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Mathew Sinclair has been named as Michael Papps’s replacement in New Zealand’s Test squad which is currently in Bangladesh. Papps dislocated his shoulder during a training session at Lincoln, an injury that will keep him out of action for four to six weeks.While it has yet to be determined whether Sinclair will open the innings or bat at No. 3, it is an overdue opportunity for him to re-stake his claim in the New Zealand side. He has been on the fringes far too long for a player with his run-scoring potential. He has had random chances in recent times to establish a more permanent place, but has not enjoyed the consistency of selection that others in the side have been given.The only player in the New Zealand Test squad to have scored two Test double-centuries, Sinclair had been told that he had matters of technique to sort out before earning more opportunities at the highest level. As a result he sought top-flight assistance with Glenn Turner, the former national captain and coach. Yet, too often those who have been preferred to Sinclair have been guilty of squandering their opportunities, and somehow managing to survive the selectorial axe.In naming the Test side for Bangladesh, Craig McMillan was left out, although he was still named in the one-day squad that was announced today. McMillan, Sinclair, Lou Vincent and Scott Styris have been the most obvious contenders for the two middle-order spaces available when Mark Richardson, Stephen Fleming and Nathan Astle have been included.Vincent, who scored a Test century on debut, like Sinclair and Styris, has also been sent away to work on his game, and is yet to convince those in control that he is worth calling back. The situation of having players who can be put under pressure in this area of the game is uncommon in New Zealand cricket history, and is the result of intensified development work to create this very problem.Sinclair has an outstanding opportunity, especially before the tour of Australia, to make the most of his chance and to keep the pressure on McMillan. Aiding his cause was his selection as the player of the series after New Zealand A’s tour to South Africa. With cricket of a highly competitive level to bank on, Sinclair has it all in front of him, and the battle for places in the side promises to be one of the more appealing contests in New Zealand this summer.Another prospect was thrown into the mix today, albeit in a one-day sense, with the inclusion of yet another middle-order contender in Peter Fulton, the Canterbury Country left-hand batsman. He has made a significant impact on the domestic scene, and is the most recent New Zealander to have scored a first-class triple-century. Another tall player, he stands just short of two metres (6ft 6ins), so he can lookJacob Oram in the eye.

Fulton, like Sinclair, had a promising tour of South Africa, and was probably the most consistent of the New Zealand A batsmen, without ever cracking the sort of big score that Sinclair managed. But after injuring his shoulder in the last four-day match, he was rested from the first two one-dayers, only to return and top-score with 98 in New Zealand A’s thrilling attempt at chasing 297 in the third and final game. In the end the South Africans won by just four runs.Fulton said today that, like most players, reaching the international stage had been his goal and he was very excited to learn that he had been included in the side. He said he had thoroughly enjoyed the A system that New Zealand has embraced this year, with a series against Sri Lanka A earlier in the year being followed by the trip to South Africa, from which the players only returned home yesterday.”It’s good to play this standard of cricket, and I feel pretty well prepared. South Africa A were a really strong team, and it was the strongest standard of cricket that I have played,” said Fulton. “Hopefully, I will get a game or two over there but I am taking nothing for granted, I just want to make the most of it.”Fulton spent most of the New Zealand winter in England, playing forLowerhouse in the Lancashire League, and helped them to win the Worsley Cup. It was the first time in their 140-year history that Lowerhouse had won anything.”It was quite odd playing a club game and having 3000 people there when we won the final,” said Fulton, who scored around 1100 runs and took 60 wickets in regular club matches and one-day games during the season.The other feature of the one-day selection was the recall of Andre Adams, who impressed with the level of vitality that had returned to his game after experience with Essex in the County Championship this year.As expected, Stephen Fleming was not included in the one-day side, and along with Jacob Oram, will be rested in preparation for the tour of Australia that follows the Bangladesh trip. Daniel Vettori will captain New Zealand’s one-day outfit in his absence. John Bracewell, the coach, explained that the selectors were looking to broaden the captaincy experience available in the side, especially now that Chris Cairns is unavailable for Test selection.

Virender Sehwag lit up the opening day of India’s first Test match in Pakistan for almost 15 years, and afterwards expressed a desire to go on tomorrow morning and become the first Indian to score a triple-century. He also surprised many by saying that he would still prefer to bat in the middle order if there was a vacant slot."It’s my best innings in Test cricket," he said of his 228 not out, refreshingly devoid of doubt at the end of a day of exhilarating batting. "And I would definitely like to go for 300 tomorrow."Sehwag was candid in his assessment of the pitch, saying that it was loaded in the batsmen’s favour, but adding, "You still have to apply yourself to make runs."After a blistering start to the one-day series at Karachi, Sehwag did little of note in the remaining four games. But he said that Test cricket was perfectly suited to his brand of batting. "In one-day cricket, you have to try and play a lot of shots in the first 15 overs. In Tests, you can wait for the loose balls, and it’s easier to hit boundaries." Pakistan learnt that the hard way, conceding a whopping 30 fours and five sixes to him.He added 183 with Sachin Tendulkar, whose contribution to the partnership was a subdued 60, and said that having his hero at the other end had been a big help. "Whenever I made a mistake or played a false shot, he would tell me from the non-striker’s end to just stick around and wait for the loose balls."Sehwag insisted that there were no nerves when he was on 199 for ten deliveries. "I was just waiting for the loose ball," he said, before adding that it was vitally important that he carried on rather than giving it away."At Melbourne [he made a dazzling 195 in five hours on Boxing Day], I got out and the team struggled afterwards," he said. "I knew that if I stayed not out today, it would benefit the side much more."When asked what words he had exchanged with Shoaib Akhtar, he smiled and said, "Nothing much, it was just banter." Shoaib, who went wicketless in 18 overs today, clearly didn’t see the funny side.Sehwag dedicated his innings to his parents and bride-to-be, adding that the innings was even more valuable given that it was India’s first match here in such a long time. "There are four days left," he said, "and if we play well tomorrow, we can win the game." A couple more hours of controlled mayhem will go a long way towards bringing that about.

FANTASTIC!I withhold my right of reply to the reaction to the question I posed for a couple of weeks. It was fantastic to see Zim make the Super Sixes, and I think talk of anything else would detract from that.Assuming the reasonable happens, and Aus and India win their next three games, and Zim beat Kenya, then all (sic) we have to do is beat either SL or NZ for a crack, probably at India, in the semis. Form goes out of the window in knockouts, and Zim have a real chance to make history. How I wish we had Campbell (I’ll eat humble pie) and Evans there!Phil Garland (Australia)TRAVIS FRIENDI’ve been watching the World Cup, and cannot work out why Travis Friend hasn’t been playing for Zimbabwe – he really impressed me after breaking into the side at a young age.What has happened to him?Rod Ward (Australia)Reply: I haven’t been able to ask about this but my feeling is that his bowling is not accurate enough and better bowlers are fit (at present!)CONGRATULATIONSIt’s my pleasure to congratulate your lads on your job well done. Even though I live in the United Kingdom you make me proud to walk around London streets with our flag as a proud Zimbabwean. It’s a shame about our match with England because I was looking forward to that match. Anyway it’s part of politics which I am not part of, but my message to you is to keep the good work going, don’t let politics let you down and prove to the world that we are still the best country to live in.Mandie Mudavanhu (England)GOOD LUCKGood luck to the boys. Contrary to what most people think I still believe we will make it into the Super Sixes. We can beat both Kenya and Sri Lanka and if other results go as expected then we will make it.I am also just sick and tired of reading and watching English reporters report about how England were robbed of a place in the Super Sixes by not coming to Zim. In truth they didn’t come for political reasons, whilst the other five teams in the group had enough sense to leave politics out. Even though they forfeited, if they really were that good then they should have still qualified by beating all the other teams, but no they didn’t because they are just a mediocre team. Nothing special at all. We have stars like Heath Streak and Andy Flower, but who do England have? Nobody, everybody they had is past their prime.So to all those English fans and journalists moaning, just face the fact that we are in and you are OUT.Sibusiso Nkomani (Belgium)ENGLAND v ZIMBABWEWhen people talk about England not making the Super Six they say it’s because we didn’t play in Harare and therefore sacrificed four points.It may not be very patriotic of me to say so but I’m not convinced that England beating Zimbabwe was a foregone conclusion. England never seems to play consistently. Namibia gave them a scare but then they played well against Australia.It only needed Trescothick, Knight and Vaughan to be out cheaply, which did happen in some matches and then Andy and/or Grant Flower to have a good innings, backed up with reasonable scores from others, and Zimbabwe could easily have won.I agree you are not the force you were in ’99 but your appearance in the Super Six is not all down to fortuitous circumstances.And what a revelation Kenya have been!Beverly Treml (England)ZIMBABWE v KENYAI am gutted after Zimbabwe’s performance last night. They seemed disinterested and had not half the enthusiasm that Kenya had. I thought they had a real chance to get to the semis but that dream is no longer.I think the team needs an overhaul for future matches. I would like to think that Zimbabwe will improve in the future but I think the talent is a bit thin on the ground at the moment. The conditions they face daily in their homeland are obviously having an effect on the players and I can’t blame them. I would love to see my team getting back to playing with enthusiasm and having fun out there but, sadly, I think that is lacking at the minute.Michael Shepherd (Australia)HEATH STREAK – GENTLEMAN OF THE WORLD CUPMy wife and I are ardent supporters of cricket, and even more so of Kenya.We’d like to offer our condolences to the Zim team after yesterday’s game which saw Zimbabwe exit the World Cup. It’s always sad that someone has to come second in such games.However, we’d also like to say a warm thank you to Heath Streak for his comments at the awards ceremony after the game. He accepted defeat with grace and took the time to congratulate Kenya on their win. He came across as a good sportsman and a gentleman.This was in stark contrast to the mutterings of certain other captains either defeated or almost defeated recently by Kenya! In both cases the captains said that they’d played the worst cricket in their lives (in one case) and that they’d played brilliantly to recover from a precarious situation (in the other case). Not a word about the fact that Kenya played an excellent game in both cases.We will be supporting Zimbabwe in their upcoming match against Sri Lanka. Our thoughts are also with the Zimbabwe team and its members as they face such an uncertain future back home after the CWC.Rob Mousley (South Africa)

The New Zealanders are back in the nets preparing for their firstmatch of the second round of the Coca Cola Cup against Sri Lanka atthe Premadasa Stadium which will be played on Wednesday.The Black Caps beat India convincingly in their first round match ofthe Coca Cola Cup while in the match against the host nation, theywent down after a gallant fight.After the matches in Dambulla were shifted to Colombo, the teammanagement decided for a two day outing in Kandy. "Well, the onlyreason to go out of Colombo was because we didn’t want to spend threeand half weeks in the same hotel in Colombo. That was to give the guysa different atmosphere. But I tell you we haven’t neglected anypractice opportunities" said Jeff Crowe, the manager of the NewZealand team."We fitted in the essentials of our programme during our stay inKandy. For example we did our gym sessions over there and the playersare looking forward."Reflecting on the two matches the Black Caps have played, the NewZealand manager said; "We would have liked to win both the gamesobviously. But we played better cricket in the second game. In thefirst game we were bit rusty, but I still feel we had chance to winthat game as well. But more importantly, we checked our mistakes onthe second game and we are improving" said Crowe who has been themanager of the side for close to two years."Even in the game against India, our batsmen struggled. But we’veaddressed that issue and we have to see that we won’t repeat themistakes in the matches ahead," said the former New Zealand captain.Talking about the second round matches of the tournament, Crowe said;"We are looking forward for both the games and want to do well tobook a place in the final," Crowe continued, "The prime importancewill be to beat Sri Lanka. We’ve lost the first match against them,then they defeated us at home few months back. If we can puteverything that we’ve been practicing, that’s it."In the one day game, the New Zealanders cornered the headlines whenthey won the ICC knockout tournament in Kenya last year, but all thegood work was spoilt after the side lost two successive series to SriLanka and South Africa soon after."I think we are capable of winning the Coca-Cola Cup. We have shownin the past that we’ve got the nucleus to win tournaments. We provedthat in the ICC knockout tournament" reflected Crowe. "But this isnot a knock-out tournament. Here you’ve got to be consistent and whenit comes to the final it’s the team that’s good on that day."However, a key player missing in the side is Chris Cairns who wasinstrumental in leading the side for victory during the ICC knockouttournament, "He’s a world class player. No doubt about it.Unfortunately he’s not here so you can’t worry about that."The Black Caps’ chances of going through to the final increased afterIndia fell to bottom of the points table with a poor run rate as well.No one can take them lightly and they are capable of doing what theyaccomplished in Kenya last year.

A comprehensive bowling performance from Dolphins saw the side kick off their Momentum One Day Cup 2015-16 campaign with a bonus-point, 76-run win over Knights in Pietermaritzburg.Opting to bat, Dolphins lost Morne van Wyk in the third over but a brisk 71-run, second-wicket partnership between Cameron Delport and Vaughn van Jaarsveld lifted them to stability. After Delport fell, van Jaarsveld was involved in another fifty-plus stand, this time with Andile Phehlukwayo, giving the side a strong platform going into the final leg of the innings. Once van Jaarsveld fell, however, after top-scoring with 82 off 112 deliveries, Dolphins lost wickets in a heap and were eventually dismissed for 246 in the final over.The pace trio of Craig Alexander, Robbie Frylinck, Ryan McLaren and left-arm spinner Keshav Maharaj ensured that the poor finish with the bat did not have too much bearing on the result. Frylinck struck off successive deliveries in his first over and by the 26th over of the innings, Knights had lost half their side, including opener Reeza Hendricks, who top-scored with 38. Malusi Siboto, at No.8, was the only other batsman to score more than 30 as Knights folded for 170 in the 47th over. Frylinck and Maharaj finished with three wickets each while Alexander and McLaren chipped in with two apiece.

Aftab Habib, the England batsman who recently bought out the last year of his contract with Leicestershire, has signed a new three-year deal with Essex.Habib made his debut for Middlesex in 1992 but was released at the end of the 1994 season. He had trials with Somerset and, ironically enough, Essex, but spent 1995 playing Minor Counties cricket with Berkshire. During that season he also had a trial with Leicestershire, when he played in three first-class matches and averaged 76.66. That was enough to earn him a contract.He was awarded his county cap in 1998, and the following summer was selected by England for two Tests against New Zealand, without conspicuous success.Nevertheless, he continued to score prolifically for Leicestershire, helping the county to two championship titles in 1996 and 1998 and earning two England A tours. By the end of the 2001 season, his first-class average stood at 44.77 after 150 innings. He has scored 15 first-class centuries.Once he had concluded his contract buy-out negotiations with Leicestershire, Essex were widely tipped as being his destination, and the 30 year-old is delighted with the move.”I am truly excited by having signed for Essex and can’t wait for the season to start. Essex is a big club, having enjoyed a lot of success over the years. Obviously another attraction of the club is its ambition, demonstrated by the signing of Graham Gooch as coach. One of my goals is to get back into the England team, and I am looking forward to working with Graham and my other new team-mates in an effort to get as many runs as possible for Essex.”

In what is being seen as a corporate move, Harbhajan Singh’s pictures have been taken off all the advertisements that promote the Mumbai Indians, including the team’s website.Reliance Industries, the owners of the franchise, thought this was a sensible move, taking into account public sentiment. Harbhajan was found guilty of slapping Sreesanth in the league game against Punjab last week and was banned for 11 IPL games subsequently.”When we know a player is not going to be available for the team it really doesn’t make sense for us to have his picture,” Kaushik Roy, president of branding, Reliance Industries, told Cricinfo.Roy felt the company decided that as long as Harbhajan was not going to take part in the tournament it would be ideal to not include his pictures in any promotional activities, especially when the pictures were meant to attract the crowds. “So as long he is not going to be playing the matches, there is a clear directive.”Retaining Harbajan’s image would amount cheating, Roy felt. “The pictures are for gate sales. You cannot show the pictures of a player who is not playing the game. So there is no use fooling people. That would be unethical advertising.”The team management, meanwhile, is silent on the matter. “It is a corporate decision. In any case it doesn’t make sense to have the picture once he is not playing,” a top official in the Mumbai team said.But the franchise is terming the move “temporary”, and hopes that if Mumbai’s fortunes soar and they make it to the IPL final then Harbhajan will be back on the advertisements. “We hope this will be a temporary arrangement. Mumbai Indians hope to reach the finals, and god willing if that happens, Bhajji will be free to play in that,” an official said.Fearing the move might be termed as controversial the team’s brand managers are now planning to introduce new faces as part of their campaign as that would help newcomers gain public recognition.”The current hoardings featuring Harbhajan Singh, Sachin Tendulkar, Sanath Jayasuriya and Shaun Pollock were put up in the run-up to IPL, because they were the big crowd-pullers,” an official said. “But a decision had also been taken that as the IPL progressed, we would give exposure to the younger lot by turning them into recognisable forces through the hoardings.”

Mahela Jayawardene expressed disappointment that Marvan Atapattu had decided to opt out of the upcoming three-Test series against Bangladesh starting on June 25 at the SSC.”I just got to know over the weekend about Marvan’s opting out of the series. I am disappointed because it would have been great to have him around. The experience that he brings to the team would be immense,” Jayawardene told a press gathering held to welcome the Bangladesh cricket team at Hotel Taj Samudra on Monday.”Marvan’s absence definitely opens doors for new players. Hopefully they will grab it. That’s how I see it. We’ve already have a couple of young guys in the squad and we were thinking in the lines of giving them some exposure. I haven’t still sat with the selectors and finalized what the outcome would be after the news we’ve heard from Marvan. All of us have to take responsibility and look forward to the series,” said Jayawardene.Atapattu announced over the weekend that he was unavailable for the Test series citing personal reasons.When it was pointed out that two other experienced cricketers Chaminda Vaas and Muttiah Muralitharan would not be playing in the one-day series, Jayawardene stated: “We have to manage these players in the long term. Four years down the line we never know what will happen. We need to give opportunities to other cricketers to get the exposure and give them the experience.””Those were the lines that we’ve been thinking when we selected the sides. Vaasy and Murali have been playing a lot of cricket especially in the counties. If we could give them a break in between it would be ideal because after September onwards we’ve got a lot of cricket ahead of us. We need to make sure we manage them properly,” he said.On the opposition they will be encountering Jayawardene said that Sri Lanka would not take anything lightly. “Bangladesh has made a lot of strides forward from the time they were last here. The more exposure you get in international cricket the players mature. We know how good Bangladesh are. We knew how good they were in the World Cup. They were in our group and we knew how dangerous they could be. We had to play a really good game to beat them in Trinidad,” said Jayawardene.”There are a lot of our guys who want to prove a point. Test cricket for us is all about pride. Personally, for me that’s the ultimate challenge or for any cricketer. We are simply looking forward to this series. We haven’t played in Sri Lanka for almost one year and we are keen to go out and play good cricket and have the fans behind us,” he said.Trevor Penney who has taken over the role as coach of the Sri Lanka team after the departure of Tom Moody said the strategy for the series would be very much the same as it has been in the last few years.Penney hoped that the new coach who would take charge of the team would not interfere with it too much.”The two years Tom and I had dealt with the side we leave a bit of a legacy to go forward. I hope the new coach who comes in doesn’t try and change too much of what we’ve done with the side. We have made them a real team unit who believe in themselves and playing for each other,” said Penney who would also be leaving to join Moody in Western Australia at the end of the series.Sri Lanka Cricket on Friday signed another Australian Trevor Bayliss as the new coach to succeed Moody. Bayliss is expected to officially take over the national team from the first week of September.Mohammed Ashraful, Bangladesh’s new captain, said his team were hopeful of putting up a better performance in the Test series than their last tour to Sri Lanka which former captain Habibul Bashar described as one of the worst.Bangladesh on that occasion was routed 0-2 in the Tests and 0-3 in the one-day series. “We have been practicing hard and every day we are improving. One day cricket we have improved a lot but Test cricket we have some way to go. Our intention is to improve our Test cricket. We will play hard on this tour to achieve that,” said Ashraful.Bangladesh will play a full series of three Tests and three one-day internationals during their one month tour of Sri Lanka. They begin the tour with a three-day practice match at the Colts grounds on Wednesday.

England are increasingly confident that Andrew Flintoff will be available for the second Test against Pakistan at Old Trafford which gets underway on July 27. Flintoff missed out on England’s calamitous one-day series against Sri Lanka and has undergone extensive rehabilitation on his injured ankle, spending time at Bovey Castle in Dartmoor with the England physio Dave Roberts.He will make his return to competitive cricket this afternoon in a Twenty20 clash for Lancashire against Nottinghamshire, one of two Twenty20 matches he will play. It was confirmed by England’s chairman of selectors, David Graveney, that he will also take part in a Championship match against Kent on July 18.”Everything is on course. It is very positive,” Graveney told BBC Radio 5 Live. “All things being equal, he will be available for the second Test.”He is going to play in two Twenty20 games for Lancashire and then a county championship game.”Last week, Flintoff was named as the official stand-in to Michael Vaughan who was ruled out of the Ashes this winter; while Flintoff continues to recover from his injury, Andrew Strauss will lead the side at Lord’s on Thursday.

Latest bettingThe last time Pakistan won a Test match in the Caribbean, Salman Butt – the youngest member of the likely playing XI – was not even four years old, and that says enough about the challenge that Inzamam-ul-Haq and his side will face at Sabina Park against a rejuvenated West Indies side. Just weeks after being trounced by South Africa, Shivnarine Chanderpaul and his embattled crew administered a drubbing of their own in Barbados, and the dent to the Pakistani psyche would have been far worse but for Shahid Afridi’s rage against the dying light on the fourth day.Unfortunately for Pakistan, most of the fighting spirit in Bridgetown was confined to the dressing-room and the showers – if leaks from the camp are to be believed. It was a sad state of affairs for a team that had accomplished wonders in India by dint of sheer hard work and a refreshingly united approach.Deprived of the services of Inzamam, to suspension, and Yousuf Youhana – back home tending to his ailing father – the Pakistani batting was a shambles on a shirt-front at the Kensington Oval, a surface where the incomparable Brian Lara caressed and bludgeoned his way to 178 from just 172 balls. After that debacle, Yasir Hameed and Bazid Khan will make way as Inzamam returns, along with Shoaib Malik, who has served out a ridiculously light punishment for throwing a domestic game.Pakistan were undone in the first Test by the slingshots of Fidel Edwards – whose subsequent breakdown has seen him replaced by Tino Best – and the seemingly innocuous offspin of Chris Gayle, and also by their own refusal to pick Shoaib Akhtar.On a placid pitch where only extreme pace was likely to breach a batsman’s defences, neither the tireless Rana Naved-ul-Hasan nor the gangling Shabbir Ahmed looked remotely like running through a side, and neither offered even a smidgen of the intimidatory air that Shoaib brings with him. He may have days when he’s a liability, but as Matthew Hayden and Darren Lehmann – both know a bit about the art of batting – would testify, he can be frightening when in the mood.The bowling travails were worsened by the contempt with which Lara treated Danish Kaneria. Before the tour, Inzamam had talked of Kaneria being his trump card, but Lara – who has pulverised as great a spinner as Muttiah Muralitharan – quickly set about showing that it’s one thing to talk the talk, and quite another to walk it.Ominously for Pakistan, West Indies romped to victory with only Lara and Chanderpaul – utterly assured, and as ugly as ever during his second-innings 153 – making sizable contributions. The likes of Chris Gayle, Ramnaresh Sarwan and Wavell Hinds will be anxious not to miss out if Sabina Park offers similar batting delights.There has been Jamaican delight in plentiful measure for West Indies down the years. Since the genesis of the pace quartet in the mid-`70s, they have lost here only three times – twice to England (1989-90 and last year) and once to Australia (1994-95). That last defeat, masterminded by the gutsy batting of the Waugh twins, was possibly the most epochal result of the modern era, heralding the definitive shift in cricket’s balance of power.Pakistan themselves would do well to be blissfully ignorant of history. In their first outing here, in 1957-58, a young Garfield Sobers reeled off an undefeated 365 as the hosts strolled to victory by an innings and 174 runs. Almost 20 years later, a brave second-innings hundred from Asif Iqbal and eight wickets from the peerless Imran Khan weren’t enough to prevent a 140-run hammering. After the fiasco of Barbados, perhaps they can look to Jamaica’s most famous son for succour. After all, Robert Nesta Marley did inspire a whole generation with Get Up, Stand Up.