI to nominate Dravid for Khel Ratna, Yuvraj for Arjuna
The cricket board has decided to recommend recently retired stalwart Rahul Dravid for the prestigious Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna award and Yuvraj Singh, the player of the World Cup, for the Arjuna Award. "We will be forwarding the names of Dravid for Khel Ratna and Yuvraj Singh for the Arjuna Award next week (to the government)," BCCI's CAO Prof Ratnakar Shetty said. The government had recently extended the deadline for the nominations till July 20. The 39-year-old Dravid retired from all forms of the game at the international level following the Test series in Australia last year after having accumulated over 23,000 runs in Tests and ODIs combined since making a spectacular debut at Lord's in 1996. If awarded the highest sports award in the country that was instituted in 199192, former India captain Dravid would follow the footsteps of his illustrious ex-teammates Sachin Tendulkar (1997-98) and Mahendra Singh Dhoni (2007-08) as the third cricketer to win the coveted award.
56 foreign players in Sri Lanka Premier League
The inaugural Sri Lanka Premier League will feature 56 foreign cricketers, not one of them Indian, after the seven franchises made their choices in a closed-door players' draft system. Australia, with 18, provided the most players for the franchises with 13 Pakistani players being the next highest. Not a single English or Indian player figures in the lists. The non participation of Indian players in last year's inaugural SLPL had forced the cancellation of the event. The foreign players to participate in the SLPL: Uthura: Shakib Al Hasan, Brendan Taylor, Kevon Cooper, Imran Farhat, Fidel Edwards, David Miller, Dillon du Preez, Samuel Badree. Nagenahira: Mitchell Marsh, Imran Nazir, Travis Birt, Ahmed Shahzad, Ben Laughlin, Elias Sunny, Mushfiqur Rahim, Nasir Hossain. Ruhuna: Shahid Afridi, Daniel Harris, Ryan Harris, Aaron Finch, Jerome Taylor, Nathan McCullum, Ryan McLaren, Richard Levi. Wayamba: Azhar Mahmood, Umar Akmal, Tamim Iqbal, Colin Ingram, Kemar Roach, James Faulkner, Abdul Razzaq, Brad Hogg. Kandurata: Saeed Ajmal, Misbah-ul-Haq, Sohail Tanvir, Chris Lynn, Dane Vilas, Albie Morkel, Johan Botha, Adam Voges. Basnahira: Brad Hodge, Marlon Samuels, Daniel Smith, Dirk Nannes, Robin Peterson, Tim Southee, Clint McKay, Cameron Borgas. Uva: Andrew McDonald, Umar Gul, Shoaib Malik, Callum Ferguson, James Franklin, Abdur Rehman, Hammad Azam, Chris Gayle.
Azarenka reclaims world number one spot
Belarusian Victoria Azarenka returned to the world number one spot in tennis in the latest rankings released on Monday thanks to American Serena Williams' victory over Poland's Agnieszka Radwanska in the Wimbledon final. WTA Rankings: Radwanska needed to win Saturday's final to take the world number one ranking but had to settle for a move up from third to second. Australian Open champion A z a r e n k a reclaims the ranking that she lost to Maria Sharapova after the Russian's French Open success last month. Sharapova's fourth round defeat in Wimbledon meant she would lose her number one ranking to either Azarenka or Radwanska. Williams moves up two places to fourth after winning a fifth title at the All England club.