Stuart MacGill has been called up to the Australian Test squad as the replacement for the injured Brad Williams.Trevor Hohns, Australia’s chairman of selectors, today announced that MacGill had been called for after Williams was forced to pull out with a back injury. The selectors had to track MacGill down in Venice, where he is currently on holiday.MacGill, 33, has been playing for Nottinghamshire in the English County Championship this season, and has taken 25 wickets in nine games. MacGill had taken advantage of a break in the county schedule to escape to Italy, but he has now been summoned back to Australia immediately. The first Test against Sri Lanka starts next Thursday (July 1) at Darwin. MacGill’s legspin claimed seven wickets there last year against Bangladesh – and he added ten more scalps in the second Test.MacGill has played 32 Tests for Australia, taking 152 wickets, but he recently decided not to tour Zimbabwe for moral reasons and was then not originally picked for the squad to take on Sri Lanka.”It’s obvious that we haven’t gone for a like replacement for Brad Williams,” said Hohns. “But given we already have four fit fast bowlers in the squad, Stuart gives us some added flexibility. He is a proven Test performer and is match-fit, having spent the last few months playing county cricket.”

Michael Bevan will become the latest in a long list of overseas players to play county cricket this season when he makes his Kent debut, against Middlesex at Southgate tomorrow.Bevan, 34, has also played for Sussex, Leicestershire and Yorkshire in the past, and he will have seven Championship matches with Kent, whose title ambitions took a severe blow after they were stuffed by an innings and 45 runs against Sussex at Hove yesterday.Kent were without Andrew Symonds, the Australian allrounder who has been one of their overseas players this season, for that match. He was recalled by the Australian board to have an Achilles injury looked at, and David Fulton, Kent’s captain, is looking forward to Bevan’s arrival. “He’s a world-class player who demands high standards from himself and his team-mates in terms of preparation, performance and fitness,” he said. “It’ll be good for our younger lads to work with someone like that and I’m really looking forward to working with him.”Bevan certainly has plenty of experience. He has played 232 one-day internationals and 18 Tests for Australia, and was once renowned to be one of the best finishers in the one-day game. However, his international career now looks to be over after he was overlooked by the Australian board in the 30-man squad for the Champions Trophy in England this September.

Australia’s newly-contracted state players and rookies will spend two days at Cricket Australia this week as part of the inaugural induction camp. Organised jointly by CA and the Australia Cricketers’ Association, the camp – to be held on September 16 and 17 – is designed to introduce the 22 players to the pressures and opportunities faced by first-class cricketers in Australia, as well as familiarise them with the policies and code of conduct established by the board.Presentations will cover player contracts, code of behaviour – including CA’s racial and religious vilification and anti-harassment codes – the spirit of cricket project, and the Memorandum of Understanding between CA and the ACA.There will also be presentations on professional development, financial management and a section on players and the law. Current and former first-class cricketers will talk about life as professionals. Michael Brown, the general manager cricket operations, said that the camp would help prepare players for some of the issues they might encounter during their cricket career.”Players who are new to the elite level can be forgiven for focussing only on their playing performances and the challenge of breaking into the team,” he said. “However, the role of the player induction camp is to show them a broader picture and highlight several other aspects of the game in Australia and their importance.”The demands on cricketers these days – and sportspeople across all codes in general – is vastly different to that of yesteryear. There is a lot more scrutiny and media exposure of cricketers, and we are committed to ensuring that our players are good ambassadors as well as being the best players they can possibly be.”We have a responsibility to ensure that all players in our national competitions are familiar with our expectations of them, and hope that the player induction camp will provide an excellent vehicle for newly-contracted state and rookie players to make a smooth transition into the elite level.”Tim May, the ACA’s chief executive, echoed those views. “Newly contracted state players are exposed to significant new pressures and responsibilities both as cricketers and as people as they progress along the cricketing pathway,” he said. “We believe the induction camp will assist players to better absorb the significant pressures they will face through their involvement in sport at this level, and additionally better prepare the players for their increased responsibility to both the game and cricketing public.”

India 401 for 4 (Sehwag 164, Gambhir 96, Ganguly 57, Dravid 52*) trail South Africa 510 for 9 dec by 109 runs
Scorecard and ball-by-ball details

The bowlers continued to toil with little reward on a placid Green Park track at Kanpur. South Africa had the satisfaction of restricting the runs, but they managed just four wickets as India – despite Virender Sehwag’s electrifying 164 – scored only 216 in the 72 overs bowled in the day. With one day to go, and India’s first innings still some way from completion, a boring draw, and an avoidable last day, was in prospect.While only four batsmen were dismissed in the day, the contest between bat and ball was far more even than yesterday – except for a brief period in the afternoon when Sehwag launched an astonishing assault – largely because of South Africa’s greater discipline in the field. Their bowling was more accurate, and, crucially, all their seamers extracted reverse-swing in varying degrees, which prevented most of the batsmen from hitting through the line of the ball. Gautam Gambhir was an early victim of the seam and swing, while Rahul Dravid (52 not out) and Sourav Ganguly (57) had to exercise plenty of caution early on, and it was only when the second new ball was taken that both became more comfortable.One batsman, however, was completely unperturbed by the sideways movement. Sehwag had been in fairly watchful mode yesterday, and started off in similar fashion today, but in a 40-minute period immediately after lunch he launched into a blistering attack on the South African bowlers, adding 56 off a mere 35 balls. Sehwag’s technique was simple: he stayed still, with feet on leg stump, as the ball was delivered. That allowed him the room to execute the strokes to incoming deliveries. If the ball went the other way, Sehwag still trusted his hand-eye co-ordination to do the job. Andrew Hall was tonked for an audacious six over long-on, while anything pitched up around off was belted over or through the off-side cordon. And against Robin Peterson’s completely innocuous slow stuff – it wasn’t spin, since he hardly turned the ball at all – Sehwag was utterly disdainful, reverse-sweeping, driving inside-out through the off side, or lofting boundaries to leg almost at will.In eight overs after lunch, India piled on 59, during which period Sehwag passed 1000 runs for the calendar year. Then, a dubious decision by Simon Taufel ended it all. Hall got one to swing in prodigiously, and hit Sehwag on the pad in front of leg stump. The ball seemed to be drifting down leg, but Taufel thought otherwise, ending a gloriously entertaining innings (294 for 2).With Sehwag gone, normal service resumed. Sachin Tendulkar struggled to cope with the low bounce, and was bowled off his pads for 3 by another Hall inswinger, while Dravid and Ganguly struggled to get the ball off the square. Dravid was particularly bogged down. Unlike Sehwag, Dravid shuffled across his stumps, which often got him into a tangle with the indippers. Probably mindful of his dismissals in the series against Australia, even half-volleys were patted back with exaggerated caution.The second new ball, taken immediately after tea, eased his misery somewhat, as it came onto the bat quicker, and without that late movement. Ganguly prospered too, executing some delectable drives through the off side en route to his half-century. He finally became Zander de Bruyn’s first Test victim, miscuing a pull to Peterson at fine leg (394 for 4), but Dravid continued with his painstaking effort, and had faced 169 deliveries by close of play, which, again, was brought forward by almost an hour by poor light.Earlier, Gambhir missed out on his maiden Test hundred, edging Shaun Pollock to the wicketkeeper when just four short. Gambhir had hammered 85 off just 114 on the third day, but, with a century in sight, he was understandably cautious. The bow;ers kept an excellent line to him as well, and the persistence finally paid off, ending a first-wicket stand of 218. Sehwag briefly seemed set to take the game away from the South Africans, but his unfortunate dismissal made it a good day for the visitors.

Pakistan have recalled Azhar Mahmood and Taufeeq Umar to their squad for the VB Series, the triangular one-day tournament which also features Australia and West Indies. Mohammad Hafeez and Iftikhar Anjum have also been included, while Mohammad Sami, Danish Kaneria, Asim Kamal, Imran Farhat and Mohammad Asif will return home after the Test series.Mahmood has been a star performer for Surrey over the last couple of seasons, but has struggled to make a permanent place for himself in the Pakistan team. He last appeared an ODI in 2003-04, when Pakistan toured New Zealand, and has played only 13 of them in the last two years. His return will be especially pleasing for Bob Woolmer, who has often spoken highly about Mahmood’s allround ability.Taufeeq and Hafeez, meanwhile, return after being dropped due to poor form. Taufeeq, a left-handed opener, was earlier seen as a Test specialist, but has slowly been part of the mix for the one-dayers as well – the last of his 18 one-dayers came against India at Lahore last year. Hafeez, an allrounder who bowls offspin, made an impressive start to his international career in a triangular tournament in Sharjah immediately after the 2003 World Cup, but was then dropped after a string of dismal performances.A media release from the Pakistan board also announced that Inzamam-ul-Haq and Abdul Razzaq would be fit for the tournament. Both missed the ongoing Sydney Test – Inzamam failed to recover from a back injury while Razzaq was struck with a mystery ailment during the second Test at Melbourne.The VB Series starts on January 14, while Pakistan play their first match against Australia a couple of days later.Pakistan squad for the VB Series
Salman Butt, Taufeeq Umar, Yasir Hameed, Mohammad Hafeez, Yousuf Youhana, Inzamam-ul-Haq (capt), Younis Khan, Shoaib Malik, Shahid Afridi, Abdul Razzaq, Azhar Mahmood, Kamran Akmal (wk), Shoaib Akhtar, Naved-ul-Hasan, Mohammad Khalil, Iftikhar Anjum.

Scorecard and ball-by-ball commentary

In a dramatic turnaround Bangladesh snaffled ten wickets for just 86 runs as Zimbabwe slipped to 189 all out at Dhaka to lose the fourth one-day international by 58 runs. Bangladesh thus squared the five-match series at 2-2, with the decider to be played at the same ground on Monday.Once again it was left-arm spin that demolished Zimbabwe in sensational style after Stuart Matsikenyeri and Barney Rogers, the openers, had raced to 103 inside 23 overs in pursuit of 248 – a stiff target, especially under lights at the Bangabandhu Stadium. In the Test series, Enamul Haque junior had given Zimbabwe all kinds of trouble, and Mohammad Rafique, who came into the team in place of Enamul here, bowled effectively in tandem with Manjural Islam Rana, another left-arm spinner, to ensure that Zimbabwe’s nightmare was revisited in front of a partisan full house.Manjural followed up his 4 for 34 in the third game at Chittagong with another superb matchwinning four-wicket effort, after Rogers and Matsikenyeri had dismissed the medium-pacers to the fence with regularity. Once Manjural had cut through the top order Rafique got into the act. The rot started when Matsikenyeri, who had looked uncomfortable against spin all along, played close to the line of one from Manjural but was beaten and bowled. Matsikenyeri had been authoritative and had just reached 50.That gave Bangladesh a hint of an opening. Dion Ebrahim, who is going through a horrendous run of form, swept the fifth ball of the same over, and the resultant leading edge carried to square leg where Khaled Mahmud, sprinting in, held onto a sharp tumbling catch (104 for 2).Rafique then trapped Rogers lbw one shy of a well-deserved half-century with one that turned in to the left-hander. Rogers had played some exquisite straight-drives, but fell when well set. Brendan Taylor then offered a tame return catch to Manjural after the ball stopped on him. One ball later, Bangladesh got their most prized wicket: Tatenda Taibu. All tour he has provided Bangladesh with headaches, but he finally failed in this match. He attempted to sweep the second ball he faced, but was rapped on the pad and Asad Rauf gave him out (118 for 5). In 26 balls Zimbabwe had lost five wickets for 15 runs.The innings had turned on its head, and Zimbabwe’s last hopes evaporated when Rafique changed ends and, with his first ball, sent back Elton Chigumbura with a peach that pitched on leg stump and spat on to the off (139 for 6).With Manjural already having completed 10 overs, Rafique made his remaining ones count. After sending back Tinashe Panyangara lbw, he pulled off a one-handed catch, diving to his right, to dismiss Prosper Utseya, and finished with 4 for 33. While the carnage was taking place at the other end, Hamilton Masakadza watched helplessly before running out of patience and losing his leg stump to a full-length ball from Mashrafe Mortaza (169 for 9). The end came soon after.Bangladesh had earlier given themselves a fighting chance thanks to half-centuries from Nafis Iqbal and Khaled Mashud. Useful contributions from Aftab Ahmed and Mohammad Ashraful helped too, taking the score to 247.Bangladesh lost Rajin Saleh on 14 in the sixth over, but Iqbal and Aftab kept Bangladesh on course, putting on 71 for the second wicket. They then almost made a hash of the reasonable start, and were struggling on 161 for 4 at the end of the 40th as the Zimbabwean slow bowlers, Utseya in particular, turned up the heat. But Bangladesh accelerated when it mattered, and collected 86 in the last ten overs.Aftab breezed to a 49-ball 44, looking in no trouble. Then he got out in the only way that looked likely. He went for a second run, taking on the throw of Chigumbura at backward point, but was well short when Taibu took the bails off (85 for 2).

Iqbal then stepped out of his shell and belted Rogers for a straight six to bring up his 50. Soon after, though, he holed out to Matsikenyeri at long-on trying to repeat the shot. Bangladesh lost Bashar to a stupendous piece of stumping. Taibu, standing up to Hondo, took the bails off in a flash after collecting a wide delivery down the leg side. Suddenly, with two new batsmen at the crease, the runs began to dry up.Ashraful and Mashud could add just 29 runs between the 30th and 40th overs, and not a single boundary was scored. Finally, Ashraful cracked the wayward Hondo for two successive fours in the 43rd over. Utseya meanwhile slipped in his full spell, which cost him just 36, and again kept the batsmen guessing.Ashraful’s promising knock ended on 35 when Matsikenyeri caught him at long-on (196 for 5), but Mashud continued to thrive. His half-century came courtesy of a six off Taylor in an eventful over in which three wickets fell. But Manjural was there to give the total a more solid look by blasting 15 off seven balls as 14 came in the last over, which was bowled by Taylor.Rabeed Imam is a sports writer for the Daily Star in Dhaka.

Scorecard

Queensland’s last-wicket pair of Nathan Hauritz and Joe Dawes hung on for 43 minutes to deny New South Wales an outright victory at Bankstown Oval in Sydney. Set an unrealistic 426 to win, the final pair joined at 9 for 156 and survived 69 balls to claim a gripping draw.Stuart MacGill set up the the thrilling conclusion with 4 for 12 in 16 balls, but no bowler could get the final wicket, although Hauritz stood his ground to a huge appeal for a catch to Phil Jaques, the close-in fielder. “Not to get the six points is disappointing,” Brad Haddin, the captain who did not enforce the follow-on when leading by 207, said. “We had 12 overs to get those last two out and you’d back yourself nine times out of 10. We had 70 overs to bowl them out so I don’t think I would have changed anything.”Jimmy Maher, who top-scored with 73, was “baffled” when the Bulls weren’t made to follow-on and praised the “never-say-die attitude” of Dawes (8 from 29 balls) and Hauritz (6 from 44). “Great character was shown by Dawes and Hauritz and the true Queensland fighting spirit came through,” said Maher.Haddin’s lunch-time declaration came after his unbeaten 80 from 73 balls and Ed Cowan’s 66. New South Wales claimed first-innings points yesterday to join Queensland on 28, two behind Western Australia, but the Blues are ahead on quotient.

For many Indians, he remains the cherub-faced boy who refused to be bullied by the fearsome pace of Waqar Younis and Wasim Akram, and the guileful menace of Imran Khan. For others, the most pristine memory dates back to a meaningless 20-over hit-out in Peshawar, where a 16-year-old who was subjected to breast-feeding jibes launched Abdul Qadir’s tossed-up offerings into orbit with impunity.When the roses fade, they will also remember an innings at Sydney in 1992, where he unveiled a near-perfect 148, an effort surpassed only by the resplendence of the subsequent masterpiece at Perth, where he stood on tiptoe – boy-man on hopelessly burnt and charred deck – to cut and drive Mike Whitney, the eventual matchwinner, and Merv Hughes with a fluency that suggested a childhood spent on that WACA trampoline.Those innings embellished a legend that had its genesis on the dusty maidans of Mumbai school cricket, where he and his ebony-hued comrade, Vinod Kambli, had laid waste a string of run-scoring records. By the time Tendulkar was 15, Kapil Dev had bowled to him in the nets, while Sunil Gavaskar and Dilip Vengsarkar had already earmarked him for greatness.As the years passed, more and more layers of delicate gold leaf – many against the all-conquering Australians – would add lustre to a cricketing deity quite unlike any seen before. But in a land noted for its idol worship, there was also a tendency to look for feet of clay. And in Tendulkar’s case, that Perth innings was to set an unfortunate precedent, of glorious innings tarnished by the ineptitude of those around him. The 122 he made at Edgbaston in 1996, and the 169 at Cape Town a few months later were both works of genius fit to grace any triumphant canvas, but the colours faded because of the manner in which those around him capitulated.That sad turn of events would be repeated at Melbourne in 1999, where he made 116, and most notably at Chennai a few months earlier where his 136 took India to the door jamb of victory, despite agonising back spasms restricting his mobility for much of the innings. However, a tail prone to self-evisceration ensured that his finest hour would instead be one of his darkest.When the cynics and the doubters wish to denigrate the Tendulkar legacy, they can easily call upon the figures which tell you that only 11 of his 34 Test centuries have contributed to Indian wins. That conveniently ignores the fact that India’s overseas record until the Wright-Ganguly era began – 13 of Tendulkar’s 22 centuries till then had come away from home – was shameful enough to be compared to the hideously ugly sister you hid away so that even the frog-prince couldn’t woo her.Sunil Gavaskar, Tendulkar’s predecessor as India’s batting talisman, had scaled the 10,000-run peak in the hot, dusty and scarcely awe-inspiring environs of the Motera Stadium in Ahmedabad, whereas Tendulkar chose one of sport’s great amphitheatres to plant his standard there. And now, that delicate late-cut off Ijaz Faqih, an integral part of Indian cricketing lore, is joined by a sweetly struck flick off Abdul Razzaq in that I-was-there kaleidoscope.As time goes by and the old cavalier becomes a receding memory, the hum of criticism will intensify, with some unable to accept the slow fade to black. But as Muhammad Ali, the Greatest, once said, “Champions are made from something they have deep inside them — a desire, a dream, a vision. They have to have last-minute stamina, they have to be a little faster, they have to have the skill and the will. But the will must be stronger than the skill.”In Tendulkar’s case, that will has been his triumph, and it remains as unbending as ever. Jack Fingleton’s appreciation of the peerless Victor Trumper was titled , and sadly, it may only be when he’s gone that many Indians will fathom just how special this diminutive genius was. As with any other mortal, there have been flaws and there is no need to gloss over them. But as a wise man once wrote of the inimitable George Best, “For the pleasure he has brought to millions, he could be forgiven a great deal.”

When the itinerary was drawn up for Zimbabwe’s two-Test tour of South Africa, there had originally been just a two-day gap scheduled between last week’s Cape Town Test and the Centurion match, which gets underway tomorrow morning (Friday). But, thanks to South Africa’s ludicrously facile two-day victory at Newlands, the two sides have been given the best part of a week to prepare for the rematch, or rather, the mismatch Part Two.There really isn’t a lot that can be said about this fixture. Amid the outrage that greeted the result of the first Test, in which South Africa bowled Zimbabwe out for 54 before romping to 340 for 3 by the close of the first day, there were renewed calls for Zimbabwe’s Test status to be reviewed, and not even the return of their former captain, Heath Streak, was able to increase the team’s competitiveness.Nobody in their right mind expects Zimbabwe to bounce back from such a humiliation, least of all the CEO of the Nashua Titans franchise, Elise Lombard, who warned last week that another two-day finish could cost the Centurion authorities a small fortune in lost revenue. But Zimbabwe can at least console themselves that things surely cannot get any worse.Their captain, Tatenda Taibu, remained defiant however, arguing that his team had learned a great deal from their Newlands humiliation. “We learnt how important it was to bat for long periods and we also learnt that there is no margin for error on the South African grounds,” Taibu told the SAPA news agency. “We’ve all learnt a lot and we need to go back and put what we’ve learnt into practice.”The only bright spot for Zimbabwe came on the second day, when, with South Africa’s intensity understandably reduced, they kept the match alive until after tea, thanks in particular to a storming innings from the returning Andy Blignaut, who cracked 61 from 58 balls, including six sixes.

“The boys weren’t destroyed by the loss because we fought back well,” said Taibu, adding that the likes of Blignaut and Streak were not yet match-fit after spending a long time on the sidelines during their dispute with the Zimbabwe Cricket Union.With a major tour of the Caribbean looming at the end of the month, South Africa have chosen to rest their established new-ball pairing of Makhaya Ntini – who hasn’t missed a game for 36 matches and three years – and Shaun Pollock, who has a long-term ankle injury. But South Africa’s captain, Graeme Smith, warned Zimbabwe that there would be no let-up at Centurion.”It would be difficult to re-enact the two-day Test,” Smith told SAPA, “but certainly we’ll be playing with the same intensity, the will to win and the will to be ruthless that we had at Newlands.” Into Pollock and Ntini’s places come Monde Zondeki and Andre Nel, and Smith expects great things of the pair.”They are all different kinds of bowlers with their own special talents,” he said of his attack, which also includes Charl Langeveldt, who ripped through England in the Cape Town Test in January. “Nella’s big and strong, and he gets good pace and bounce, and he gets good shape. We want to see him bowl the way we know he can.”I want to see Monde run in, get pace, hit good areas and create chances,” added Smith. “Although Langes doesn’t have the same pace, he is a guy that gets good swing. We want to see them work together as a trio and build the pressure. That’s what our four seam bowlers did for us in Cape Town.”South Africa 1 Graeme Smith (capt), 2 AB de Villiers, 3 Jacques Rudolph, 4 Jacques Kallis, 5 Herschelle Gibbs, 6 Ashwell Prince, 7 Mark Boucher (wk), 8 Nicky Boje, 9 Monde Zondeki, 10 Charl Langeveldt, 11 Andre Nel.Zimbabwe (from) Stuart Matsikenyeri, Barney Rogers, Hamilton Masakadza, Dion Ebrahim, Sean Williams, Tatenda Taibu (capt and wk), Alester Maregwede, Heath Streak, Andy Blignaut, Elton Chigumbura, Graeme Cremer, Prosper Utseya, Twanda Mupariwa, Christopher Mpofu, Douglas Hondo.